800, 1066, 1333 FSB???

[Cheezeit]

Hey guys,

I'm a bit confused by all the different FSB's various components have. I was going to get an E4300, now I think I'm going to get a E6400 because it has 1066 FSB rather than 800. Does this increase in FSB actually make a difference?

And now, gigabyte has their new rev. 3.3 of the ds3 which has 1333 FSB.

Can anyone explain all these numbers and what they mean for performance? (miss the A64 days when everything had the same FSB)

Thanks in advance,
Darren

 

[Cheezeit]

I think I found the answer to my own question, the only thing that got me really confused was that I didn't know the mobo's speed was rated FSB x 4. Thus, 1333 is just "certified" I guess, because if you're going to run at 400mhz FSB, the mobo will be running 1600mhz anyways.

As for the CPU's there's no difference in the FSB 800/1066. All you have to do is lower the multi and raise the FSB to achieve the higher rating.
Stock e4300 has 200mhz x 9 multiplier, and gets the 800 FSB rating because 200 x 4 = 800. However, drop the multi down and put FSB up to 266 mhz, and now you have the 1066 FSB rating, even though the CPU is running at the same speed.

 

[Roguestar]

It won't make much of a difference, but of two CPUs running at the same speed, the one with the higher FSB will be communicating with the memory on a higher frequency and will have greater memory throughput. FSB numbers get confusing, especially with memory, because of the way people multiply them. The normal FSB actual speed for conroe C2Ds is 266Mhz, and this is "quad-pumped" (sends four bits of data instead of one) and marketed as 1066Mhz. Same how Allendale's 800Mhz FSB is at an electrical frequency of 200Mhz. People often also double the speed at which DDR2 works when talking about it; DDR2 at 533Mhz is considered a "1:1" ratio with an FSB of 266Mhz.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Front_side_bus

 

[fire400]

it's like a highway

FSB is the roadway

MHz are the cars

more cars can travel through when you have a larger FSB, which represents the lanes

more cars can travel through when you have more MHz, which represents how fast the cars are going with the given lanes available from the FSB analogy

a smaller FSB with fast cars will supposedly be slower and cause a traffic jam with slower cars (MHz).

increase both and you get faster performance, so long software and other hardware components are considered

overall, I think that 1066 core2 1.86's are the norm for most people who want fast. by 2008, quadcore will be the norm for fast, as they become more mainstream.

single core comps with higher FSB's showed very little sign of speed increase with today's applications. more cores the better. cache is important too.

 

[Azndude51]

I was trying to decide between an E4300 and a 6300 also. I went with the E4300 mainly because since it has a lower FSB, the RAM won't have to be clocked as high in order to get the same overclock as a 6300 (or at least that's my understanding of it). Pretty much, if you're not overclocking, the 6300 is probably a better choice at around $10-15 more.