A64 Sempron Vs XP What?

[Texun]

I've Googled but didn't find the benchmarks I was looking for.

I have an XP1800 in my file box and it works fine but I would like a little more processing power for DVD authoring. I want to keep it cool and cheap to operate and was thinking about a Socket 754 Sempron. I use a Radeon 7000 just to fill up the slot so I'm fine with a 754.

Does anyone have a link to benchmarks showing the A64 Sempron against the XP's? I'm looking at the S754 Sempron 2800 but can't find any relevance to how it stacks up against what I have. At first glance it looks like it would smoke the old XP1800, but with the smaller cache and relatively similar clock speed the numbers aren't that impressive. More instructions, yes, but what's the real world difference?

Many thanks!

*NOTE* I already have 1g of PC3200 and a perfectly good AN35N board. If the Sempron has a huge advantage over the XP then a board and cpu is all I would be interested in replacing.

 

[DrMrLordX]

The only way a Sempron would really help you is if you overclock it. Most of them are rather disappointing at stock speeds.

Granted, a 2800+ can OC to 2.2ghz almost guarenteed, and will hit 2.3-2.4 most of the time. Mine hit 2.3 without raising vcore while using the stock HSF.

 

[Hacp]

3300+ is almost neck and neck with a 3000+ venice


http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/sempron.html

Here is the article you want to see. Compares Socket A semp to 754 semp.

 

[cbolt67]

I just recently went from an Ayhlon XP 2500+ to a Sempron64 2800+ and I am very happy with my decision. I OC'ed both and my smpron is satble @ 2.5GHz with a small .1V incraese in core voltage and the stock HSF.

This article should help also. It shows the influence of the small L2 cache on benchamarks and it has socketA Semprons, which are comparable to your AthlonXP< with the Socket754 Semprons. This article is why I decided on the Smpron I bought.

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/sempron-2600.html

 

[forumposter32]

http://www23.tomshardware.com

 

[sandorski]

S754 Semprons are better than same rated AthlonXPs. SocketA Semprons are a different story though.

 

[evilharp]

Originally posted by: Texun
I've Googled but didn't find the benchmarks I was looking for.

I have an XP1800 in my file box and it works fine but I would like a little more processing power for DVD authoring. I want to keep it cool and cheap to operate and was thinking about a Socket 754 Sempron. I use a Radeon 7000 just to fill up the slot so I'm fine with a 754.

Does anyone have a link to benchmarks showing the A64 Sempron against the XP's? I'm looking at the S754 Sempron 2800 but can't find any relevance to how it stacks up against what I have. At first glance it looks like it would smoke the old XP1800, but with the smaller cache and relatively similar clock speed the numbers aren't that impressive. More instructions, yes, but what's the real world difference?

Many thanks!

*NOTE* I already have 1g of PC3200 and a perfectly good AN35N board. If the Sempron has a huge advantage over the XP then a board and cpu is all I would be interested in replacing.

Look at the original Sempron articles. The Sempron was/is available as 754 or 462 (Socket A). The Socket A sempron is either a Thoroughbred-B or a Barton. [Edit: these are now out of production, so the only ones left are those floating in the channel or in dealers/distributors inventory.]

In the Original articles, the 754 Sempron smokes the Socket A chips by a large margin thanks to the improved core (A64 - 64bit extensions) and the integrated memory controller.

See: http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=2139

 

[Shenkoa]

Yeah I agree.

 

[Texun]

Alrighty then.... one last thing before I pull the trigger. This will be part show ( the case has a window so I might as well bling it up just a tad) and I would prefer to use a blue board, but the most important factor is stability. I'm not that concerned with options since I have PCI Firewire, sound, capture card and a controller card.

Any pros or cons on the following boards?

Asrock Very little info on this one.

Gigabyte I read this one has some temp sensor issues.

Albatron

The "bling" isn't important if these boards are junk, so please speak up if you know or have heard they are crap. I can drop them from my list in a second.

I have an Antec 350 True Power in the case now and also have a good 420 Antec so I should be okay on clean power. I would like to know if the boards listed above have 2 or 3 stage voltage regulators but I haven't seen that yet.

THANKS!

 

[Zap]

Not familiar with those particular boards, but I have a suggestion for your CPU choice. Athlon64 performance (as well as socket 754 Sempron) has a lot to do with clock speed, meaning higher clock speed = higher performance, more so than faster RAM, more cache, etc. I think PCClub is clearing out retail box Athlon 64 3400+ for socket 754 for about $130 (check Hot Deals forum). Those run at a true 2.4GHz, the highest ever made for socket 754. That price is almost the same as a 2-2.2GHz Sempron. If your budget only allows for the under-$100 Semprons, ignore this. If you were eyeing the over $100 Semprons, the A64 is a valid option. As an added bonus your motherboard doesn't have to be super-high FSB/HTT friendly to overclock these to 2.6GHz or higher.

 

[PhreakyMike]

I heared that the AsRock board cause a lot of problems... and aren't as good as the regular asus boards.

 

[Texun]

Thanks, ZAP.

I checked but didn't find the deal so I guess it's gone. :-(

 

[hurtstotalktoyou]

If you get an Epox 8KDA3I motherboard, you should be able to overclock your Sempron 64 2800+ to 2.4 GHz, turning it into a virtual Athlon 64 3400+.

 

[DrMrLordX]

Originally posted by: PhreakyMike
I heared that the AsRock board cause a lot of problems... and aren't as good as the regular asus boards.

The only problem I've ever noticed in Asrock boards is a lack of overclocking options, particularly vcore and vdimm settings.

 

[Zap]

Originally posted by: Texun
Thanks, ZAP.

I checked but didn't find the deal so I guess it's gone. :-(

Linky, but looks like they're all sold out. Your choices now would be any of the Semprons, or the Athlon 64 3700+ socket 754 at Ewiz for $159.

Originally posted by: hurtstotalktoyou
If you get an Epox 8KDA3I motherboard, you should be able to overclock your Sempron 64 2800+ to 2.4 GHz, turning it into a virtual Athlon 64 3400+.

I've got that board. It seems to be good to about 300MHz HTT, meaning expect about 150% of default clock speeds if all goes well.

 

[Bull Dog]

get the DFI nForce4-4x Socket 754 board. Very good HTT speeds can be had with it.

http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview...atid=28&threadid=1708047&enterthread=y

 

[Texun]

Follow-up. Here's what I ended up with for my file\media box.

New Parts
Gigabyte K8NS socket 754
Sempron 3400+ with 256k Cache
Zalman 7000 Cu HS
$215

Reused parts from the XP1800 setup
2x512's of Crucial 3200
5 HD's (2 are external)
2 Opticals.
Hauppauge WinTV 250
Gigabyte RADEON 7000
Firewire\USB PCI card
Promise Controller
Aopen PCI Sound (Don't have HT speakers so it's fine for now)

This was my first Gigabyte board and to be honest I couldn't have asked for an easier board to install. My eyes aren't as good as they used to be so the color coded headers and connectors helped keep it goof-proof. I ordered the Sempron 3100+ but when I got it I noticed it only had 128k L2. I already had all the other parts so I returned it for the 3400+

If I had done my research better I would have seen that regardless of what Newegg said there is no 256k L2 in the Sempron+ cpu's until you get to teh 3400's. Their site had incorrect information and has since been corrected. If I had it to do over I would have picked up the A64-2800 for a few dollars less.

I lit up the board and went straight to the BIOS. It didn't recognize the 3400+ but I sort of expected that and had the new update ready. The Q-Flash feature in the BIOS made updating it way too easy and took all the fun out of finding a handy boot disk. I flashed, rebooted and moved on with the format and installation of XP. After getting the updates I finished installing the cards and then set up the Prime95 torture test and let it run for 2 days before shutting it off for the first time and I didn't have a single error. One thing that is puzzling, maybe because I'm new to the 90nm core, but I can't even get it to run warm much less hot. Even under P95 it never went above 31C. I'm not sure how accurate that is so I gave it to feel test - the Zalman is as cool as anything else in the case and so is the socket. It's not even warm.

My initial objective was to get more "oomph!" out of the old but solid XP1800 and I can honestly say I got more with the Sempron than I expected. I ran P95 on the torture settings, opened 30 windows of Firefox, 15 of Internet Explorer, loaded movies in Divix and Media Player, Opened Photoshop, MS Word and a few other apps and let it run overnight. Not only did it run without a single error, with 480 megs of memory left it was still very useable for email and file transfers.

I may regret not going with the 939 but for now I'm very satisfied with the combo as my file and media box. It's cool, quiet and has a low current draw which was important. The last budget cpu I used was a Celeron 500 which burned me out on low end cpus, but the Sempron performs much better than I expected. I've got 2 other PCs networked to it and I see no reason why it wouldn't be more than strong enough for what I need.

I appreciate all the advice. Thanks again for the opinions and tips!

 

[Hacp]

Yep AMD Semprons take the budget out of the word budget . They are awesome performers, and the only thing wrong with them is that they aren't 939 . If they were 939, I'm willing to bet that everyone would take a Sempron and OC them instead of the venices

 

[Texun]

Yep. I haven't OC'd it yet but I am real curious to see what it has left. The K8NS doesn't have a very full featured BIOS but it does have some easy overclocking options.

 

[Zap]

Thanks for the update. Yes, some CPUs run that cool. If you want it to run warmer, gotta overclock the thing.

How well does it do with the DVD authoring that you mentioned in the first post, compared to the XP1800?

 

[hurtstotalktoyou]

I'm sorry that I can't provide you with more detail or specific benchmarks, but here's an anecdotal comparison...

My Thoroughbred 2400+ w/1GB DDR266 used to encode DivX/XviD movies to DVD in approx. real time. My overclocked Sempron 64 2800+ with 512 MB DDR400 does the same stuff at about half time--which is double the processing power.

Considering you have an 1800+ (466 MHz slower than a 2400+), and you won't be dropping any RAM, I'd say you should nearly triple your power (1/3 encoding time).

Newegg has Sempron 64 2800+ retails for $76 and Epox EP-8KDA3Is for $64. Go with those.

 

[deadseasquirrel]

Originally posted by: Hacp
They are awesome performers, and the only thing wrong with them is that they aren't 939 . If they were 939, I'm willing to bet that everyone would take a Sempron and OC them instead of the venices

There are 939 Semprons.... just not for sale in the US yet.

 

[Texun]

Originally posted by: hurtstotalktoyou
I'm sorry that I can't provide you with more detail or specific benchmarks, but here's an anecdotal comparison...

My Thoroughbred 2400+ w/1GB DDR266 used to encode DivX/XviD movies to DVD in approx. real time. My overclocked Sempron 64 2800+ with 512 MB DDR400 does the same stuff at about half time--which is double the processing power.

Considering you have an 1800+ (466 MHz slower than a 2400+), and you won't be dropping any RAM, I'd say you should nearly triple your power (1/3 encoding time).

Newegg has Sempron 64 2800+ retails for $76 and Epox EP-8KDA3Is for $64. Go with those.

If I understand this correctly I would say you are just about right on target. I've only ripped and burned 1 DVD so far. The ripping was about the same (DVDRom) but re-encoding with TMPGEnc took 19 minutes. I didn't time it with my XP1800 but I know it took much longer. What I found impressive is the number of tasks I can now perform at the same time. My XP1800 was pretty much hands-off while crunching or doing anything I/O intensive. I know it's a "budget" chip but I'm not complaining.

 

[dogmir]

i had that asrock board and it is a good option if you want to keep it cheap.....it will only allow you to go to a fsb of 300 which sucks but that is a solid 2.4ghz on a 2800+.....ocwforum has a 40+ page post on the k8 upgrade and its overclocking...dont know to much about the other boards but i was a fan of the asrock

 

[SickBeast]

The Semprons are maybe 10-20% faster than the XP clock-for-clock. Not worth the upgrade IMO, especially if you can hit 2400mhz+ on your XP.