Athlon XP 2600+ vs Barton 3000+

[Sword]

Hi,

By looking the old Anandtech article : "AMD's Athlon XP 3000+ Barton cuts it close", I can see that there is only 5% to 10% of performance gain. (while 10% improved performance only happenned 2 times out of 10 benchmark)

I know that Barton has a larger cache but the clock speed isnt really different, and the performance isnt really different also.

Why would you buy a Barton ? And more important question, why do they call it a 3000+ when it is only 5% faster than a 2600+ ???

And since I bought my system not so long ago (just before Athlon64) because it was a really cheap upgrade, do not tell me to change to a A64 system 🙂

 

[SneakyStuff]

Get a 2600+ MOBILE Barton, and overclock the bajeezez out of it. There's your best socket A upgrade.

 

[BW86]

yes get a mobile barton...

 

[Sword]

Why should I ?

What is the stock clock speed ? What kind of performance gain should I expect with such an upgrade ?

One of the problem is that my RAM is not a super ram and I would not be able to run in 1:1.....it is DDR333 "standard" quality branded (I do not remember which one).

 

[imported_Kiwi]

Originally posted by: SneakyStuff
Get a 2600+ MOBILE Barton, and overclock the bajeezez out of it. There's your best socket A upgrade.

I've seen similar advice many times lately about XP's and Socket A systems. What I haven't seen is the actual CPU's being listed for sale on eBay, nor seen as specials at Mwave / Newegg / ZipZoom et al. And then there is the question of easily keeping track of which wattage version is more highly desired -- if these things are seen so seldom, do the retailers know which kind they have when they actually have any on hand to sell?



:frown:

 

[Sunbird]

Depends on what you do with the 2600+ afterwards and if its a barton or thoroughtbred core. If its a thoroughtbred 2600+, you'll only notice a very slight difference, since they would have the same clock speed.

The Barton 3000+ runs at 2.17GHz. I upgraded from my Barton 2600+ that ran at 1.92Ghz to a 3000+ (thats easily overlcocks to 2.4Ghz on 1.7V), last week, the extra 250Mhz makes a nice difference.

And the 2600+ made nice upgrade (and birthday gift) for my brother.

 

[Avalon]

Originally posted by: Kiwi

Originally posted by: SneakyStuff
Get a 2600+ MOBILE Barton, and overclock the bajeezez out of it. There's your best socket A upgrade.

I've seen similar advice many times lately about XP's and Socket A systems. What I haven't seen is the actual CPU's being listed for sale on eBay, nor seen as specials at Mwave / Newegg / ZipZoom et al. And then there is the question of easily keeping track of which wattage version is more highly desired -- if these things are seen so seldom, do the retailers know which kind they have when they actually have any on hand to sell?



:frown:

Most major etailers know which they have and will tell you. I know newegg has most of the 35w chips and 45w chips for sale. Same should go for monarch, excaliburpc, zipzoomfly, etc.

 

[WobbleWobble]

I personally wouldn't bother as you'd barely notice the performance boost to a stock 3000+. If you go the mobile route and overclock, remember to also to budget for a nice copper heatsink fan as well.

If you're going to spend money I'd recommend buying more RAM, a new video card, hard drive, DVD burner or something else.

 

[Sword]

I do not really want to overclock right now because I dont have the time and money (if anything fail). I just wondered if there was a way to maximise the performance of my motherboard (MSI k7N Delta2). It seems that the overclock route is the only way.

I plan to upgrade my vid card (GeForce4 ti4400) to a 6800GT OC from BFG (or any other), so I guess I will notice a major difference.

As for the Ram i have 1 Go.

Thank you all for your advice !

 

[ts3433]

If you're not overclocking, wait a while and then get an A64 or something. The 6800 GT might be cutting it a little close on a 2600+, but you should be fine.