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In doubt between Athlon XP and Pentium 4

2

2morrow

Junior Member
Hi there

I'm going to buy a new PC, and until now I was completely sure it was going to have an AMD Athlon XP 2200+ in it. But since my budget is big enough (about 2800 euro's which is about the same in dollars I think) some poeple advise me to choose a Pentium 4 instead. I know enough about the XP to know what my upgarding options are, but there are a few things which I could use some advice on:

- chipset; Intel 845 is the one to take, I don't need Intergrated graphisc (G)
- future upgrade possibilities (what cores will be compatible with current mainboards)
- type of memory (I don't want RIMM, so should I take DDR333, DDR400 or something else?)
- speeds (2.53 GHz 533MHz FSB is probably OK)
- price/performance in relation to the XP
- available motherboards

thanks in advance 🙂
 
Gaming, browsing/email/internet stuff, tv-recording, text editting. It's going to have a tv-tuner. The system is going to have 512 MB DDR-SDRAM from Samsung and a ATi Radeon 9700Pro videocard.
 
I've looked into P4 chipsets a bit, and the SiS 648 is supposed to be very good. It supports all the new stuff, like DDR400.
I'm wondering about these two things:
- Why is it better to take P4 2.53 than Athlon XP 2200+ in the first place?
- Is the SiS 648 with DDR400 memory (considerably) faster than the same chipset with DDR333 memory?
 
The Asus P4PE is my current favorite motherboard. Although, that may change with the release of the Granite Bay (dual-channel DDR) chipset. The i845PE is currently Intel's fastest DDR chipset.

I am not a fan of SiS chipsets. I've had two in the past, and both had issues.

I wouldn't concern yourself with DDR400 yet... It's not a standard yet, and thus there are many reports of instability.
 
Either one won't really fail you and the truth of the matter is, the difference won't be astounding. Although I think the 1.8 Athlon would be cheaper. I'd either get an Asus P4PE with the i845pe chipset or the Athlon with a KT400 or so chipset. Both would suite you fine. You could probably experiment with overclocking more on the P4 and possibly get a much faster system or you could spend a little less money on the Athlon system. Either way, you won't be disappointed.
 
Originally posted by: imgod2u
Either one won't really fail you and the truth of the matter is, the difference won't be astounding. Although I think the 1.8 Athlon would be cheaper. I'd either get an Asus P4PE with the i845pe chipset or the Athlon with a KT400 or so chipset. Both would suite you fine. You could probably experiment with overclocking more on the P4 and possibly get a much faster system or you could spend a little less money on the Athlon system. Either way, you won't be disappointed.
Click to expand...

In that case it would be better to take the AXP: I'm not going to do any overclocking, and I agree with you that the AXP 2200+ is fine too. Besides, I just noticed the P4 2.53 is more than $100 more exopensive here than the AXP 2200+. Maybe I should take the Gigabyte GA-7VRXP (KT333) with the AXP 2200+ and 512 MB DDR-SDRAM Samsung PC2700 memory anyway?
 
Welcome to the boards! 🙂

Sounds like you have a good game plan, you can't go wrong with either. If you go AMD, just make sure you get a Fan and Heatsink Combo you can live with. They can get very loud if you aren't careful, and since you won't be OCing, you should probably find yourself a nice quiet low rpm 80mm solution.

Chiz
 
- chipset; Intel 845 is the one to take, I don't need Intergrated graphisc (G)
- future upgrade possibilities (what cores will be compatible with current mainboards)
- type of memory (I don't want RIMM, so should I take DDR333, DDR400 or something else?)
- speeds (2.53 GHz 533MHz FSB is probably OK)
- price/performance in relation to the XP
- available motherboards
Click to expand...
For your chipset: Reviews on the SIS 648 have been mixed. Intel's 845PE has turned out well for the P4. Granite Bay boards will not be available for a few weeks. Boards to look at are the Albatron PX845PEV Pro, ABIT BE7, Epox EP-4PEA+, or Asus P4PE. All of these boards will be compatible with the Northwood core P4, but they will not work with the next P4 core, the Prescott. This is also true for the SIS 648 and Intel's Granite Bay. The Prescott will be released in the 1st half of 2003.

For AMD, the nForce2 chipset and boards based on it are just emerging, although initial reports are promising. I think that the nForce2 chipset will support the next AMD core, the Barton. I am not certain however. AMD processor's model number (2600+) will give you a good feeling for how it compares to the P4. (ex. AMD 2600+ ~= P4 2.53GHz; AMD 2700+ ~= P4 2.66GHz) Currently, the P4's at these speeds are cheaper than their corresponding AMD CPU. With either CPU, a retail package with the included heatsink and fan will work well for you.

DDR memory will be fine. The fastest is currently DDR433 (PC3500) using 5ns chips. The faster your memory is, the higher you can set your Front Side Bus/Memory speed ratio. If you can adjust that setting, it will give you better performance. With DDR333, you can set the ratio to 4/5. With DDR400, you can use the 3/4 or 2/3 ratios. DDR433 is used mainly in overclocking applications. DDR400 will be used in a dual channel configuration with Intel's next chipset, the Springfield.

I think this covered everything. Good luck with you new PC. Peace.
 
I always went with AMD until I lucked out and got a P4 2.26 with a Gigabyte 8PE667 Ultra. Man I am impressed with this thing. I had a XP1700 then XP2200 and this new setup I would not give up (unless someone gave me a P4 3.06). The bench marks are a little higher but the feel is considerably faster than the AMD. It always took awhile to configure the AMD with the VIA chipsets.
 
I am currently using and Amd xp 2100+ and if I were to upgrade to an amd system it would be an xp2400+ with nforce2, but it would be awfully hard to pass up intel's 2.53ghz and the new granite bay mb. The difference in price is pretty small and I would imagine if you were to oc the intel would really shine 🙁
 
Well, there is no big difference between AMD and Intel if you look at comparable models, except, that you can overclock almost any P4 to 2.8-3.2 GHz without any special cooling or problems.
 
i kinda agree with Budmantom, the nforce2 and the xp 2400+ are a great combo
but i don't think granite bay is all that good after seeing the reviews
i felt it was a bad overclocker and not too impressive in performance either...
besides the amd solution will be cheaper in most cases
 
I wasnt that impressed with GB, I expected a lot more, on most of the benchies I've seen, GB is still behind RD, although those were not OC'ed, still expected better, I'm probaly not getting my new PC until Jan/Feb, so I'll wait 'till final results are in.
 
AMD = Low priced CPU's. However good motherboards require your arms and legs for payment.
Intel = High priced CPU's. However motherboards do not cost much.

Either way. The systems will cost around the same with AMD just slightly lower. Not enough to justify the extra noise (cooling) that seems to come inherint to AMD's.

In either case. You will be happy with the performance of both.
 
If you go with Intel, definitely go with an Intel chipset. They may not be as feature rich as the SIS chipset boards or newer AMD boards, but it's almost certain you'll have high compatibility and stability. The intense validation that Intel puts their chips through pretty much guarantees this.

If you go with AMD, I'd go with the Nforce2 boards.
 
i don't think granite bay is all that good after seeing the reviews
i felt it was a bad overclocker and not too impressive in performance either
Click to expand...
And why do you say that? The GB is an incredible overclocker. You will get to a higher FSB with it compared to any other P4 chipset available. Performance is the best of any P4 DDR chipset available as well.
 
If you got nearly $2800 to spend, I'd go with either of Intel or AMD's flagship CPU's... the P4 2.8... or the AMD XP2600 with a 333 FSB (tiger direct has them for sale @ $300) I've read all over the place that AMD based chipsets with 8X AGP are very buggy. So that might be a reason to choose Intel. If you're lookin for brute power, Intel holds the crown right now... but you just have to ask yourself, is it worth a couple hundred dollars more for 300 fps instead of 275? By the way, if you're going Intel, and you have the cash to spend, isn't RDRAM a better choice than DDR????
 
Originally posted by: Soulkeeper
i felt it was a bad overclocker and not too impressive in performance either...
besides the amd solution will be cheaper in most cases
Click to expand...
Just to add a bit to this:
TBreak review:
The dual channel performance is pretty good- right up there with RDRAM, however, the true potential in performance lies with overclocking. At 190MHz FSB, the performance is simply out of this world.

Performance was quite good on the P4G8X- comparable to an 850E/RDRAM1066 at stock speeds.... When overclocked, the board performs insanely fast- the Granite Bay is definitely a chipset you would want to overclock.
Click to expand...
How again is this a bad overclocker? 190 MHz FSB is not good?

 
Originally posted by: mrman3k
I would go AMD unless you have ample money for a high speed Intel.
Click to expand...

I think 2800 Euro (approx 1:1 to $US) for a system means 'ample' money for whatever CPU he wants... ;-)

In which case I would definitely recommend Intel.

 
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