Is SSE3 worth waiting for on Athlon64?

Gronich

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Jun 18, 2000
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As reported on Anandtech SSE3 Article will come in 2005 on revision E of the Athlon.

Any speculation on the performance of SSE3?

Has anyone seen any performance comparisons on an Intel processor with SSE3 enabled/disabled to make a informed guess?

Gronich
 
Oct 18, 2004
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SSE3 is going to perform diffrently on the Athlon64 SO I dont think you will get the results you want by seeing an intel with it disabled. I think at most it will be a modest boost, but it should bring it ahead of the p4 in SSE
 

sandorski

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Oct 10, 1999
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Probably be awhile before SSE3 makes any difference, though I don't know how it compares right now. Also not sure when these AMD Athlon64s will be available. If tthey come out within the time you are upgrading, it would probably be worth getting(unles the price is much higher), but if it's a few months out I wouldn't really worry about it(again, depends on whether it makes any difference yet).
 

MobiusPizza

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Apr 23, 2004
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It wouldn't offer a lot of performance gain as you would expect than buying a processor that is 100MHz faster. However in specialist applications such as DivX encoder you would be looking for 5-10% performance. SSE3 is pretty specific, it needs software support therefore wide benefits would not be seen. If you can wait go for it. If not it doesn't really matter.
 

Yanagi

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Jun 8, 2004
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SS# will be on Revision E which is due aroiund Jan next year last I heard.
 

Vee

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Jun 18, 2004
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"Waiting for..." whatever, is a losing game. So is "getting that *nice* (=hot, buggy) , bleedin edge equipment" in the expectation that it "will last you for years".

Buy when the need is right. Buy mature and 10% off performance, at half the price. And settle for buying often. It's the only advice I'm giving. But it's glorious times for "wait for". ;) nForce4, SSE3, PCIe, SLI, SSE4, 1066FSB, dualcore, Hyper Transport2, DDR3, K9, Conroe... Better hang on to that 166MHz Pentium awhile longer. :D.
 

fell8

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Nov 12, 2001
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Assuming they are actually available in Jan, I'd wait. This is not a "bleeding edge" part--it is a revision of an established and proven part. I will have other key refinements, including a supposedly much-improved memory controller.

My guess is this generation will really close the gap in the few areas where Intel hold a performance advantage, at least Intel implements SSE4 (which will probably be awhile). If it really is only 2 months, I'd say it's probably worth the wait.

Of course, how often are items like these actually available when promised?
 

Vee

Senior member
Jun 18, 2004
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Originally posted by: fell8
Assuming they are actually available in Jan, I'd wait. This is not a "bleeding edge" part--it is a revision of an established and proven part. I will have other key refinements, including a supposedly much-improved memory controller.
Buy when the need is right.

This guy is on a XPM 2600+ @ 2.4GHz /R9800pro today. I cannot assume why he is in a need of an Athlon64 today, but if he does need 64-bit capability, for instance, there's no point in waiting.
On the other hand, if he has no *need* (need up to the buyer to define), then it's not exactly a question of *waiting*.
But by all means, if it's any help to the OP, I'd say he won't see much change in performance from a A64 today. That (IMO) performance would not justify a purchase of A64 today, rather than later.
As for revision & refinements, that's always true, a point I tried to humorously make with my 166MHz referral.