Skt 754 ...130nm A64 vs. 90nm Sempron

[daagphur]

I'm building a low to midrange system for my girl.I've got an Asus K8S-MX mobo,and a Foxconn TLM454 mATX case.I had planned on getting either A64 2800+ or 3000+,depending on how the budget looks.Now the new Palermo core 90nm Semprons have my attention,namely the 3000,3100,and 3300.

Not because of price,but since I know she won't be doing any gaming or video work,and I'm concerned about heat dissipation in the small case.Especially the 3300 model,which has SSE3 instructions and an improved memory controller over the older models.And if I did a save a little cash,it wouldn't kill me

I have to make the decison in a couple days.I hate to give up the 64 bit capabilities and big L2 over just a couple bucks,but I don't want to regret missing an opprotunity to take advantage of a newer cooler architecture.

So I'd appreciate any input you folks could give.

TIA,Bill

 

[theMan]

get the palermo

 

[Zap]

Flip a coin. At default speeds and with Cool and Quiet enabled either one should work fine.

 

[daagphur]

Originally posted by: Zap
Flip a coin. At default speeds and with Cool and Quiet enabled either one should work fine.

Do the Semprons have Cool and Quiet capability?

 

[Furen]

I'd say get any palermo. I made a pc for my sister with a 2800, OCed it to 2.2GHz on stock voltage/heatsink using a divider for the ram. It never goes over 45C when fully loaded and it idles at 38C. The only problem that I have with it is that I got a winchester based palermo (so no SSE3+better mem controller for me), but if you're careful with what you buy getting an E3 palermo shouldnt be a problem. The best thing about it is that I only paid 80 bucks for the CPU =).

EDIT: no cool an quiet on anything under 3100+, I believe. Also, if you wait for like a month, AMD64 enabled semprons should start coming out ^^.

 

[rgreen83]

Definately wait for 64 bit semprons if you can, cant hurt to have down the road.

 

[Budman]

Originally posted by: daagphur
Do the Semprons have Cool and Quiet capability?

Only the 3000+ and up has cool & quiet,under that the cpus are completely locked so no lower multipliers = no C&Q.

Got a Sempron 3000+ in my other box here & cool & quiet works very well with it.

 

[Hacp]

How are the Ocing features? If it is half decent, then get sempron. If it is non-existant, get the 3000 or 2800 64.

 

[Budman]

Originally posted by: Hacp
How are the Ocing features? If it is half decent, then get sempron. If it is non-existant, get the 3000 or 2800 64.

mine didnt Oc well at all,2.2-2.3ghz was it's max and needed too many volts so i banished it to server duty.

 

[Furen]

You should be able to OC any 1.6ghz sempron to 2.1+ on stock voltage. Of course that means that you'd need a motherboard that can reach over 260 htt otherwise you'll be motherboard limited.

 

[Hacp]

Just a quick question, on Newegg, they say that the sempron has a fsb. Does that mean that hypertransport is not supported for 2800?

 

[imported_wyrmrider]

sempron 2800 is exactly like athlon with less cache and no 64bit instructions
also single chanel memory- which actually is not a big handicap

OC procedure is exactly the same
fsb is a little incorrect but lots of people do it
early semprons may have been a athlon with half a bad cache disabled
today they are smaller dies for better yeild per wafer
remember there is lots of family tree similarities between the Barton 32 and the Athlon
with AMD it's been evolution ever since the K6-3+
not completly new designs like Intel
I do not see 64 bit coming along fast enough to make it imperative for your girlfriends apps

wyrmrider

 

[Hacp]

yes, thats what i thought, but newegg is listing the sempron 2800 as having a fsb of 333 and also having no ht support. This is on socket 754 btw. Is it just a mistake on newegg's part?

 

[Furen]

If it is on socket 754 then yes, it's a mistake. I would make sure before buying it though, wouldnt wanna get a stupid socket a sempron

 

[sangyup81]

i got to 2.4ghz with the stock cooler on a 2600+ sempron

 

[daagphur]

Yeah,they say that about the skt754 2600+ and 2800+.It's a mistake.They also state that the Sempron 3300+ runs at 1.6Ghz in the header,then in the specs correctly state 2.0Ghz.
I like this AMD comparison tool...
http://www.amdcompare.com/us-en/desktop/Default.aspx

OOPS!...I goofed;the 1.6Ghz on the 3300 refers to the FSB,not the clock speed.