Computers: Build or Buy?

[Giancarlo]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui
Fez: Asher is right. Pentiums are better than Athalons. There is a reason they cost so much. AMDs can do games well, but Pentiums can do everything well. The only place where they are just about equal is on games.

Yeah, and pigs fly. AMD does everything well... and Pentium would rather make a great paper weight.

Ah, it's so nice to have Giancarlo back.

Who is Giancarlo? Me Fez.

[Asher]

Originally posted by tniem
Not to mention that even if the Pentium is slightly faster, it is more expensive and for me pound for the buck is very important. So I will stick with AMD.

That's why I have an AMD gaming system.

There's a difference between best of the best and best deal. Athlons always affer the best deal, but next time around when I'm not so short on cash I'll love to get an Intel.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Imran Siddiqui
Fez: Asher is right. Pentiums are better than Athalons. There is a reason they cost so much. AMDs can do games well, but Pentiums can do everything well. The only place where they are just about equal is on games.

He's right only if you measure in absolute terms, but that is plainly silly. With the same amount of money I spend on a top end P4 system I can whip up a dual AMD processor system, and two is always better than one.

Intel is more expensive because many people think it's better, but not if you count in relative performance terms.

Gian clearly stated he wanted to buy the best within budget constraints, so that clearly pointed to an AMD system. Glonkie either can't read or is out trolling, but he starts acting strange when somebody else trolls him

[Asher]

UR, his statements contradicted themselves.
First he says:

I build with the best of the best. I don't ever, I mean ever skimp on a part.

Clearly implying he never skimps on a part.

Then he says:

I buy the best I can with the money I am allowed to spend.

It's not fun trolling Gianny with the second phrase, so I chose the first.

[Asher]

BTW, a Pentium 4 2200 is $226, a Athlon XP 2200+ is $211.

There's not a big price difference with comparable systems.

It's only the excessively fast Pentium 4s that have a markup.

For motherboards, the KT333 chipset for Athlons is $72 at the cheapest, while i850 (RDRAM) is $43 and the i845 (DDR) is $40.

Add them up, and the 2200 Athlon system costs $283, the 2200 Pentium 4 system costs $266-269. Not much cheaper, is it?

edit: duh, past=fast

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Asher
UR, his statements contradicted themselves.
First he says:

Clearly implying he never skimps on a part.

Then he says:


It's not fun trolling Gianny with the second phrase, so I chose the first.

Pah, you're just picking a fight. Bored at home?

[Asher]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
Pah, you're just picking a fight. Bored at home?

I'm trying to find something to distract me from this math assignment.

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by Asher
BTW, a Pentium 4 2200 is $226, a Athlon XP 2200+ is $211.

There's not a big price difference with comparable systems.

It's only the excessively fast Pentium 4s that have a markup.

For motherboards, the KT333 chipset for Athlons is $72 at the cheapest, while i850 (RDRAM) is $43 and the i845 (DDR) is $40.

Add them up, and the 2200 Athlon system costs $283, the 2200 Pentium 4 system costs $266-269. Not much cheaper, is it?

edit: duh, past=fast

That seems reasonable, until you realise the AMD 2200XP is the top of the line item.

Let's move down one notch and see:

Athlon 2000XP $127
P4 2.0GHz $221

Oops.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
That seems reasonable, until you realise the AMD 2200XP is the top of the line item.

Let's move down one notch and see:

Athlon 2000XP $127
P4 2.0GHz $221

Oops.

a 2.2GHz P4 is $226 and 2.0GHz is $221?

That is very clever, using the obsolete rare-socket part.

The Socket 478 2.0GHz P4 is $184, the old (423?) P4 is $221. No one buys those anymore unless you've got an old P4 motherboard.

[cia]

Asher, you like ignoring two important points.
AMD processes more instructions per cycle than the Intel part, which tends to tell you where the better design is. AMD's big problem is the have to move to the 0.13um processing to get the clock speed up. So the P4 wins for now, but the crown sits uneasy on the head.
BTW, speed is NOT everything. At work I use 20+ processor servers which are only clocked at 700MHz but I guarantee you those will knock the socks off anything Intel builds. More IS better .

[cia]

And Asher, one more thing. Looks at the specs on the new Nvidia board and try to whine about FSB and bus size for P4 vs Athlon.

[Asher]

cia, the G4 processes more instructions per cycle than the AMD part, does that make it better?

It's all about striking a balance for OVERALL performance.

Speed, as I talk about it, is IPC * MHz. You seem to think I'm only talking about MHz. I understand there are 1GHz and under CPUs that knock the pants off regular CPUs (hell, Intel's Itanium 2 is one of them!), but that's not what I'm talking about.

The Pentium 4 strikes a good balance between raw clock speed and IPC, which is why it's working so well right now for them. It can scale incredibly well, not just in terms of MHz but in terms of SPEED.

The Athlon was never designed to work at this high speed, and it's showing now. Even at 0.13 micron it can't scale much higher. That's why they've done some major redesigns with the hammers, like giving a longer pipeline...

[Asher]

Originally posted by cia
And Asher, one more thing. Looks at the specs on the new Nvidia board and try to whine about FSB and bus size for P4 vs Athlon.

Huh?
There is no new Nvidia board, are you talking about the new ATI R300/Radeon 9700?

And the P4 and Athlon have the same bus size, both are 64-bit @ 133MHz. It's that the Pentium 4's bus is QDR, for effective 533MHz, and Athlon's is DDR, for effective 266MHz.

[cia]

The nforce2 chipset is coming out on some new boards. Too lazy to get the article but it's on Tom's hardware.
Here's an oft overlooked fact Asher. When you want REAL speed, use the memory man. Check this out: www.cenatek.com. Strap one or two of those with about 2Gig of your programs loaded on them and benchmark.

[Asher]

Ohhh, the nForce2. I thought you were talking about a graphics board.

The nForce2 looks sexy in paper, but so did the nForce1. We'll see how it turns out.