Athlon 64 Price War

[Saint]

Will be launched on 23rd Sept. I hope price war Btw Intel and AMD will spark another round of price-slicing, so that I can buy a notebook with better price and performance.

 

[Beren]

Oh, there will be price-slashing, but not on the 64 for quite a while. It'll probably be released for around 450 and stay that way for at least 5-6 months.

 

[Dagenais]

No price slashing.

When AMD comes out with their 64-bit CPU, only two will exist from large companies.

The G5 64-bit computer from Apple and IBM.

And the AMD.

 

[Beren]

When AMD comes out with their 64-bit CPU, only two will exist from large companies

But obviously, only for so long. In fact, Intel hasn't released anything about 64-but development, but it's strongly suspected that they have.

Oh, wait just found an article. The Prescott will have 64-but compatability built in! :/

Here's to hoping AMD comes out on top. Cheers.

 

[russ_watters]

Guess you guys have never heard of the Itanium...its been out for about a year, but it isn't meant for consumers.

 

[Greg Bernhardt]

Originally posted by kenikov
When AMD comes out with their 64-bit CPU, only two will exist from large companies.
[/B]

I believe it's code named "hammer"?

 

[Beren]

Originally posted by Greg Bernhardt
I believe it's code named "hammer"?

That it is. And in fact, M$ is developing a new OS based on the hammer, code-named "The Anvil".

 

[BoulderHead]

Originally posted by Beren
That it is. And in fact, M$ is developing a new OS based on the hammer, code-named "The Anvil".

Will the consumer be stuck between them?

 

[Saint]

i expect there will be price war bwt amd and intel,
hold on first, wait till Nov/Dec to upgrade your PC

 

[russ_watters]

Originally posted by Greg Bernhardt
I believe it's code named "hammer"?

Server version "sledgehammer" -> Opteron (already released)
consumer version "clawhammer" -> Athlon FX (today)

 

[dduardo]

bah with all this 64bit mumbo jumbo. I'm not wasting a penny on this technology until I really need to use more than 4GB of RAM. As it is already, I don't see myself upgrading my hardware for another 10 years or so.

 

[Guybrush Threepwood]

Originally posted by dduardo
bah with all this 64bit mumb jumbo. I'm not wasting a penny on this technology until I really need to use more than 4GB of RAM. As it is already, I don't see myself upgrading my hardware for another 10 years or so.

just wait for Win2004

 

[dduardo]

Originally posted by Guybrush Threepwood
just wait for Win2004

You mean Win2006. Longhorn, Microsoft's next version of windows, isn't do for a while. Perhaps they will release a Windows XP SE, just as they did with windows 98. I also can't wait for the new MS Office with really really advanced spell checking, requiring 10GB of RAM

[edit] By the way, I just love Monkey Island. I own every version.

I challenge you to Monkey Kombat:

Ack-Chee-Eek

 

[BoulderHead]

Originally posted by dduardo
bah with all this 64bit mumbo jumbo. I'm not wasting a penny on this technology until I really need to use more than 4GB of RAM.

Maybe I'm not the only one who still uses 486's?
I know some people who think win311 was too bloated.

 

[dduardo]

The official toms-hardware review of the AMD 64 is in: http://www.tomshardware.com/cpu/20030923/index.html

As I suspected from the beginning, the processor falls flat on its face. Intel is yet again the leader in CPUs.

 

[russ_watters]

Originally posted by dduardo
The official toms-hardware review of the AMD 64 is in: http://www.tomshardware.com/cpu/20030923/index.html

As I suspected from the beginning, the processor falls flat on its face. Intel is yet again the leader in CPUs.

The article was far less negative than you indicate. The P4 was faster in 32 tests, the Athlon in 15.

Its also important to note that the chip currently runs in 32 bit mode only. The A64 version of Windows isn't ready yet. When it is ready, AMD will have a 64-bit desktop chip and Intel will not. I have heard that companies like the fact that AMD's chips run both 32 and 64 bit code. Intel's will not.

And also, the platform is brand new - it will improve significantly over the next few months as kinks are ironed out. The P4, if you recall, was a colossal flop when released and has since come of age.

 

[BoulderHead]

I have played with the 16-bit win311 extensively on a PII-450MHz. It runs fast of course but still takes longer to load web pages and is more prone to skip during playback of mp3 files than, for example, the 32-bit win9x versions run on the same machine.
So, based on that, I'm thinking that once all the support is in place for a 64-bit OS that it should be an improvement over a 32-bit OS.

 

[Guybrush Threepwood]

certainly multimedia applications will benefit from going to 64 bits...

dduardo: are you my perpetual enemy LeChuck in disguise?
Ack-Chee-Eek

 

[russ_watters]

Originally posted by russ_watters
The article was far less negative than you indicate. The P4 was faster in 32 tests, the Athlon in 15.

Something else I didn't realize - that P4 hasn't been released yet (1-2 months). The Athlon is faster than the current fastest Intel chip in most of the tests.

 

[Jikx]

Here's an Athlon 64 shown in a completely different light..

http://www.aceshardware.com/read.jsp?id=60000253 [Broken]

And another thing you should know about the tomshardware review was that some of the graphs for P4EE had them running @ 3.4 and 3.6Ghz.

Well.. personally i could care less, because both beasts costs over $1000AUS!

 

[russ_watters]

Originally posted by Jikx
And another thing you should know about the tomshardware review was that some of the graphs for P4EE had them running @ 3.4 and 3.6Ghz.

Where do you see that?

 

[Jikx]

http://www.tomshardware.com/cpu/20030923/athlon_64-22.html

Update Sept 24,2003: Unfortunately we have made a mistake in the original article: In addition to the official P4 EE 3.2GHz we had included benchmark scores of the P4 Extreme 3.4GHz and 3.6GHz. These values were planned for a future THG article and were not intended to be included here. We would like to apologize especially to those readers who misinterpreted our charts. The two bars of the P4 Extreme 3.4GHz and 3.6GHz have now been removed.

 

[dduardo]

Still, there is no clear advantage to using 64bit vs 32bit from the home users perspectiv. It is all going to come down to the software manufacters supporting the increase in bandwidth.

 

[russ_watters]

Originally posted by dduardo
Still, there is no clear advantage to using 64bit vs 32bit from the home users perspectiv. It is all going to come down to the software manufacters supporting the increase in bandwidth.

Its actually a myth that 64 bit equals double the bandwidth or speed (in this context). 64 bit vs 32 bit processing has nothing to do with bandwidth. Its the size and complexity of the instructions. For example if something could do 2 32 bit operations a second, it would do 1 64 bit one per second for exactly the same bandwidth.

 

[dduardo]

Originally posted by russ_watters
Its actually a myth that 64 bit equals double the bandwidth or speed (in this context). 64 bit vs 32 bit processing has nothing to do with bandwidth. Its the size and complexity of the instructions. For example if something could do 2 32 bit operations a second, it would do 1 64 bit one per second for exactly the same bandwidth.

I didn't say it doubled the bandwidth, but 64bit does speed things up. For instance , double precision floating point on a 32bit processor requires going through the floating point unit multiple times. but a 64bit processor can do the same in one clock cycle, thus increasing the amount of data it can handle.

The point is, if the software doesn't support these type of features, then 64bit is no better than 32bit.

 

[Dagenais]

I believe it's code named "hammer"?

Sorry that my reply is so tardy, but I've been away and haven't gotten a chance to revisit this post.

It is actually "Clawhammer", according to PCWorld.

Yes, previous 64-bit CPUs have existed, but this will be the first one targeted towards consumers.

As of right now, they are on sale everywhere and they lead the charts. Many claim they already beat the highest end Dual 64-bit from IBM. Or, in other words the G5 even though Apple had nothing to do with the CPU.

Costco even sells them.

 

[russ_watters]

Originally posted by kenikov
It is actually "Clawhammer", according to PCWorld.

I thought I said this before, but maybe not - Clawhammer (Athlon 64/FX)is the consumer version, Sledgehammer (Opteron) is the server version. Opteron has been out for about a year.

 

[Monique]

What is meant with 64 bits??

Actually I have a question about CPU usage, every time the notebook's fan starts working, my CPU maxes at 100% and effectively freezes the activities of my programs..

OK, I admit I have quite a few background programs running, but this shouldn't happen right?

Some specs: I've got AMD Athlon XP 2500+, with 512 Mb DDR Memory, 40 Gb capacity.

Now ACTUALLY I was browsing through the OS (if that is possible :P) and found a menu with which I can allocate virtual memory. Now, it was set to 180 Mb and I have got 30532 Mb of free memory. Can I just change this to whatever I want? I increased it 10 fold, but the fan hasn't started yet, so I might find out later..


Then there is a different issue: I noticed that the clock speed is 1.86 GHz, I was under the impression that it should be 2.5 GHz, since that is the processors name?? AMD Athlon XP 2500+, or am I just illiterate?

Another thing, it said I have 480 Mb RAM, but the specs say, on paper, that I have 512 Mb DDR Memory.. these are different things too?

 

[Monique]

Actually, I have AMD Athlon XP-M mobile.. I was just thinking, when I bought the notebook I preferenced it to be energy-efficient. Maybe that is why the clockspeed is much slower? Or wouldn't that have anything to do with CPUs?

..experiments further.. tries to find the shortcut which was removed from the desktop..

 

[Beren]

Now ACTUALLY I was browsing through the OS (if that is possible :P) and found a menu with which I can allocate virtual memory. Now, it was set to 180 Mb and I have got 30532 Mb of free memory. Can I just change this to whatever I want? I increased it 10 fold, but the fan hasn't started yet, so I might find out later..


Then there is a different issue: I noticed that the clock speed is 1.86 GHz, I was under the impression that it should be 2.5 GHz, since that is the processors name?? AMD Athlon XP 2500+, or am I just illiterate

About the virtual memory, I would suggest not messing with that number in any way at all. VM is incredibly, incredibly slow, since it runs off your hard drive (which is more or less the slowest part of your machine)

And Athlon does things very oddly. The XP 2500+ isn't a number relating in anyway to the clock speed. On another of my computers I have an 1800+, and the clock speed is abuot 1.4 GHz (I think, if I'm remembering correctly)

 

[russ_watters]

"2500+" is a "performance rating" meaning it performs about the same as a P4 running at 2.5 ghz. Its a marketing thing since most people only look at the number and don't necessarily understand that that's not the only factor in determining performance. The 2500+ runs at 1.83ghz (variations of a % or 2 are normal).

Virtual memory is what your operating system uses on your hard drive when it runs out of physical memory (ram). Since you have 512MB, it is unlikely that you will ever use much virtual memory (windows always uses a little) so changing the size won't have much effect on your system - it won't be used.


64 bits (I mentioned it in another thread) refers to the size of the numbers or instructions that a computer can handle at one time. One of the main benefits initially is that it breaks the 4 GB memory barrier - 32 bit processing if you do the math (2^32) means you can only address up to 4GB of memory.

As for your freezing problem, hit ctl+alt+del once and click "task manager" then "processes" and it will tell you exactly what programs are using how much of your processor. You may be able to pinpoint (and disable) the one that is messing you up.

512-480=32MB. 32MB is the amount of your system ram being dedicated to your display adapter. Machines without a dedicated video card and its own ram have to steal system memory. Its not a real big deal except that it is considerably slower than dedicated video ram - if you ever get into 3d games, you'll want a stand-alone video card.

 

[Monique]

Thank you for the advice Russ, I tried the taskmanager thing before, but it doesn't tell me much, besides that there are like about 43 processes, practically all not using any CPU. I did notice that a trial version virus scanner seems to overload the system when the fan is on.. I'll just stick with NAV.

 

[Tweek]

Originally posted by Guybrush Threepwood
just wait for Win2004

Ugh that's a scary thought! Gee I wonder how many patches that OS will have. It's all about the Penguin baby! I'm staying under the brim (Redhat 9)

 

[dduardo]

Tweek, now your a Redhat Fanatic? What happened to the super awsome Knoppix STD.

 

[Tweek]

I use both and I like both. I like Knoppix STD the best because it is easy to use but it's only a disk. Redhat 9 is staying on my new HD partition. Redhat is good and I can call for help everytime I mess something up. I'm going to try out debian. I have all the disks and a bunch of apps. I just need money for a new HD. I'm going to slap it in my old P3 next week.


I take it you like debian the best?
What are some good linux message boards that you go to for info?

I go to thebroken.org, cyberarmy.com, and
linuxforum.com

I'm still a noob to linux but I'm a fast learner. I want to be able to break free from windows completely sometime soon.