Author: Aaron Gordon
Date: 14:46:40 10/25/04
Go up one level in this thread
On October 25, 2004 at 11:58:31, stuart taylor wrote: >I think it's approaching 4 years now that I got my 1.4 Ghz. AMD computer and >setup, being determined that this time, I'd wait untill speed is tripled before >upgrading again. I was determined that I might even be prepared to wait for over >2 years, this time, and would not give in, until it has tripled, AND is at >reasonable price. >But AMD has not yet even reached 2.8 Ghz. which is double. The 64 bit makes only >a very slight difference. So what great accomplishment have I gained with a new >computer even NOW? (other small things for other small purposses were also >almost sufficient [in my computer of] almost 4 years ago, though, I hadn't been >able to exploit all its uses for personal reasons, of not having my own living >quarters). > >I'm however, aiming at getting the best laptop for chess as soon as possible. >Can someone tell me a) which that is now, and b) which it will be soon? >Thanks! >S.Taylor It isn't all about MHz, if it was everyone would have a P4. The Athlon 64s are faster than your Tbird MHz for MHz.. plus the added cache, much, MUCH faster ram, lower memory latencies, higher bus speeds, etc. It doesn't have to run 2.8GHz to be twice as fast. In most applications/games 2.2GHz/1mb L2/dual channel DDR Athlon 64 will run over twice as fast as a PC133 SDRAM based Thunderbird 1.4GHz. As far as chess goes.. where cache, memory speed, etc make little difference.. you'll still see a large increase. If you figure about a 20% +/- 5% increase MHz for MHz over a Tbird then an Athlon XP 3400+ (2.4GHz/512k l2) will run about like a tbird 2.4*1.20 = 2.88GHz. Also, you have to figure in marketing. Intels 90nm Prescott isn't able to hit 4GHz (it was recently cancelled). AMD is just getting started. They can released 2.8s, but, why do they need to? They already released the 4000+ and FX-55.. both of which in the consumers eyes beat the P4-3.6GHz and soon 3.8GHz. So releasing an even higher part (4200+, 4400+) will cut into the sales of the lower end chips and drive the prices down quite a bit. Another thing is it is nice for them to be able to just add on more cache, run dual channel, increase the bus, etc and be able to increase the PR without increasing clock speed. This is what people look at (the PR). Intel can take a P4-3.2 for example and throw L2 cache on there, increase the bus and people will still see it as a P4 "3.2GHz". I'm talking about average consumers (which make up nearly all of the market), rather than the more knowledgable people. Even my Athlon XP 1.83GHz (2500+/166fsb) @ 2.6GHz (4200+?/218fsb) w/ the Nforce2 chipset is faster than the Tbird 1.0 @ 1.4GHz that I have here. It is an iWill KK266 (also use the Abit KT7a, as well as an Abit KT7a-raid) with 512mb PC133. The Athlon XP at "only" 2.6GHz is over twice as fast in just about everything. Excluding stuff that is strictly cpu bound, then it is a linear increase up from 1.4. With a nice Athlon 64 system running on a 74gb 10k rpm SATA Raptor drive.. I don't see how you could get disappointed in any way. ;)
This page took 0 seconds to execute
Last modified: Thu, 15 Apr 21 08:11:13 -0700
Current Computer Chess Club Forums at Talkchess. This site by Sean Mintz.