Athlon or Intel

[KickChick]

Just recently purchased a laptop with Athlon XP-M processor as opposed to one with Intel Pentium 4 .....

Wise choice or not?? :confused:

[RichieRich]

Just recently purchased a laptop with Athlon XP-M processor as opposed to one with Intel Pentium 4 .....

Wise choice or not?? :confused:
Depends what you want and which model you baught. Porcessor is only one part of a chain which can be slowed by ANY weakest link - and most people have over-kill machines when you look at what they actually use them for.

http://www.cpuscorecard.com/benchmarks2.htm
http://www.amd.com/us-en/Corporate/VirtualPressRoom/0,,51_104_572_863%5E7227,00.html

look for some benchmark sites like this one - although the internet, bus speed, video card, configuration etc may all be the constraint on your system. With a modern PC, unless you play new video games or do hard core CAD etc, you should be okay with something moderate..


*note - both are fine, fast and fairly cutting edge processors*

[Kirberus]

Yes, just what RichieRich said. I personally prefer Athlon for a couple of reasons, my dislike for intel and I tend to have less problems with Athlons(I build my own computers and it is REALLY annoying to have to take out the motherboard, take off the heatsink, return the processor which broke for who knows what reason, wait for it to come back, clean off the heatsink, put on the heatsink[depending on the heatsink this can be a piece of cake or practically impossible], reattach everything and put the mobo back in the case. After a few times of that due to intel processors I gave up on them.)

[cybermonk]

It depends what models you are talking about, Intel's pentiums have turned up pretty good for me but I dont put much trust on the cheaper models of the family. If you are going for a processor of the Intel family go for pentiums :)

[JohnnyX]

Just recently purchased a laptop with Athlon XP-M processor as opposed to one with Intel Pentium 4 .....

Wise choice or not?? :confused:

I expect that you saved yourself some money - at the end of the day, that's AMD's main selling point.

What Laptop is it?

[KickChick]

Actually it was a toss up between the Toshiba and the HP that I decided to go with.

HP Pavillion ze4805us with the Athlon XP-M processor ... the Toshiba had the Intel celeron ... all other specs comparable other than that

[RichieRich]

Actually it was a toss up between the Toshiba and the HP that I decided to go with.

HP Pavillion ze4805us with the Athlon XP-M processor ... the Toshiba had the Intel celeron ... all other specs comparable other than that

I got the comparative specs for the Athlon XP 2500+ which is slightly less powerfull than your XP-M

from here..

http://compreviews.about.com/library/weekly/aafpr-AthlonXP2500.htm


"For testing of the straight CPU power, I used both the PCMark2002 and SiSoft Sandra tools for testing. In addition to the CPU results, I've also included the memory scores for reference. For comparison, some of the scores from my review of the Shuttle SB51G XPC with a Pentium 4 2.4 GHz processor are used.

......


Overall the scores of the XP 2500+ put it very close to the 2.4 GHz Pentium 4. Since the XP 2500+ costs less than the Pentium 4 processor, it makes for a very attractive purchase. Of course Intel has released the newer Pentium 4 2.4 GHz with an 800 MHz bus that uses DDR400 memory. While that processor is faster than both of these for general purpose and memory, it does cost over twice as much as the XP 2500+."

Also, the article mentions the Athlons AWESOME overclocking capabilities and concludes..

"What more can be said other than the Athlon XP 2500+ processor is amazing. Its price to performance ration at the stock speeds are fairly impressive. Once overclocked, the processor gains an incredible amount of power for such a low price. AMD must have an incredible fabrication plant that allows for such a low-end processor to be able to reach the same processing power as their top of the line CPU. With just a little bit of tweaking and an investment in a strong air cooling solution, it was possible to get the same performance as the XP 3200+ but at less than 1/3 of the cost! In the end, the AMD Athlon XP 2500+ is an easy recommendation for users who are looking for low cost general use system or even for high performance computing through overclocking."

I think you baught wisely.

[JohnnyX]

Actually it was a toss up between the Toshiba and the HP that I decided to go with.

HP Pavillion ze4805us with the Athlon XP-M processor ... the Toshiba had the Intel celeron ... all other specs comparable other than that

Can't find that model. :confused:

I love HP/Compaq hardware. Sold it by the van load for many years.

Happy Computing! :)

[quartermaster]

As with most things, what you should have always depends on something. The athlons tend to give more bang for the buck; many of them come unlocked so overclockers are given free reign and the 2500+ specifically is often regarded as the best value CPU on the market. For a laptop, the centrino standard usually offers the best portability due to the little extras like 802.11g wireless and more sophisticated methods of power saving than the Athlon series.

I wonder...has anyone here ever tried a transmeta CPU? The datasheets are quite impressive, but I haven't found any benchmarks to compare with.

As an added thought, i have a P4 (Northwood, pre HT) and i find my system tends to hang quite horribly in Windows XP, not too bad in Windows 2000, and very rarely in Fedora Core (GNU/linux). This probably has a lot more to do with the fact that my PC was cheap at the time and having looked inside, i find nothing but cost cutting. That said, most people with properly built computers don't suffer this problem but just a small red light for you. Come to think of it the Northwood processors are well out of date now and have been replaced by much more efficient architectures.

[pgm316]

I got the 2500+ better than the 2600+ as it has bigger cache and core speed is slower, just 1800 mhz so good for the overclocking as Gingerfist says.

Could argue Intel is better but you get more for your money with AMD so it usually an easy decision :)

[WhiteWizard]

Yeah buy intel :D

[quartermaster]

Speaking of benchmarks, I found this comparison table and analysis that i find quite interesting.
benchmarks for various CPUs (http://www.vanshardware.com/reviews/2004/04/040405_efficeon/040405_efficeon.htm)

[Hui Lai]

At work i have a pentium 4 1.7 gigahertz and at home i have a AMD XP 3000+ clocked at 2.17ghtz. I have to say that for the lower frontend bus of the AMD, it blazes! I've had both processors and personally like the AMD better. Cheaper, runs a bit cooler, and a little faster. IMHO

-Hui

[hongkongfuey]

Just recently purchased a laptop with Athlon XP-M processor as opposed to one with Intel Pentium 4 .....

Wise choice or not??

it's a bit late to be asking! ;)

I'm a big AMD fan myself - definitly better value for money in most contexts.

The Intel Centrino chipsets are pretty decent for laptops if you need all the facilities (WiFi, Bluetooth etc). If not, then AMD is the route I would pick. For desktops, Althlon64 stamps on the Pentium4 in many newer games (Doom3 being the classic example). For mathematical applications P4 still has the edge, although that may change when 64bit XP becomes available.

[Cain]

The AMD rules!!! Top notch perfomance, low price ;)

|Cain|

[burungkol]

Hi kickchick!

AMD is more prone to overheating especially if you would overclock it, so make sure you've got extra fans (well, not for laptops) on it if you're living in a warm region, but as the other guys said, you get more bang for your buck.
It is also cheaper than intel cpu's, you could get as much as half the price off for the same speed. On the other hand, AMD motherboards costs much more than intel bords...but not that much.
From my experience though, video quality is a bit better when i'm using intel processors(using the same video card).

hope this helps. :D

[Sanitarium]

Intels have more raw speed, not just in mhz but in media applications like converting video files etc.

AMD on the other hand are cheaper and more overclockable. They're also better for games.

I haven't seen any benchmarks for the Athlon 64 against the 3ghz+ P4 for media, so the situation may have changed. But the last time I checked, Pentiums were better for encoding/decoding and stuff.

But to be honest I think the difference is marginal for the normal PC user. Price is most important. And if you get a 3000+ rated processor, you aren't gonna see either gaming or media stuff being paticularly slow.

[DonDuuk]

I like athlons cos they're cheaper

[Yukimushu]

Athlon chips do more operations in a clockcycle. Whilst Pentium chips do less operations in the clockcycle, but performs them faster.

I personally stick with Athlon chips. Ive just ordered myself an Athlon64 3400+ (runs at 2.2ghz but out performs a P4 3.4gig) which should be here either tomorrow or the day after :D

[KickChick]

Hi kickchick!

AMD is more prone to overheating especially if you would overclock it, so make sure you've got extra fans (well, not for laptops) on it if you're living in a warm region, but as the other guys said, you get more bang for your buck.



The laptop does get quite HOT come to think of it :eek:

... but I can always purchase a "lapinator"! :)

[Yukimushu]

AMD's aren't more prone to overheating! If you've got a headsink and fan ontop of it; and you don't live in an oven, then you should be fine!

[Yukimushu]

Actually it was a toss up between the Toshiba and the HP that I decided to go with.

HP Pavillion ze4805us with the Athlon XP-M processor ... the Toshiba had the Intel celeron ... all other specs comparable other than that

Wise choice over the Celeron thats for sure... Celerons are Intel's budget CPU which are generally alot slower than a Pentium or an Athlon running at the same clockspeed.

[dfilson]

In my ever so humble opinion I think for the most part it's just dumb luck which is the better choice. No matter what piece of hardware you are comparing between stable manufacturers you are going to find people who will tell you that their prefered brand is best and give you reasons why. In your particular case, AMD and Intel both make very good CPUs. And unless you are runnings applications that are highly mathmatically intensive you probably won't notice much difference between either one. Also, you are just as likely to get a bum chip from either manufacturer that doesn't preform up to their publicly stated benchmarks. Anyway, to more specifically answer your question I don't think there was a wrong choice in your decision, either CPU will serve you well.

[Cain]

That's right but the AMD cpu's have a much better value for money than intel considering their price ;)

|Cain|