Celeron Processors (1 Viewer)

[Ken Chan]

Such an emphatic absolute statement:

(except for brand-name recognizability and having a warm, fuzzy feeling for owning a "genuine Intel" -- oo-oo-ooh! I'm impressed!) for anyone to have to buy an Intel-based system

For stuff like video encoding (multiple threads, deep pipelines, little branching, specialized ops) the fastest Pentium beats the fastest Athlon by a clear margin.

Would such a system cost more? Probably. (For the actual chips, the prices at the high end aren't that different; and at the moment, the 3200+ is a little more than the 3.0C) Is it worth it? That depends on what your time is worth.

//Ken

 

[John_Berger]

(multiple threads, deep pipelines, little branching, specialized ops)

...but all of those will only be of value of the software that is performing the functions specified is written specifically to take advantage of those functions. The "specilized" functions of the newer Pentuim chipsets won't mean much unless the program is written to take advantage of those functions.

So, to just make a blanket statement that "for video encoding Pentium beats Athlon" is somewhat disingenuous. There are other factors that come into play.

 

[John_Bonner]

My homemade system: AMD 1.2GHz on an Epox MB with Win 2K professional has been running rock solid since August of 2001 when I put it together. My next venture is into the world of HTPC and I'll again use AMD.

A quick look over at Newegg shows an Intel P4 2.0GHz for $162. An AMD XP 2400 (also 2.0GHz) is $86. Almost half of the Intel's price.

Oh well, Keith_R good luck with your new system and enjoy it!

 

[Jonny K]

Maybe once you could say that AMD wasn't as stable or reliable, but things change.

Today, both AMD and Intel put out awesome products. Both are very reliable, and both are high performance. The only difference is that AMD costs half as much.

You do the math.


Jonny K.

 

[Alf S]

I'm in the same boat as Keith...

Anybody have anything good/bad to say about the new E Machines sold at Best Buy?? I've heard that they've made quite a turnaround (for the better) than years past?

Alfer

 

[DeepakJR]

I am currently using a eMachine, model is T2200 I believe. It really runs great and gaming is pretty good. Only complaint is that sometimes I have to unplug usb devices and plug them back in, im not sure if its Win XP or the mobo, besides thats, its all good. But the systems from gotapex still run cheaper or the saem price as the eMachines.

L8rz,
Deepak Jr.

 

[Ken Chan]

to just make a blanket statement that "for video encoding Pentium beats Athlon" is somewhat disingenuous

Even though that's not really what I said, suppose I qualify it with "many common video encoders".

On the flip side, you did simply say "no reason" for an Intel system. If a guy has an MPEG encoder that works faster on the fastest Pentium system he can get than on the fastest Athlon, and that was important to the guy, that would be "a reason", wouldn't it?

//Ken

 

[Brad kl]

I have an old PC hooked up to my HDTV right now, I don't use it as my primary DVD player, but it has a DVD drive and plays DVDs (and compressed AVI files) flawlessly.

and it is a Celeron 333 which is overclocked to 550MHz. I would imagine a processor which is 4 times that speed would run beautifully.


anyone who tells you you can't play DVDs with a celeron 2.2 is apparently either misinformed, or making things up.

 

[John_Berger]

On the flip side, you did simply say "no reason" for an Intel system.

Fine. Then I'll qualify mine by adding "there is no reason for non-specialized purposes".

 

[AjayM]

For home computing AMD usually has more than enough for what most people need. Talking about stability and performance and ignore the value/$$$ side of things Intel will win by a clear margin. However very few of us can ignore the value/$$$ side of things and that's where compromise comes into play. I've used and experienced both since pretty much the beginning of time, and I'll still stick with Intel unless the budget crunching starts to get severe.

Andrew

 

[Ken Chan]

clock speeds are a small part of the equation. Anyone who makes a determination based solely on clock speed is cheating themselves.

Sure, although it may not be as small as you make it out to be, when comparing processors with similar overall architectures. And it's not like I didn't mention the other major parts of the equation both times (some later in the sentence you quoted from).

//Ken