Pentium D vs. Athlon X2 - Equivalency?

[Legion Kreinak]

Okay, I've heard in the past that a 3.4 Pentium D is comparable to a 2.4 Athlon X2. Is the "exchange rate" among the parts a clean GHz?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16819103562

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16819116212

Top is Athlon X2, bottom Pentium D. Both of those cost $322. The way I see them measuring up is this:

Customer Reviews - The Pentium runs hot and requires a new heatsink and fan. It runs multiple heavy programs easily. Athlon is recommended a heatsink (guessing if you OC it) and boots up things VERY quick - people couldn't even slow their CPUs down.

Athlon Core is a Manchest, the Intel is a Smithfield. Not sure which is better, if it matters.

Athlon is 2.0 GHz, Pentium 3.0 GHz

Athlon FSB is 1 GHz, Pentium is 800 MHz (big difference, anyone?)

The L1 Cache is 64+64 KB on the Athlon, 12+16 KB on the Pentium (does this matter? Athlon seems way ahead here.

The L2 Cache is 2 x 512kb on the Athlon, 2 x 1 MB on the Pentium (Pent seems to win out here...what gives?)

Both have the same process type.

"Hyper-Transport" is supported by the Athlon. I can only guess this mirrors the Pentium's "Hyper-Threading", which isn't supported here.

BOTH have 64-bit support, so the idea of buying an Athlon solely for the 64-pit OSs coming out is off.

Both have a heatsink and fan, Athlon has one or two extra things under the multimedia instruction catergory, and they have three year warranties.

Okay, so from what I see, these parts are basically identical, and it's more a matter of preference. I don't see much showing that Athlon rules out over Pentium in terms of performance. If it is better it seems to me that it's pretty nominal.

 

[Siphon]

the clock speed of the athlon is 2.0 ghz, however, the performace speed of the athlon is at 3800+. this means that although it runs at a clock speed of 2.0, it is actually comparable to an intel running a 3.8 ghz. this low clock speed, but higher performance speed is what makes athlons so cool when they run; intels tend to heat up when running at the same performance. since it runs cooler, you can overclock the cpu to a higher clock speed which obviously will bring it up to a higher performance speed. also, the athlon x2 is a much better cpu because the memory controller in built into the chip. on the other hand, intel pentium d's have the memory controller somewhere else on the mobo. since the memory controller is on the mobo, it will take longer for it to communicate with the cpu. you may have also heard about the dual core duel where amd challenged intel to compare their cpus head to head, but intel has still not accepted the challenege.

 

[jac006]

hahaha.... the difference... quality... Intel THEMSELVES said that the D was rushed into production to compete with Amd's X2. Intel just slapped two prescott cores on top of each other and gave it a new name. Amd is a totally difference story. Amd's own on-die memory controller is the main difference, espepcially in games. And yeah, HEAT. The intel cpu, the prescott, is a really hot cpu. Give it a brother and it's like hellish-hot. Amd, on the other hand, still runs rather cool. Hyper-transport technology is A high-speed interconnection between integrated circuits. Code named Lightning Data Transport and developed by AMD and others, the HyperTransport I/O Link Specification defines a protocol and electrical interface between the CPU, memory and peripheral devices. It provides a peak rate of 1.6GHz per wire pair and supports a total bandwidth of 12.8 Gbytes/sec.

So, in others words, it has nothing to do with hyper threading. Nothing. It's just fast communication between devices. DOn't get this confused.

HOpe this helps...

 

[Jamxx]

I was tellin' you man... AMD's the way to go!

 

[Legion Kreinak]

I was tellin' you man... AMD's the way to go!

Yeah, but I had to see why for myself.

Is there a big difference between the 1 GHz FSB of AMD and the 800 MHz FSB of Intel?

I guess I'm just nervous about the idea of an AMD, since I've never used one before. No one I know has one, either, so I can't even sample what the computer is capable of.

 

[alvino]

AMD Athlon X2's are true dual-core processors, not like the quickly rigged up Pentium D's. However, if you like Intel and want a true dual core, wait for the Intel Pentium D 9xx series. Those are Intel's true dual-cores and they're coming out in January.

 

[Legion Kreinak]

Wait, clockspeed is 2.0 GHz for the Athlon, but if the model is listed as 3800+ that means it has the performance of a Pentium 3.8 GHz? That sounds a bit off to me. What's the clockspeed of the Pentiums?

 

[bill gisse]

Read in the paper this morning that Intel's name and logo is changing, Pentium is disappearing . New CPU's are to be called "Core Solo" and "Core Duo" rather than Pentium 4 and Pentium M as they are now. Also read the otheer day there are rumors of 4 core and 8 core version CPUs in the mill. Now all they have to do is make them affordable.Suspect new sockets and new motherboards will soon follow.

 

[TRDCorolla1]

Whoa, what the...?!?! I'll do some research on it. That should prove interesting.

 

[jac006]

Wait, clockspeed is 2.0 GHz for the Athlon, but if the model is listed as 3800+ that means it has the performance of a Pentium 3.8 GHz? That sounds a bit off to me. What's the clockspeed of the Pentiums?

Clock speed has nothing to do with anything. lol... actually, yes it does, but, in real-world benchmarking, a freakin 2.6ghz fx-57 kills a 3.8ghz pent. 4. Look up some benchmarks my friend...