Great value, brilliant performance (AMD Athlon (Thunderbird))

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Product:	AMD Athlon (Thunderbird)
Date:	29/11/01 (21 review reads)
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Advantages: Great performance, stable and wide compatibility, great value

Disadvantages: slower clock speed than P4, XP labelling is confusing

I've never seen a tv advert for "AMD" processors?

I was thinking about this the other day, whilst installing my new Athlon processor. I'm sure everyone's seen plenty of Intel adverts, with the technicians in bunny suits running around, spangly music and the famous Intel "jingle" played against the "Intel inside" logo.

Yet my PC doesn't have "Intel inside". It has an AMD Athlon 1.2 GHZ DDR 266mhz fsb processor (what a mouthful) that cost a measly £90. The equivalent Intel Pentium III or IV chip would have cost twice or three times that amount, and would be a less capable processor.

AMD has put Intel under serious pressure, both at aftermarket retail, and OEM system integrators. AMD has provided these two markets with a better performing, cheaper alternative to the Pentium processor.

Why is the AMD processor superior to the Intel offering?

AMD: 9 instructions per cycle
P4: 6 instructions per cycle

This means that the AMD processor can process more information per clock cycle.

AMD: 256k cache x 2
P4: 256k x1, 32k x 1

The AMD processor has more on-chip cache, which makes for much quicker processing.

AMD: front side bus -266mhz
P4: front side bus - 400mhz

The P4 steals the show here, but less chip cache and less instructions per cycle still means the Athlon is quicker.

AMD: Dual Data Rate memory (DDR)
P4: Rambus memory

Though the Rambus memory is quicker, it is more expensive and less widely available. This often means that Athlon based systems will have 256mb or 512mb of system memory as standard, whilst Intel based system have only 128mb due to cost cutting.

AMD: 3DNow!, enhanced 3D Now! and SSE
P4: SSE2

The Intel chips also pulls ahead here, with an extension of the original SSE instruction set which relates to multi-media operations, internet browsing, video playba
ck,etc.

But the new Athlon XP processor includes an enhanced instruction set which levels the difference.

In terms of real world performance, the Athlon is usually 30% faster than the P4. The P4 pulls ahead when running multimedia applications, due to the SSE 2 instructions, but for 3D applications, office productivity and gaming the Athlon is quicker.

You can get the Athlon in several flavours:

Athlon 200mhz front side bus (max 1.2ghz)
Athlon 266mhz front side bus (max 1.4ghz)
Athlon XP 266mhz front side bus (1.53ghz so far..)

The 200mhz front size bus Athlon is still widely supported but not a good value option for someone upgrading, as the 266mhz front size bus (f.s.b.)version costs just £5 more!

Many Socket A motherboards support both 200mhz and 266mhz f.s.b. chips, but what you buy depends on your budget and choice of memory. If you have a DDR compatible motherboard then get the 266mhz f.s.b. chip. If you have a PC-133 memory compatible motherboard then also get the 266mhz f.s.b. chip, 'cause it will run fine! - and if you upgrade your memory and motherboard in the future, you can use your existing chip.

The XP processor has caused some confusion, as AMD have decided to rename their chips according to equivalent performance with Intel. Because the AMD chips are more efficient, AMD state - for example, that their 1.53ghz chip is equivalent to a P4 1.8ghz, so they call it the AMD XP 1800.

The reason for this is consumer perception of clock speed. People assume that a 1.5ghz P4 is faster than a 1.4ghz Athlon, which is wrong as the Athlon is 20% faster even though it runs 0.1ghz slower!

Apple has suffered this problem for years, and AMD didn't want to fall into the same trap, hence the renaming of the XP . Intel's P4 is up to 2ghz, whilst AMD is stuck at 1.53ghz with the new XP (but renamed 1800).

AS more applications are written for P4, the performance
gap may increase, realistically the 2ghz P4 IS faster than the XP 1800 for multimedia applications. But for many 3D applications the XP is currently quicker, especially playing games.

What about cost? This must be the biggest question for people buying new processors?

Value versus performance?

AMD Athlon 1.2ghz DDR 266mhz fsb £90
AMD Athlon 1.4ghz DDR 266mhz fsb £140
AMD XP 1800 £170
Intel Pentium 4 2 ghz £450

This gives you an idea of the cost difference! If you figure in the tiny gap if performance between the XP and the P4 then there is not contest. Also figure in the cost of the RAMBUS memory for P4 platforms, and the AMD solution is way cheaper.

Overall, I'm very happy with my Athlon, especially now that DDR memory is cheap and widely available - I paid just £56 for 512mb of Crucial 2100 DDR, a great value.

Final notes - overclocking is easy with a suitable motherboard, I use Abit's Kt-7 Lite which has great Softmenu III Bios which allows easy overclocking. Just be careful about extra cooling as Athlon's run real hot already.

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