Intel P4 570J - the fastest ever CPU, but is it really a ferrari? (Intel Pentium 4 570J 3.8 GHz)

Member Name: ecolier

Product:	Intel Pentium 4 570J 3.8 GHz
Date:	04/10/09 (24 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Fast speed

Disadvantages: Poor reliability, Overheats a lot, Eats electricity like nobody's business

On 12/11/2009, this processor would reach 5 years old. 5 years is a very, very long time in computers - almost a lifetime, certainly 2 generations. Yet this processor still holds a record in the Intel consumer retail release - it is the fastest EVER clock frequency. At 3.8Ghz, or 3800Mhz it is still to be beaten in today's world of 2, 3 or 4 cores. But is it really that good? Is high frequency really the way forward? I am afraid not.... read on!

---the BASICS---

The Intel Pentium 5 570J 3.8Ghz is a socket 775 CPU. It has a cache of 1Mb and front side bus of 533Mhz. It supports hyper-threading, which means the CPU shows up as 2 on the computer (but is not actually dual-core).

---my EXPERIENCE---

I did not actually take this CPU out and plug it in another computer for comparison - it basically stayed in the same computer for the whole 4 years that I have owned it. The PC's specification is: 1Gb DDR2 RAM, 250Gb hard disk, and 512Mb Sapphire ATi Radeon 9600 display card. It performs relatively fast (during the first year) - after that it was consistently slowing and overheating.

The worst bit of this CPU is that it overheats a LOT. The whole computer case would get hot and I would have to switch it off after a while.

The computer did not work well (it breaks down very often - BSOD) - whether it was due to the CPU I can't really comment - but what I can say about the CPU is that it is completely out of touch after only 2 years and most modern programmes would be slow.

---CONCLUSION---

When I first bought this computer with the fastest processor ever made I thought I had struck gold and I would never need to replace my computer. How wrong was I?? The computer now sits in isolation and my new computer in its place. The new one is faster / more responsive, uses less electricity (95W vs 115W) , is smaller (45nm vs 90nm) and has nearly 4 times more transistors than the predecessor (456 million vs 125 million). My new processor is the Core 2 Quad Q8200. Its clock speed you ask? Only a measly 2.33Ghz.

Summary: Wouldn't recommend this processor. Consider a multi-core instead.

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