AMD Vs. Intel processor

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brzilian said:
That may be the case now, but guess what - AMD is not profitable!

Regardless of whether they make better chips or not, they can't continue to do business the way they're doing it by undercutting Intel's prices. Sooner or later they're gonna go belly up or bump up their prices to continue to exist as a company.
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Unless you saw the financial statements of AMD, you cannot assume they are losing money solely by undercutting the competition. Only if they have the exact same overhead, selling, and general administrative expenses as Intel will they have to face the possibility of losing money.

Considering I have never seen an Athlon commercial, or some bozo retail establishment try to push a consumer loaded AMD, or someone on the home shopping networks trying to push the brand makes me think that they probably don't have Intel's budget.

Cy
 
I like AMD cpus because they are better...

lol, just kidding

Significant differences as I understand (all of this could be wrong)

AMD has had better floating point processing (complex math operations) this over Intel for some time now. I think AMD has more physical fpu registers in the cpu. These sort of operations are used extensively in 3D gaming and any reasonable audio processing.

I think Intel has more cache bandwidth than AMD. The connection between the most local cache and the core is a fatter pipe. By contrast AMD is known for their more coprehensive cache designs. I don't think audio needs anything fancy for cache, just enough so the plug ins aren't hunting around in main memory all the time. I would bet both company's strategies are well enough matched.

AMD used to have better memory performance at a concumer level, but I think they are about the same now.

AMDs do more per clock than Intels due to architechture differences. One nice thing about clock speed is that your local caches are usually timed by it, so a higher clock means higher bandwidth to the cache (and higher memory developement costs I would think). So the Intels should benefit from their brute force clock speed approach.

The big issue for audio is stability and bus timing. Intel seems to have this category sewn up, especially after all the via bs.

I suppose someone could make an argument that with n plugins loaded, all doing floating point math, the AMD would have the afvantage. The Intels are no slouch in fpu performacne. The fastest Quake III machines had typically been Intels, so who knows.
 
I've tried both AMD(with AMD chipset) and Intel(with Intel chipset) as my DAW. The time I spent swearing at my computer vs. using it to make music has drastically reduced since switching to Intel and I will never go back.

However, I do appreciate what AMD has done to keep Intel's prices under control.
 
erichenryus said:
AMD chipset
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Isn't that VIA? Or am I way off?

The VIA-chipset was horrible before, but it's been improved alot. With the latest VIA 4-in-1 driver, my computer is perfectly happy! :)
 
I think you're right moskus. By the time they finally fixed the via southbridge drivers (it was like version 34 or something!) I had spent so much time scratching my head and reinstalling my OS that it just was time to try Intel for the sake of my sanity. I do remember better stability with that final patch but that was after about 8 months of pain!

My Intel rig worked and still works completely stable right out of the blocks, with the exception of Kontakt DXi which should be grounds for a class action pain and suffering lawsuit against NI.
 
From my experiance, either CPU works fine with almost everything. Currently the two PCs I use for recording both use AMD cpus (Athlon XP 2000 and 2200) and VIA chipsets (266A and 333). I was very surprised when I actually had a dropout in cakewalk last weekend - the first I've had since upgradeding from P3 to Athlon - but I think the problem may have been from a plug-in I was using.
 
The last time I emailed MAudio about compatibility with an AMD processor, they told me that if I must use AMD, then use an Athlon...

I've heard others make the point that Intel is the 'standard' (although this may be changing now...), and therefore, most hardware/software manufacturers will, if nothing else, test their stuff with an Intel...I can see the logic of this...

That being said, my AMD is running pretty good with my Delta (after months of tweaking, of course)...

Tom
 
Okay, then i must say...
All I can say is, we got happy users on both camp. Now it's just a matter of taste, prices, reliability, subjective oppinion, compatibility issue, temperature, noises,...


...were those that making this is a good topic, eh :confused:
 
The real issue in the AMD vs Intel discussion is the chipset, not the processor.

Nearly all the AMD processors have been supported by VIA chipsets in the past.

VIA chipsets suck. They sucked back then in K6 days, they suck now, and will continue to suck in the future. The VIA approach to fixing problems is releasing yet-another-chipset. Look at the version release in the 4in1 drivers... My gods... how many damn times will it take VIA to get it close to right???

Apparently VIA reverse engineered the chipset functions, rather than license them from Intel. VIA has long had the (deserved) reputation of dorking up the USB bus. Logitech had a bold statement on their web site about this, but it is since removed. Mostly likely a consequence of being sued by VIA (who is being sued by Intel).

VIA got caught with their pants down with the PCI disk transfer bottleneck by some German researchers. They hooked a logic analyzer on the bus, and found the VIA chipsets were choking on the disk burst transfer rate. Intel chipsets were miles faster in the disk performance. SoundBlaster cards are pieces of shit in their own right (IMO), but combined with a VIA chipset, they can be a real nightmare. Two kiddies playing in the same PCI bus sandbox, and neither wants to share nicely.

I own a computer consulting firm, have a ton of letters after my name, and spent almost a quarter century at IBM as an engineer. The VIA chipset has been a chronic nightmare as long as I've used them.

I'm hoping to find out if there are any nForce chipset users here who are having success. The NVidia chipset appears to be the only way to use an AMD without all the VIA problems. I have used the AMD 760 chipset in ABit KG7 boards without all these problems. Too bad that chipset died. But.. the nForce looks to be "the" solution for AMD powered boards.

It ain't the AMD processor, it's the chipset that supports it.
 
Another alternative to the nforce is the SIS 745. Been running an XP2000 for several months now with no problems.
 
Fans

Temperature is another topic.

AMD boards that retain the 4-hole mounting system around the processor socket can use a variety of quality heat sink units. Some of the manufacturers were eliminating the holes, so enthusiasts eliminated those boards from their purchase lists. Voila... the holes are back.

I use the Alpha PAL8045 assembly on all my client machines. The cost is $50 including fan, and I buy from www.heatsinkfactory.com because they are always in stock. The Alpha is a huge sink and premium quality.

The trick to fans for silent operation as the Panasonic Panaflo series. These run in a sealed hydraulic bearing and are very quiet. I use the H1A model for the Alpha heatsink, and get a typical 13C temp delta with an XP-2100 processor. I use the L1A low volume Panaflos for case and hard drive rack fans, as they are virtually silent.

If you have noisy fans, you can switch the +12v and +5 wiring around in the fan jack, and run the fan at 5 volts. This slows down the fan, reduces air flow, and significantly drops the noise level.

I was using ABit KG7 boards in my client machines, and removed the silly 40mm fan on the Northbridge chip. I use a big, passive Zalman heatsink instead. No noise, no moving parts, and no bearing failure after 3 months. They are $6 or so and require removing the system board for mounting, same as with the Alpha PAL8045 mentioned above.
 
Ummmm...wow....

bgavin:

Thanks for the info...

Ever think about working for NASA? :)

I know this is off topic, but I'm wondering what your (and others) thoughts are about Epox chipsets with AMD processors? I've got an 8KTA3 Pro waiting in the wings along with my AMD 1800 waiting to be installed...

Just ignore me if this too far off topic...

Thanks again for the info...

Tom
 
This is being written on the 8KTA3Pro board. I'm running a 1.4 GHz T-Bird, Alpha PAL8045 with a corner hacked off to clear the !@#$% board capacitors.

I prefer the ABit KT7a board for this level of technology, simply because I don't have to saw up my Alpha heat sinks to get it to fit. Other than that, the EpoX board works well with Win2000/SP3.

I'm running Turtle Beach Santa Cruz, Matrox G450, 3C905 network, an ancient Adaptec ISA bus scsi card for my scanner. Temp delta on this machine is 14C (28C ambient, 42C processor), using Arctic Silver II heat paste. HSF fan is the Panaflo H1A. Case is the Antec SX840. I don't do any USB, so cannot speculate on this board and VIA chipset being FUBAR or not.
 
You actually hacked a corner off your heatsink just to make it fit???!!

OMIGOSH...I would be terrified of doing something like that...

Talk about 'thinking outside of the box'...

Well...

I'm just gonna go ahead and try and install this bugger, cause it's the only thing I got for now...

Thanks for your thoughts...

Tom
 
hows this for outside the box...

There's a very well-known and IMO amazing producer here in Knoxville who modifies Avalon preamps because he believes they're set up wrong from the factory.
Hows that for thinking outside the box..

I'd never stick my hand inside a high-dollar pre like that, but he makes great recordings so whatever works i guess.
 
I bought a ton of intel stock at 15 and change.
So go with intel
:)

Just wanted to share.
 
I spent a whole f****** year trying to get my Amd setup to work with my soundblaster audigy (now replaced by a 1010lt), before switching to intel. Haven't ever had a problem since. Maybe the new amds are cool but the old K7VZA motherboard I had sucked! I would never switch back to amd.
 
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