Duron, Athlon...which one???

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Basslord1124

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After my final decision on what mobo (Asus A7A266), the question now lies with what processor. My mobo supports either Duron or Athlon processors up to 1.2 GHz and I'll probably shoot for a 1.2. But is there really much difference between the Duron or Athlon performance wise? Not much difference price wise I've seen. Any AMD peeps wish to give me some info or recommendations. Or hey if there are any posts within the boards please let me know...I didn't even think about searching the posts for this one, sorry :(
 
If you can afford the extra couple dollars then DEFINETLY get the T-Bird!!
 
I would suggest the Athlon. I replaced a Duron with an Athlon in my household computer and it runs much faster. Athlons are superior processors.
 
The Duron is a SWEET processor for the price if you're building a cheap system. Very nice indeed.

Of course the Athlon is better, the duron by design is a scaled down athlon, much like the Celeron II is a scaled down version of the Pentium III.

Slackmaster 2000
 
Prices look something like this:


$91 - Athlon 1.4GHz 266 FSB
$99 - Athlon 1.4GHz 200 FSB
$84 - Athlon 1.33GHz 266 FSB
$83 - Athlon 1.3GHz 200 FSB
$81 - Athlon 1.2GHz 266 FSB
$84 - Athlon 1.2GHz 200 FSB
$76 - Athlon 1.13GHz 266 FSB
$76 - Athlon 1.1GHz 200 FSB
$72 - Athlon 1GHz 266 FSB
$71 - Athlon 1GHz 200 FSB Sock A

$84 - Duron 1.3GHz
$64 - Duron 1.2GHz
$59 - Duron 1.1GHz
$45 - Duron 1GHz

If I was only planning on spending about $65 on a CPU, I'd get the Duron 1.2GHz over the Athlons under 1.2GHz.

If I was really going cheap, the 1GHz Duron looks pretty good for $45.

If you can afford more, I'd still opt for the Athlons, though.
 
If Duron's are built anything like Celerons, then that means they did away with the L2 cache, and minimized the L1 cache, which basically means slower processing for most apps. Those caches act as first level memory buffers for processor commands. Ive got a free version of Pro tools running on one of my 98 machines, and while it runs, it crashes frequently. Then I read that pro tools should not be run with a Celeron (courtesy of digidesign). With that said, I imagine that other music software will be affected as well. Whil it might not crash, those L1 and L2 cahes are probably utilized for better continuity, thus lower performance with the Durons.

In Durons favor though (again if they are anything like Celerons), the architeture is probably identicle to the Athlon's with the exeption of the caches.

hope this helps
 
The Celeron and Duron both have full speed L1 and L2 cache. However, they both have less cache than their Pentium and Athlon counterparts.

The Celeron II has 128K L2 cache, and 32K L1 cache. The PIII boasts 32K L1 cache and 256K L2 cache.

The Duron has 128K L2 cache, and 64K L1 cache. The Athlon uses 128K L1 cache and 256K L2 cache.

It could be argued that the larger L1 of the AMD is one of the reasons it beats Intel, but there are so many design differences between Intel and AMD processors that individual specifications.

At any rate, the Duron is an Athlon and the Celeron II is a PIII aside from cache sizes and bus speed requirements, which are internal implementation issues that will have absolutely no impact on the rest of the system. In other words, the machine utilizes both the Celeron and the PIII in the same exact manner and there are no incompatibility issues to worry about. If PT doesn't recommend the Celeron, it's a performance issue.

Slackmaster 2000
 
just went to both amd and intel sites, and I stand corrected (probably shoulda done that before I started posting!)

out of curiosity, what do youy do for a living slackmaster?
 
Well, I am a software enginner/quality assurance engineer/manager/system administrator/network technician/telephony technician/technical writer/teacher/webmaster/generic computer bitch all rolled into one. My technical title is Computer Systems Analyst but it's not so technical because senior management just made it up. Actually, they orginally called me Computer Services Expert but that made me laugh and laugh and laugh so they changed it.

Basically what I do all day is this:

1) Screw around on hr.com right up to the point where I have to quit or I won't get all my other shit done.
2) Help some jackass print something.
3) Help some other jackass print something.
4) Explain to someone why I can't retrieve the document that they forgot to save.
5) Restart some shitty microsoft service.
6) Perform managerial activities (I am technically a manager. How many people do I manage in my department? There ARE no people in my department, haha!) like writing SOP's, validation plans, etc.
7) Restart some other shitty microsoft service.
8) Help some jackass print.
9) Do math for somebody.
10) Think about the software projects I'd like to work on if I had some large blocks of time. Think of good excuses as to why I haven't had time to work on the software projects I'm supposed to work on.
11) Think about cleaning my office because it's sort of starting to stink.
12) Feel guilty because i can't seem to get anything done.
13) Run a line because some jackass decides to move his computer waaaaay over there where it's really inconvenient to run a line.
14) Write long winded purhasing proposals. Asking for funding is an art form.
15) Help some jackass print something.
16) Hang up on some asshole telemarketer trying to sell printer cartridges.
17) Feel like an idiot because I can't explain to somebody in simple detail why exactly MS Word just crashed. Can't I simply look at the code or something? Horf!
18) Tell somebody that no I can't tell them which computer they should buy for home because no matter what computer they buy, it won't work right unless they pay me to stand next to it.
19) Worry that I'm ruining my career which should strictly in software engineering. I've been here for almost 7 years. I can't get out...help me....help me....help me....
20) Listen to some new idea my boss has for a software project, as if he has no idea of the other 5 software projects I'm working on concurrently all of which are months or years into production and hardly being worked on because some jackass can't print.

:)

Slackmaster 2000
 
goodness, this has been a popular post today...

got plenty of emails for replies to this post today (I was kinda hoping for more replies to my other one :D ) but I've already reached the decision in regards to Athlon vs. Duron. It's Athlon definitely. And plus I've decided to stick with my original decision in terms of speed which was a 1.2. So to summarize it, I'll most definitely get an Athlon TBird 1.2Ghz 266 FSB. Try to change my mind and I'll slap ya hehe :D (sorry been hasseling sooo much with this decision that I am almost tired of looking at processors). And I'll probably get it with the heatsink and fan...if I can find one that's reasonably priced...cheapest I've seen has been $115 (on pricewatch). I should look on newegg...haven't looked there yet. Any other computer places I could check out for low prices? And if I ever come to a conclusion that I should've went with that XP 1.5Ghz that you suggested Slack I'll take you out to dinner and pay for it all ;) Does Hooters sound cool?
 
NewEgg actually advertises on pricewatch. I just placed a large order with them for the machine I'm putting together for my step-daughter for her birthday. They're an ok outfit I think. Today anways.... :)

Slackmaster 2000
 
hehe

slackmaster

thats about one of the funniest damn things Ive ever read. Ive been in the exact same boat now going on 2 years. to the T. its funny how in this field, your job descrption never seems to match those of your job duties.
 
That's a great post Slack. While I don't have the software creditials you do, your day sounds very similar to mine, doing helpdesk stuff for a telecom company. God help me if I didn't just have to run up two flight of stairs because someone couldn't tell their right mouse button from the left - "oh I thought they did the same thing".

YES THAT'S WHY I JUST TOLD YOU THREE TIMES ON THE PHONE TO DOUBLE CLICK YOUR LEFT MOUSE BUTTON YOU STUPID BIOOTCHHHH!!!!!! AAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRGGGGGHHHHHH!!!!!

Two more hours and I can leave... two more hours... two more hours....
 
Slackmaster2K said:
NewEgg actually advertises on pricewatch. I just placed a large order with them for the machine I'm putting together for my step-daughter for her birthday. They're an ok outfit I think. Today anways.... :)

Slackmaster 2000
Click to expand...

Yeah newegg is pretty good....as long as you get all your parts in working-shape. They can be a bit of a pain if something arrives DOA.
 
The new XP athlons are what you should be going for if you're going Athlon. Anything lower, and the Duron's a better bet. The price-performance ratio of the Durons are superb. 1.2 is a pretty in-between speed, at that speed you should be looking at the Duron, not the T-bird.

Just my opinion.

Sang
 
Sangram said:
The new XP athlons are what you should be going for if you're going Athlon. Anything lower, and the Duron's a better bet. The price-performance ratio of the Durons are superb. 1.2 is a pretty in-between speed, at that speed you should be looking at the Duron, not the T-bird.

Just my opinion.

Sang
Click to expand...

Huh? Sorry man, I you are way off base. The Duron is NOT a better bet considering that a same speed T-Bird is roughly only $10 more and is perfoms much better.
 
Well well

Greetings,

Given that the processor is a huge part of your sustem, why not buy XP? They are a major push by AMD so its not like they are gonna go obselete in the next 15 years. An athlon XP 1.6 is right near the best value you can get per $.

on a related topic, does anybody else here think that hardware is far outpacing software these days? Toms hardware overclocked a pentium 2.2 to 3ghz. Thats insane. Stick in a good chipselt and a gig of ram and when do you think that this computer would be "Slow" for any realworld task? I know you might ask it to manipulate 10 gigs of 24/96 audio, but unless you get a mainframe thats never going to happen instantly.

I don;t know, I'm torn between getting althon 2000+ and a soyo dragon + with a gig of crucial ram, and NEVER have to worry about it again (for the rest of my natural life), and build up peripherals slowly. Or get an economical solution early and have some extra cash right now.

I mean, i can recycle keyboads, monitors, mouse, speakers, LAN, case, HD, CD, floppy.

All ya need extra to go home recording is a 24x burner, and a good soundcard.

When will software catch up to hardware?
SirRiff
 
Re: Well well

SirRiff said:
Greetings,

Given that the processor is a huge part of your sustem, why not buy XP? They are a major push by AMD so its not like they are gonna go obselete in the next 15 years. An athlon XP 1.6 is right near the best value you can get per $.
Click to expand...

For that comment here's what ya get: *slap* *slap* :D Hopefully no one will report me for abuse or anything. Actually this is a discussion I've had numerous times here as well as on other message boards. People trying to convince me go the Athlon XP route and it's driving me crazy ughh LOL. The thing that is really hindering me from the decision is pretty much "will my motherboard support anything higher than a 1.2?" It says 500mhz to 1.2Ghz+. I want to think the plus means it'll accept more but I'm afraid to test it to find out. Mobo is an Asus A7A266. That and I kind of have the needs vs speed thing going. Do I really need a 1.6Ghz processor when I've heard people with a much slower processor get track counts around what I might average? I've even asked close friends of mine and they felt for my needs a 1.2 is fine. Like I said if it's possible that my mobo might take larger than a 1.2 I might consider getting one of the slower XP's. Besides I am just a poor musician :(
 
Basslord,

if it for 1.2+ AMD processors then it probably will support the XP processors... but most boards that don't "officially" support the XP's require bios updates for anything over the XP 1.4Ghz.
 
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