Whats the difference between a K6-2 450 and a K6-3 450?

[vedder]

Im just curious which to buy becuase the k6-2 is a lot cheaper but is the k6-3 really that much better? thanks

[EVGTech]

k63 has an l2 cache on the chip. You should make sure yout board supports the k63. dont trust the manual check the mfg's website.

In a more practial sense k6-3's are faster then k6-2's. From my personal experience a k6-3 "feels" faster running windows then a celeron at the same speed. Game performance is a different story but a k6-3 with a decent video card will play the in game movies in AVP without stutter.

[vedder]

So if i could get a K6-2-450 for $56 or a K6-3-400 for $87 which one would you go for? Even though the k6-2 is rated faster is it really? Icq me EVGTECH 16295980 if you have icq

thanks

[OuTpaTienT]

No, please don't ICQ him, just answer him here if you're gonna. That's the whole point of this (and any) bullitin board vedder, to share information. For every one user that posts a question and has it answered, there is probably at least 5 or more people that followed the thread and could come away with an answer.

But you really toss a monkey wrench into the works by "teasing" a question then requesting a private e-mail for answer.

Oh yeah, BTW, if it were me, I'd go for the K6-III/400. I think it'd easily match the performance of a K6-2/450, plus with the "III/400" you have a very good chance of overclocking it to 450 without hassle. But OTOH, getting any K6/450(2 or III) up to 500 is quite a chore and most likey not possible.

[jad1097]

From some of the benchmarks that I have seen the K6 3-400 Is better than the K6 2-450 and almost as fast as the PIII-500 and
K6 2-500! I will be overclocking my K6 3-400 when I get some more fans. I should be able to get it to 450 or 500 and run stable. ALso get as much ram as possible. I only have 32 and that is not enough for win98.Still waiting for the price to go back to $1 a meg. Now I have a ? Can I put pc100 and pc133 sdram together with no problem?

[EVGTech]

OP is absolutly right. I know it irrtates me a great deal when i am reading a thread that doesnt have a conclusion. irratating enough when someone suggest something but there is no word back whether it worked or not. not only that but if i reply in private no one will be able to tell if you if i am full of it. you'll get a more complete answer if you keep the topic public.

there should be an option when you are starting the topic to be notified by email when someone replies. That is very usefull.

the 40 extra bucks will give you a pretty good bang for your buck but check the board and make sure it has full k63 support. the FIC 503+ claimed k63 support but when the k63 finally came out FIC said only the latest rev would support it. the earlier revs are unstable .

[This message has been edited by EVGTech (edited 12-18-1999).]

[M1pilot]

EVGtech, I agree with you on the thread portion, and I also agree with spending the extra money on a K6-3....it really is an outstanding chip. The FIC VA503+ part I don't agree with. I'm running two computers here at home, both using K6-3/450's. Both computers are using 503+ mobos. One is certified by FIC/AMD and the other has an ECN-2900 white sticker....it's quite a ways below the ECN-4503 certified number. Both comps are used heavily in Win98 apps and for gaming as well. They both have displayed no signs of instability after about seven months of 24/7 operation. The only thing I had to do to that older board was upgrade the BIOS. These are both rev 1.2a's and there have been people on this forum (and other's)using older revisions successfully with the K6-3 as well. I just don't agree with your statement that the older revisions are unstable. FIC/AMD just happened to test the mobos that were currently available at the time (4503 or O037). Obviously they can't certify earlier versions if they were'nt actually tested....that does not make them automatically unstable.

-M1pilot

[This message has been edited by M1pilot (edited 12-18-1999).]

[Toadman]

I agree with M1, my early FIC503+ w/ K6-3 450 works like a champ after a BIOS upgrade. The K6-3, although soon to be phased out, is one helluva CPU, especially in Winapps and browsing. Not shabby at gaming, but not a Celery 500 either.I get 15-20% frame rate increase in gaming over K6-2 350, and this chip just LOVES Unreal Tourney!(which uses cache) http://www.sysopt.com/forum/smile.gifIf you want to stay with a socket 7 mobo for at least a year, the K6-3 is an excellent choice, at least until nightly cold sweats require Athlon/mobo/case upgrade.

[socalgal]

SysOpt does have an option for an email reply. In the upper left corner of each thread, there is an option for

UBBFriend: Email This Page to Someone!

EDIT: Also when you post a new topic, there is the option:

Options Email Notification: emails sent to you whenever someone replies. Only registered users are eligible

Apologies for forgetting this earlier!

http://www.sysopt.com/forum/smile.gif

[This message has been edited by socalgal (edited 12-19-1999).]

[EVGTech]

Well the 1.2a that i was working with didnt work right. The board was unstable at anything past 400 Mhz. i dont think that it is simply a matter of testing. There is something about the rev of via chipset that makes the difference. I haven't found an article explaining what the trouble is. FIC has two bios's of roughly the same date available for the FIC 503+ board. One for the 4093? and then one for all the other 503+'s. only the bios for the 4093 claims full k6-3 support. the other says nothing about it. If you try to cross flash it will blank screen the system.

when we swapped out the 503+ board for the newer one the system became stable at all speeds. the old 503+ board is working fine for my roommate with a 350 mhz k6-2 right now.

Myabe the whole thing was a fluke or maybe there is an inconsistancy in the design of older 503+ boards and we happend to catch a bad one i dunno.

[M1pilot]

You might have had a bad one there, EVGTech.
I just stuck a K6-3/450 into my brother's machine last night. All I did was a BIOS upgrade. He's got a VA-503+ 1.2a (sticker no. 2925) and previously he had a K6-2/300...seems to be working ok. On the other hand I have to take a look at another machine this weekend with an older 503+ and a K6-2/450 that crashes if you look funny at it. This machine was solid with a 300 in it and we've already exchanged the 450 once already. WML.

-M1pilot

[davidk]

I have a K6-3 450 coupled with a motherboard with 2MB cache!!
It is very fast and I find it faster than celeron and P3 equivalents. (which my friends have)
It is an excellent chip and is very fast! End of story.