Is it worth it?

[Sherlok]

I was just wondering. Is there a large difference in performance between the amd 1.4ghz and the 1500+ XP? Because they seem to have the same clock speed(1400mhz), and bus (266fsb) but with the xp being newer i was just wondering.

[cbrsurfr]

The 1500+ is actually only 1.33ghz, but it would still be faster than the 1.4 tbird.

I have heard that the Xp's are basically ~200 mhz faster performance wise compared to similarly clocked tbirds. So a 1.33XP=1.53tbird.

[Comage]

This is also basically due to the new SSE2 extension instructions that the Athlon XP CPUs have. You can read more about the Athlon XPs over at http://www.anandtech.com. :)

[NDD]

due to the new SSE2 extension instructions that the Athlon XP CPUs have

Small correction : Athlon XP has only SSE of first generation, only Pentium 4 processors have SSE2 instructions.
Future AMD "Hammer" series x86-64 processors should incorporate SSE2 too.

Best Regards ...

[Comage]

Sorry for that bit of wrong information. :)

[krazefinn]

Most preview benches indicate a solid 20% plus increase with the xp, for a given clock. I would think highly worthwhile, if ya wanna have the latest and greatest (at least for a couple of weeks!!)

Heat is reduced along with ampacity requirements, indicating inherent efficiency issues as well. And the data prefetch/sse optimizations (as well as other enhancements) provide you with a bit more future. Although their is nothing wrong with the revision"d" thunderbird, and if absolute economics is the prevailing requirement, you will be satisfied with it as well.

AMD done real good...know if i just had a hammer, I'd...oh nevermind.

[Lord Sech]

Not only is their a performance difference, AMD has also started to fix some off their thermal death issues. Notice the some. They willl still run warmer than a p3/4 but the 1500+ will run neck and neck with a 1.5 or 1.6 p4.

And as was previously said, benchmarks like 3dmark2000 and 2k1 are showing a great performance jumps as well a sisoft and others.

-Sech