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Thread: AMD's Model Numbers Revisited

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    AMD's Model Numbers Revisited

    I always felt Intel screwed up the whole chip naming thing when they changed from the x86 system after the 486. Some marketing geniums came up with the Pentium name -- changing the CPU name from what it should have been called, the 586.

    Intel knew they couldn't keep up the Latin-number thing after Pentium (for 5) because what would the name for the 6th chip be? The Six-ium ??

    By my count, they would only be up to a 786 by now if they had just let nature take its course.

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    It would be nicer if the article could link to more meaningful data that compares performance between the chips both against the competitor and against its own brothers. IE: what performance gains do you get from using an XP 1700+ compared to 1900+, or a P4 1.5 Ghz to a 1.9 ghz, and a real world performance guide comparison between AMD's claims and Intels claims.

    Armed with that information,a consumer can make informed purchasing decesions, rather than emotional ones based on hype.

    AMD and Intel remind me of used car salesmen barking out deals at people walking by on the sidewalk. Each having a better convertable at a lower price.

    Tacky at best.

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    Member rlbogue's Avatar
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    Re: AMD's Model Numbers Revisited

    Originally posted by gvenditto
    By my count, they would only be up to a 786 by now if they had just let nature take its course. [/B]
    Pentium = 586
    Pentium Pro = 686
    Pentium II = 786
    Pentium III = 886
    Pentium 4 = 986

    Of course, this all started because Intel was told it couldn't trademark a number. (A wise decision by the court.)

    Initially Intel was trying to prevent consumer confusion by third parties trying to call their processors the same thing as Intel. However, the downside is that it didn't resolve the core issue which is the ability for the consumer to understand the relative performance differences.

    rlb

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    Ultimate Member Strawbs's Avatar
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    Of course, this all started because Intel was told it couldn't trademark a number. (A wise decision by the court.)


    So Intel decided to go with a new slot\slot\socket\socket\socket\socket and patent that instead.

    AMD have been led around by the nose for far too long, the PR rating has worked well (although I had my doubts as to it's Authenticity).

    The two companies processors can hardly be compared on a level playing field as they are destined to be born on different Mobos with different key components, even with the same RAM and similar chipsets, the results of most tests will be swings and roundabouts. with both AMD and Intel adding different instruction sets that enhance different aspects of their respective chips, only the battle will ever be won, not the war.

    having said that, the price war was settled a long time ago.

    S.

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    rlbogue, I do belive that Tripleshot is correct when it comes to the numbering of the chips because the numbers were based off the micro archatecture and not the revision of that archatecture. so the number actuly go more like this:

    Pentium = 586
    Pentium Pro = 686a
    Pentium II = 686b
    Pentium III = 68c
    Pentium 4 = 786

    Only with the pentium 4 has intel relesed a truly revised desigen in sted of just tweaking the pentium pro archatecture.

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    Member Tor's Avatar
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    Each one markets it's own. Would it have done Intel any good to stay with the x86 naming system. I know it would confuse the hell out of me if all mini pickups were called rangers. They aren't, which is why computer chips shouldn't be either. If AMD want's to confuse their customers by calling a 1.6 Ghz CPU a 2000, let em. If Intel calls their next chip Sextium, let em. Let marketing and performance do it's job to sell chips, trucks, etc.... I personally prefer Intel, and the Chevy S-10.

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    Generally when Intel releases a new chip at the same clock speed as an existing chip but with more L2 cache, the first chip in the series gets a A put behind the clock speed to tell you that the cache is different that the first chip released at the same clock speed. The same as they did with the different celeron chips that have been released. Examples are 1st celeron 300 with 0k L2 is just called a 300 but when they started putting L2 cache on the chip they called it a 300A, the first celeron that was a coppermine ran at 533 but they called it a 533A because the L2 cache ran at the full FSB speed instead of just hafl of the FSB,same goes for the Tualatin Celeron processors that have 256k L2 at 100Mhz FSB the 1000A. The 2.0Mhz denotes that the chip is a Williamette with 256k L2 and the 2.0A is the northwood that has 512k L2 cache.
    If You Cant' Overclock It then Forget It!!!!!

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    I think the gist of the article was that Intel would like to have its cake and eat it too. Intel has derided AMD for their new ‘equivalent in performance’ numbers rating. Analytically, one of Intel’s strengths has been a sociological reality as much as a superior architectural one. Most people are still ignorant about computers and follow wave trends: namely that > MHZ = superior performance. If you've seen the benchmarks you know the strengths and weaknesses of each respective CPU. The P4’s strength (when released in the Willamette architecture) was its vastly superior memory bandwidth due to the coupling with RDRAM. Then in a counter strike AMD released the Athlon XP, but only when it had analyzed the P4’s weakness. The XP exploits the P4 Willamette’s primal weakness in its superior instructions per clock cycle ratio. In benchmarks the Athlon XP beats the P4 most particularly in CPU intensive applications. But where Intel’s focus was on gaming, where the P4’s vastly superior memory bandwidth and specialized SEE 2 instructions would beat any competitor, its eye was also on the future. The P4 was introduced as the CPU of the future; designed with speeds of > 3ghz in mind. Unfortunately, in the current state of affairs, there were few supporting members of current computer architecture to exploit the P4’ strengths. Having been beat at its own game, of course there should be some grumbling by Intel, but not at the cost of pronouncing one’s self a hypocrite. You cannot say MHZ = performance and at the same time say there is a performance difference between a 2.0ghz P4 Willamette and a 2.0ghz P4 Northwood.
    Last edited by wallie_x; 03-15-2002 at 02:37 AM.

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    Ultimate Member Strawbs's Avatar
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    Agreed, one of Intels biggest hypocricies is designing a supposedly "future proof" CPU, and then changing the socket and instuctions just enough to render it obsolete before the software is released to push said CPU to it's limit.
    What most people want is a processor that performs now, not "tomorrow", at least that way we can see where some of the money has gone.
    The early adaptors of the P4 that I know of are not happy about a chip revision before the original has seen any decent amount of optimised software. this tactic just plays on peoples fear that their computer will be out of date in no time at all. these developments are not market driven, as companies would have us believe, they are actually the reason the market moves so fast.

    AMD's name game still doesn't have me convinced, because I know better than to fall for it, but the general public don't know that much about computers, I'm sure AMD would be quite happy for MHz ratings to disappear altogether, or at least until it's winning the MHz war again. Their triumph is not because of any performance advantage or naming switch, it is simply because of cost of ownership and upgrades for Intel systems. word of mouth is a powerful selling tool.
    Last edited by Strawbs; 03-15-2002 at 10:04 AM.

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    Member rlbogue's Avatar
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    Originally posted by zergboy5
    Only with the pentium 4 has intel relesed a truly revised desigen in sted of just tweaking the pentium pro archatecture.
    Actually, the Pentium Pro and Pentium used completely different architectures -- as did the Pentium II. The naming is almost the only thing that's the same. I never looked at the differences between the Pentium II and Pentium III -- it always struck me as almost no changes...

    Rob

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    Member wallie_x's Avatar
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    these developments are not market driven, as companies would have us believe, they are actually the reason the market moves so fast.
    I agree, and it also shows the cold reality of modern day capitalism. It has shifted from where a company sold products to supply a need, to the view that people are commodities that, if necessary, can be exploited. Intel’s pattern of crippling elements of their CPU’s purposely, e.g. the original Celeron as a castrated P 3 without L1 cache, shows a pattern, not necessarily peculiar to Intel, but to capitalism in particular. The ends justify's the means. Money is god

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    Ultimate Member Rugor's Avatar
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    rlbogue

    Actually the Pentium Pro, Pentium II, Celeron, and Pentium III are all based on the same basic P6 core. The Pentium II is basically with a P-Pro with MMX and the L2 cache moved out of the cpga package and onto a PCB. PIII is basically a PII with SSE, the later PIII's changed the cache.

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    Member rlbogue's Avatar
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    Originally posted by Rugor

    Actually the Pentium Pro, Pentium II, Celeron, and Pentium III are all based on the same basic P6 core.
    I remember that at the time of the release of the Pentium Pro and Pentium II that there were two separate teams working at Intel on processors. I also remember that there were significant architectural differences in the front end interfaces which caused a delay in the development of multiprocessor systems for the Pentium II.

    You could be right, I jst remember the differences.

    Rob

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    The reason why InHell had to use "Pentium" instead of '586' was simply due to copyright infringement. There was a another company down in the States using the number '586' on a certain model of something. Therefore, InHell could not use the moniker. Insofar as the debate about numbers, InHell has been beat at it's own game. The AMD product is superior and the boys in SJ are trying everything in their power to regain market share. In fact, Intel thinks that we, the computing public, are dirt-stupid. they flex their flabby muscles with IBM, Compaq, HP and all the other manufacturers of preconfigured **** to use their chips; you either use us exclusively or don't use us at all! This sounds no better than the clowns in Redmond. Good on them! Those of us who know good value when we see it [Ford, AMD, LiteOn, Soltek] can do what we want, not what some marketing team says we want. It's amazing how Intel 'whores' attack AMD products in order to deflect the real issue: Pentium 4s are inferior to XP's! What gives with this Rambus ****, Socket 4-whatever-it-is-this-week, and then sitting like the opportunists they are and jumping on the DDR bandwagon...after AMD perfected the DDR interface. Makes me real happy to have a CPU sitting there working at 3/4 capacity for twice the money as a comparable AMD. And before the Intel elitists can attack AMD for the temperature issue, wake up! Those of us who know what we are doing install proper PSU's, HSF's into properly designed cases that we choose. Thermal issues you may have; I don't. It was pretty sad when my poky Duron was kicking the coal out of PIII's; that's why I left InHell and never looked back! For you Intel fans, I hope it's worth it to you. Personally, I have better things to spend my money on! The benchmarks don't lie!

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    Ultimate Member Beeblequix's Avatar
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    Good bits 'n quibbs. Yeah, I love getting inside a good Intel vs AMD thread.

    My last computer was a PentiumIII. I absolutely loved it.

    My new computer is an AMD Athlon XP. I absolutely love it.

    So, I'm in the position on praising either one based on my own experience. I bought the PIII originally because at the time the Athlon was quite new and had the slower front side bus speed (2*100) compared to the 133 fsb, which I knew would affect performance. And I admit I still had that "common knowledge" thing in my mind about "incompatabilities". Of course we know now that there aren't any incompatablilities since AMD stopped reverse engineering other manufacturer's chips and made their own. You know, that's the 'great' thing about common knowledge--you don't need neither shread nor proof for the idea to implant itself in your opinion cache. Way to go iT311.

    I saw the P4 come out and quite frankly, I didn't like it one bit. First, it was paired with the b1tcH-WH0r3 of all companies, R4mbu5 Ink. Second, as was mentioned earlier, it was designed for 'tommorrow's' applications, but in actuality the 'optimizations' still really haven't come to my sector yet. Third, the enormous price difference is enough to steer anyone who is budget conscious away from an intel platform. Fourth, where wallie_x was saying that intel was going for gaming--no, that's wrong. Intel's bread and butter comes from OEM's who sell to large businesses (like mine) that really don't need a gaming machine (yeah, i'd love to game @ werk ) and use 'business' and 'professional' apps where money is no object. On existing gaming software, the cpu makes far less impact than the video card and other system components. When mentioning the 'far superior' P4 memory bandwidth, one must also realize that the p4's data prefetch is what uses a bunch of the bandwidth which is mostly thrown away data--wasted. R4mbU5 memory wouldn't do the Athlon any bit better simply because the Athlon doesn't use memory in the same fashion. Were AMD to implement a more sophitocated data prefetch into their cpu then Rambus might become a technically viable solution. But it would have to overcome perception obsticles from l337 consumers, knowing that they employ more attourneys to litigate than engineers or marketeers.

    I had a point when I started, but now I'm just rambling for being awake for 24hrs. Nite all.

    B.Quix
    "all animals are equal but some animals are more equal than others".
    George Orwell

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