Celeron 1600 vs XP 1600

Higher bandwidth for the XP1600 yields large peformance gains. — Joe

SUMMARY: Bandwidth, bandwidth, bandwidth.

Tony emailed asking for a comparison between AMD’s XP1600 vs Intel’s Celeron @ 1600 MHz – an interesting question! So herewith is a comparison using two Iwill motherboards – the BD133u for the Celeron and Iwill’s latest, the XP333 for the XP 1600.

Each system had 256 MB of RAM – SDRAM vs DDR in this case – and used a Leadtek GeForce 2 Pro with 32 MB RAM. Each was run at 133 MHz. All I did was swap motherboards and hard drives – everything else was exactly the same (I use a test stand). Benchmarks were with SiSandra 2001te, Quake at the fastest settings and 3DMark 2001 using 800x600x16:

Whatever deficiency the XP1600 has because it’s running at 1400 MHz vs the Celeron’s 1600 MHz is obliterated by memory bandwidth – and I do mean obliterated! The Quake scores are outstanding – fully 30% better than on the Celeron.

The XP1600 I have is not yet unlocked, but running it at 1600 MHz will only widen the gap further – maybe adding another 10% to the scores. Further, running the XP at something like 150 FSB will widen the gap even more. I wouldn’t be surprised to see 20% better at higher speed and FSB.

If you’re thinking of upgrading, it’s a question of how much you want to spend. On performance alone, the answer is obvious.

Update: This article was written from a gamer’s perspective. While most of our audience fits that mold, not everybody does.

There are those who simply can’t stand the notion of buying AMD. There are probably more who can’t stand the noise coming from a beefy cooler. Most office apps are not designed to take advantage of increased bandwidth.

For those who fall into one or more of these categories, the Tualatin Celeron holds up very well against the Athlon competition, actually better than low-end PIVs. We think that if you need a cheap, quiet and fast office box, the Tualatin Celeron is probably
the best choice.

Email Joe