Athlon or T.Bird

[Mojo]

I have surfed the web for hours and all the sites the generalise Athlon and Thunderbird under one catogery.... how am i to choose which one is better?
Someone please post the pros and cons for both the processors.

[AstronMike]

Mojo (Feb 02, 2001 03:25 p.m.):
I have surfed the web for hours and all the sites the generalise Athlon and Thunderbird under one catogery.... how am i to choose which one is better?
Someone please post the pros and cons for both the processors.

Well, right off the bat the difference is that Athlon usually refers to the older Slot A chips, and the newer Tbirds are Socket As. Now, there are some Slot A Tbirds, so it will depend upon which motherboard you have or going to get.

Socket A is better, especially if you have like an Asus A7V that has the dips for multiplier adjustment.

If you happen to have a Slot A board, then get the best chip you can afford and OC that. Youd find the needed GoldFinger Cards at www.highspeedpc.com.

Slot As are easier to air cool due to the increased surface area projecting from the mobo.

[Mac42]

Overclocking aside, you'd still rather have a TBird. The Athlon's cache, even though it's larger, is a lot slower than that of the TBird. TBird cache runs at full processor speed (ex- 1Ghz CPU with 1Ghz cache) where the Athlon cache is "at best" half the speed of the CPU... I say "at best" because the faster Athlons (800Mhz+?) have even slower cache. I think the 1Ghz Athlon cache might be as slow as 1/3 CPU speed... I'm probably wrong on the exact fraction since it's been a while, but I know it's under 1/2.

Also, if you are going to be getting a new motherboard anyway then YOU WANT SOCKET A! If you get a slotted mobo then you have basicly ruled out any chance of a future upgrade. I think some TBirds are actually cheaper than older Athlons anyway.


-=mac=-

[kat]

socket a abit kt7133A mother board tbird you cant go wrong ;D

[Mojo]

Thanks guys for your replies. Yes its true. Athlons are more expandsive than T.Birds. But i'm not sure if they are slot A. Or they have changed it to socket a yet. Cause the newer athlon 1ghz cost bout 90 bucks more than the T.bird