Personal computing discussed

Moderators: renee, morphine, SecretSquirrel

 
ViX
Gerbil In Training
Topic Author
Posts: 3
Joined: Mon Oct 07, 2002 1:39 am

Processor Speeds Effect Graphic Performance?

Mon Oct 07, 2002 1:49 am

Say, you have AMD Duron™ Processor 1.3Ghz with Geforce4Ti 6400. Would the graphics be better on a AMD AtholonXP 2.8Ghz? Or does it pretty much depend on the graphics card to increase graphics/performance? The only the thing you notice in games is that the 2.8 loads faster...right? Sorry for the novice questions :roll:.
 
Mr. D
Gerbil First Class
Posts: 101
Joined: Tue Oct 01, 2002 1:21 am
Location: USA
Contact:

Mon Oct 07, 2002 1:53 am

I think the speed of your processor does affect your graphics card performance. Why do u ask?
"If you didn't know, now you know..."
 
Maedhros
Gerbil Elite
Posts: 687
Joined: Sun Aug 11, 2002 10:03 pm
Location: Texas

Mon Oct 07, 2002 1:54 am

Ok ViX, little info here. AMD has yet to produce a workable 2.8GHz processor. If you are referring to the phantom XP2800+, cool. That fancy number is just AMD's way of boasting about their "Quantispeed Architecture" which is Marketese for "this is what P4 processor we are competing against." As for your original question, I don't think it would matter much unless you are running benchies. If you are not, then not really. The Geforce4 Ti series has their own GPU's (graphics processing unit), and would thus not require as much processor bandwidth.
The ego is only a bit of consciousness swimming upon the ocean of dark things. We are an enigma unto ourselves.
 
pattouk2001
Gerbil Jedi
Posts: 1903
Joined: Thu May 30, 2002 10:44 am
Location: Birmingham, UK.
Contact:

Bottlenecks

Mon Oct 07, 2002 2:20 am

Hi there. Faster CPU's do improve graphics performance until you reach a point as to where the grphics card becomes a bottleneck, and that means that the CPU is feeding it more data than what the graphics card can output! The other extreme though is where the CPU is the bottleneck, where the CPU is not feeding enough data to the graphics card to achieve optimum performance. An example of the first point made is a AthlonXP 2800+ running with dual DDR RAM coupled with a TNT2 M64, with that graphics card, you wouldn't gain no more performance in games as regards FPS than if you were to have a duron 750mhz! The other extreme is that you have a Pentium 3 500mhz coupled with a GF4 Ti4600, the graphics performance will be totally killed as the CPU cannot feed the graphics card no where near enough data as it "could" output to achieve optimum performance! I hope you understand something from all that matie, lol. Cheers.
 
Doc Oc
Gerbil First Class
Posts: 179
Joined: Sat May 25, 2002 5:54 pm
Contact:

Mon Oct 07, 2002 3:08 am

Pattouk is right. The CPU and the vidcard need to be balanced against eachother.

For this kind of thing, I like to draw a parallel to car performance. Putting a big-block V12 in a Yugo (theoretically, it fits ;)) won't yield a race car cause the chassis can't handle the power. Put a 750cc Yugo engine in a Corvette and you're not going anywhere very quickly. In both cases, a Golf GTI would be faster. It's not a spectacular chassis nor a spectacular engine, but the two are nicely balanced.
Time flies like an arrow, fruit flies like a banana. (Groucho Marx)
 
ViX
Gerbil In Training
Topic Author
Posts: 3
Joined: Mon Oct 07, 2002 1:39 am

Mon Oct 07, 2002 3:35 am

Yes I totally understand, thanks for your input guys. I was on AMD's website where they list there cards & prices @
[url]http://www.amd.com/us-en/Processors/ProductInformation/0,,30_118_756_3734^609,00.html[/url]
and it shows "AMD Athlon™ XP Processor Price 2800+ $397" so I assumed 2.8ghz. Sneaky arnt they? So what does 2800+ run at anyways lol... it dont even say there geez... Though it does on the 1.3ghz hahaha....

Why do I ask? Well...
I ask because I'm thinking about upgradeing my systems motherboard, processor, and video card so I was curious. AMD Duron™ Processor 1.3ghz is at a nice price and I researched a bit on it and its pretty nice chip. I'll probably have to get a new tower hmmm...

My system is now (Gateway) 256mbRAM, PII 450mhz, voodoo 3 3000, and I think my motherboard is thes likes of "Intel II BX w/ intergrated audio". Oh.. I just checked my motherboard and I see what it means by "intergrated audio", the sound card is apart of the motherboard. Darn, guess I'll need to buy a new sound card. Oh well, I probably should anyways I'm just getting into audio production, so it wouldnt be a bad idea to get a nice sound card... I'm expirmenting with techno.

If you want, take a look @
http://support.gateway.com/s/CASES/B00434/b0043408.shtml, do you think this tower is acceptable to the upgrades I want to achieve?

Thanks! :]
 
Austin
Grand Gerbil Poohbah
Posts: 3662
Joined: Sat Apr 20, 2002 8:04 am
Location: Birmingham ENGLAND (some say Mars, or was it Uranus)

Mon Oct 07, 2002 9:02 pm

:wink: Very well covered pattouk2001.

8) AMD revised the XP rating with their newest CPUs based upon the 0.13mu T.bred-B core (XP2400+ and up) IMHO to account for the boost P4 gets from 512k cache and 533FSB. The XP rating unofficialy relates to the P4 at that mhz clock, so XP2000+ running at 1.67ghz gives perf equal to a P4 2.0ghz. The XP2400+ and faster CPUs have had the XP rating turned down so the XP2400+ is actually faster than it sounds against the XP2200+. Anyway the XP rating tends to be under-optimistic if anything so an XP2000+ tends to marginaly beat the P4 2.0ghz if anything. Here's a run down of what the XP CPUs run at:

Rating Ghz Multiplier
1600+ 1.40 10.5x
1700+ 1.47 11x
1800+ 1.53 11.5x
1900+ 1.60 12x
2000+ 1.67 12.5x
2100+ 1.73 13x
2200+ 1.80 13.5x
2400+ 2.00 15x
2600+ 2.13 16x

:D The XP CPU is designed to do more work per cycle while the P4 is designed to intentionally do less work per clock cycle but run at a higher rate of mhz/ghz. Not only that but XP CPUs only need 256k cache, 266FSB and PC2100 RAM to take on the P4 with 512k cache, 533FSB and PC2700/RIMM. Don't be fooled by more cache, higher FSB or faster RAM as the P4 needs these to simply keep up.

:wink: If you are looking for a CPU at the mo the AthlonXP is certainly the way to go as it costs significantly less and gives great perf. Duron CPUs still lack an XP rating and are being phased out as AthlonXP's are so cheap the Durons are pretty pointless. Duron 1.3ghz gives perf about equal to a Celeron 1.7ghz so DuronXP1700+ would be a decent title for it. Still, with the prices and speed boost of AthlonXP1800+ to XP2000+ it makes a lot of sense to set your sights a little higher.

:-? All SktA (AMD CPUs) mobos have their pros and cons, chipset rather than manu dictates perf, quirks and functions so here's a quick guide. SiS are good for stability and compatability but lack tweaking options. nForce1 are a lot like SiS but offer great o/b stuff inc great 5.1 sound and NIC, some offer GF2MX gfx too which are okay in the short term. VIA are the most popular but most quirky chipsets, they are very tweakable and popular. nForce2 seem to bring it all, great o/b stuff, great tweaking, great stability/compatability and are most likely along with VIA KT400 to offer long term CPU support.

:P For the gfx card you really should consider GF4TI4200 as the best card to go for, they're about $120-150 (64MB-128MB). Rad8500 (better than Rad9000PRO) are the next best thing and you should find one with 128MB for under $100, they don't offer usable AA and don't get the most out of the fastest CPUs but they are very fine cards and are the least you should consider.

PS. Here's the best guide to how CPU clock speed affects perf with different gfx cards in a multitude of games. Do note that the clock speeds are the actual ghz an AthlonXP uses and not the XP rating. Also note the results are from a downclocked AthlonXP2100+ and as such an Athlon1.3ghz will perf slightly lower than the 1.3ghz on the graphs.

http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.html?i=1608
 
johnleiwoo
Gerbil First Class
Posts: 121
Joined: Mon Jun 10, 2002 9:42 am
Location: Orlando
Contact:

Re: Processor Speeds Effect Graphic Performance?

Mon Oct 07, 2002 9:55 pm

ViX wrote:
Say, you have AMD Duron™ Processor 1.3Ghz with Geforce4Ti 6400. Would the graphics be better on a AMD AtholonXP 2.8Ghz? Or does it pretty much depend on the graphics card to increase graphics/performance? The only the thing you notice in games is that the 2.8 loads faster...right? Sorry for the novice questions :roll:.


I think your load time is dependent on how fast your harddrive is.
 
ViX
Gerbil In Training
Topic Author
Posts: 3
Joined: Mon Oct 07, 2002 1:39 am

Which Motherboard?....

Mon Oct 07, 2002 11:06 pm

Alright, I decided to go with AMD Athlon XP 1600+ Processor: $64.99!. I don't see why someone would want to buy a 2000+ @ 120$! That much more money just for a few hunderd extra mhz... hmph... This motherboard seems nice and at a great price: http://www.computergate.com/products/item.cfm?prodcd=B7G7VAX,$84.99.
Though I found another great motherboard @ http://www.computergate.com/products/item.cfm?prodcd=B7MKT4U,$98.99. I would appreciate your personal opinions on these motherboards. Though the the last one even says "Recommended by AMD for Athlon XP Processor" Hmm... As for the graphics card im not to sure yet. Would a 200watt power supply be alright for my configurations?
 
Maedhros
Gerbil Elite
Posts: 687
Joined: Sun Aug 11, 2002 10:03 pm
Location: Texas

Tue Oct 08, 2002 8:45 am

Nope, 200 watts isn't quite enough. If you go over to AMD's website, the minimum recommended is 300 watts. Personally, I would go out and get a 400-550 watt power supply. If that's still too much for your wallet, try a nice branded 350 watt PSU from Antec.
The ego is only a bit of consciousness swimming upon the ocean of dark things. We are an enigma unto ourselves.
 
Austin
Grand Gerbil Poohbah
Posts: 3662
Joined: Sat Apr 20, 2002 8:04 am
Location: Birmingham ENGLAND (some say Mars, or was it Uranus)

Tue Oct 08, 2002 9:32 am

:wink: Yeah for a lot of reasons don't cheap out on the PSU. 300W is a minimum while 350-400W are wiser and don't cost a whole lot more. Branding is VERY important in PSUs and you should only consider Antec or Enermax although decent alternatives are ToPower, SFlower and Sparkle.

8) I'd suggest XP1800+ over XP1600+ but even so XP2000+ shouldn't be as expensive as you seem to have found. XP1600+ SHOULD o/c well but perf will largely suck considering how little extra XP1800+ would cost you. XP1800+ has great stock perf and also generally o/c's to XP2100+ type speeds but unlike XP1600+ doesn't need insane FSB speeds to do so, not that that should be a prob with new mobos. XP2000+ don't o/c but they do have great stock perf, anyway any of these type of CPUs are great choices. Rem that although the diff in actual clock speed is small the perf diff betwen them is directly proportional to the a P4 of the XP rating, so going from XP1600+ to XP1800+ is only an extra 133mhz BUT the perf diff is the same as going from a P4 1.6ghz to a P4 1.8ghz. If you plan to o/c HSF is an important consideration, Volcano7+ or 9 are very popular, more info if you're interested but you can always see what a std HSF will do for you.

:) Both MSI and Gigabyte are well respected manus, and both of your choices use the nice KT400 chipset so perf and features will be largely identical. You want a mobo which is guaranteed to handle AthlonXP2800+ and 333FSB (2x166mhz). You'll obviously be best to buy at least 256MB of DDR333-PC2700. The sound on these mobos is 6 channel but it isn't great although should be a lot better than your current sound, I'd advise at least giving it a go before shelling out for a soundcard esp the MSI version with the C-Media 8738MX with SPDIF.

:wink: If you do want a soundcard then the choices are SB Live (getting old, is quirky but is now cheap), SB Audigy (replaced the Live), Hercules Fortissimo II, Turtle Beach Santa Cruz and Philips Acoustic Edge which can reportedly produce 4point directional sound from a stereo source which should be awesome for gaming. All these soundcards are great, I'd avoid the Live though. Of course you could get nForce1 if you don't mind losing tweaking functions and 333FSB but you do gain excellent stability and great onboard LAN and 5.1 sound. nForce2 should be available soon and should bring more speed, tweaking and future proofing (DDR400 & 333FSB) to the table.
 
pattouk2001
Gerbil Jedi
Posts: 1903
Joined: Thu May 30, 2002 10:44 am
Location: Birmingham, UK.
Contact:

T-Bird

Tue Oct 08, 2002 11:18 am

AMD revised the XP rating with their newest CPUs based upon the 0.13mu T.bred-B core (XP2400+ and up) IMHO to account for the boost P4 gets from 512k cache and 533FSB. The XP rating unofficialy relates to the P4 at that mhz clock, so XP2000+ running at 1.67ghz gives perf equal to a P4 2.0ghz. The XP2400+ and faster CPUs have had the XP rating turned down so the XP2400+ is actually faster than it sounds against the XP2200+. Anyway the XP rating tends to be under-optimistic if anything so an XP2000+ tends to marginaly beat the P4 2.0ghz if anything. Here's a run down of what the XP CPUs run at:


Hi matie. AMD's PR rating is compared to their old T-Bird CPU's clock speeds, not the P4's clock speeds. For example, the AthlonXP 1600+ which actually runs at 1.4ghz, relates to the clock frequency that a Athlon T-Bird would have to be running at in order to perform similar to that AthlonXP running at 1.4ghz.
 
mattsteg
Gerbil God
Posts: 15782
Joined: Thu Dec 27, 2001 7:00 pm
Location: Applauding the new/old variable width forums
Contact:

Re: T-Bird

Tue Oct 08, 2002 11:34 am

pattouk2001 wrote:
AMD revised the XP rating with their newest CPUs based upon the 0.13mu T.bred-B core (XP2400+ and up) IMHO to account for the boost P4 gets from 512k cache and 533FSB. The XP rating unofficialy relates to the P4 at that mhz clock, so XP2000+ running at 1.67ghz gives perf equal to a P4 2.0ghz. The XP2400+ and faster CPUs have had the XP rating turned down so the XP2400+ is actually faster than it sounds against the XP2200+. Anyway the XP rating tends to be under-optimistic if anything so an XP2000+ tends to marginaly beat the P4 2.0ghz if anything. Here's a run down of what the XP CPUs run at:


Hi matie. AMD's PR rating is compared to their old T-Bird CPU's clock speeds, not the P4's clock speeds. For example, the AthlonXP 1600+ which actually runs at 1.4ghz, relates to the clock frequency that a Athlon T-Bird would have to be running at in order to perform similar to that AthlonXP running at 1.4ghz.


Of course, that's just AMD's BS way to claim they aren't basing performance off of the P4. It's no coincidence the ratings line up pretty well with performance of a P4 clocked to around the PR. Who cares what AMD's official line is when it's fairly obvious it's related to the P4 in the real world?
...
 
pattouk2001
Gerbil Jedi
Posts: 1903
Joined: Thu May 30, 2002 10:44 am
Location: Birmingham, UK.
Contact:

Ok.......

Tue Oct 08, 2002 11:42 am

Hi there mate, yeh, ok, fair comment.
 
Hellsbellboy
Gerbil Jedi
Posts: 1698
Joined: Mon Feb 25, 2002 7:00 pm
Location: USA

Tue Oct 08, 2002 3:31 pm

ViX u in the USA? maybe if u haven't already tried,, look at http://www.pricewatch.com to find the lowest price on parts. Should find a XP2000+ for $90, and everything else cheaper too.
 
getbornagain
Graphmaster Gerbil
Posts: 1027
Joined: Wed May 08, 2002 8:49 pm
Location: kansas

Tue Oct 08, 2002 4:42 pm

well i'd reccomend http://www.newegg.com in the U.S. but whatever the case i'd at least check their rateing at http://www.resellerratings.com/ or some other simlar site.

it's no use taking a gamble over a few bucks

Who is online

Users browsing this forum: No registered users and 1 guest
GZIP: On