Intel Beats AMD To 2 GHz – THG.RU

Pentium 4’s Way Into The Market

When Intel launched its Pentium 4 processor in November 2000 the world wasn’t quite sure what to think about this new ‘net bursting’ and ‘rapid executing’ CPU. Pentium 4’s completely new architecture presented as many highlights as it showed shortcomings and the benchmarks revealed a rather inhomogeneous picture. While Intel’s flagship was able to shine in some test applications, it looked pretty sad in others. Overall, it was utterly unable to completely outclass its No. 1 competitor, AMD’s Athlon processor.

Pentium 4 Optimized Software

The most important features of Pentium 4’s architecture are probably its 3.2 GB/s quad-pumped Front Side Bus, its Instruction Trace Cache, the Rapid Execution Engine and the SSE2-Instruction Engine. Each of those new features requires wisely optimized software to give Pentium 4 a real advantage. The fast processor bus wants to be fed and the trace cache as well as the rapid execution engine with its double-pumped ALUs and AGUs don’t fair too well with current software. It goes without saying that SSE2 can only bite once software was at least compiled with a compiler that generates SSE2-instructions.

Intel is of course working hard on pushing software developers into implementing code optimizations for Pentium 4, but those guys don’t feel particularly hard-pressed as long as the majority of users is using Pentium III or Athlon processors and only a small minority is owning Pentium 4 machines. Still, Pentium 4 enhancements are slowly finding their way into graphics chip drivers, games and professional applications, so that the future looks bright enough for P4.

Clock Speed Doesn’t Just Sell Well

Pentium 4’s maybe most important design feature is its high-speed architecture. The long execution pipeline allows core clocks that are far beyond the abilities of AMD’s current Athlon-design. The high clock speeds don’t mean that Pentium 4 is automatically faster than AMD’s counterpart at lower clock speeds. Especially current software requires a much higher core clock of Pentium 4 to perform on par with AMD’s Athlon processor. However, clock speed has long become the most important selling argument. The poorly informed average user assumes that a higher core clock translates into higher performance and that’s where Pentium 4 beats Athlon hands down.

Today Intel introduces a Pentium 4 processor that runs at the incredible core clock of 2 GHz = 2000 MHz. That is most certainly an impressive number and it certainly signalizes Intel’s clock speed lead over AMD. As you will see in the benchmarks however, at 2 GHz Pentium 4 finally manages to beat AMD’s fastest processor, the Athlon 1400, in virtually any application.

What We Need Is More Than Just Speed

Well, speed is nice. However, not all of us are driving around in Porsches or Ferraris just because they are faster than other cars. First of all a processor has to be affordable. Intel has actually realized that and dropped Pentium 4 prices several times. I am of course not saying that Pentium 4 is actually cheap. I doubt that I will ever live to see Intel’s processor pricing to be really attractive. What I do want to mention though is that Pentium 4 is not the super expensive microprocessor that it once was anymore.

Now the pricing of actual Pentium 4 processors is not quite telling the whole story. To run this CPU you require a motherboard and memory as well. This is where Pentium 4 lost another big round in terms of attractiveness. The so far only platform for Intel’s flagship processor is based on Intel’s i850 chipset. It makes the processor perform very well, but as an Intel chipset it is rather expensive, making P4-motherboards anything but bargains. To make matters worse, those motherboards require at least two pieces of the unpopular and overly expensive RDRAM memory. Once you sum up the price for processor, motherboard and memory you will see that Pentium 4 is not exactly an inexpensive solution. It is the predominant reason why Pentium 4 sales have been rather sluggish.

The Sense Or Nonsense Of High Speed Processors

There is another reason why the majority of people out there could and still can do just fine without 1.xx GHz processors. 99% of today’s software performs just fine on Pentium III or Athlon systems with clock speeds of 1 GHz or even less. It is difficult to find a sensible justification for the purchase of a 1.4 GHz or faster system if there ain’t any software that takes advantage of it. Even computer games, which used to be the No.1 clock speed eaters, are running perfectly on slower machines, especially once this system has been upgraded with a fast graphics card. This situation shows that the release of a processor at 2 GHz is pretty much the last thing we users really needed. The main catch of Intel’s Pentium 4 2 GHz launch is that it improves Intel’s prestige. Finally Intel can once again declare that it’s making the doubtlessly fastest microprocessor. Intel hasn’t been able to say that for a rather long time.

Improving Pentium 4’s Attractiveness

Intel is obviously working on both of the above-mentioned issues why people might do just fine without Pentium 4. Moving the software industry towards more P4-enhancements and to software that really benefits from fast processors is a slow and meticulous process. Intel has legions of expensive ‘processor enabling’ engineers that ‘help’ software developers to program their applications the way Intel appreciates it. We will simply have to wait and see for the results.

What Intel can do however is to reduce the cost of Pentium 4 platforms. People don’t like paying premiums for Rambus memory, especially not those royalties to a Rambus Inc. that is probably the most disliked company in the worlds PC hardware arena. So it took Intel only a small eternity until it finally came up with the i845 chipset. It teams up Pentium 4 with the much more attractive PC133 SDRAM memory, though removing a considerable amount of Pentium 4’s performance. The PC133-version of i845 has still not been launched officially, but it is already available in the shops. There will also be another flavor of i845 that runs with DDR-SDRAM. This i845-version will allow much better performance than the current i845 with PC133 support. Intel claims it is delaying the release of the DDR i845 because of validation issues, others claim that Intel is tied to a late release of the DDR-i845 due to license agreements with our beloved Rambus Inc. I leave it up to you to decide what you want to believe. One thing is fact: i845 reduces the costs of Pentium 4 platforms significantly and that will help Pentium 4 sales. The average user who spots an inexpensive P4-box in a shop that says e.g. “1.7 GHz” won’t know that it might be slower than a P4-system with 1.5 GHz processor only because the one is using i845 and the other is using i850.

VIA – Helping Or Spoiling?

The recent launch of VIA’s P4X266 chipset has caused a lot of commotion within Intel. VIA’s new and first Pentium 4 chipset supplies Intel’s flagship CPU with the DDR-SDRAM support that Intel is deliberately holding back right now. Who cares if Intel ain’t selling i845 with DDR-support as long as you can get a cheaper chipset WITH DDR-support from VIA? We as well as Intel know about VIA’s plans for a Pentium 4 DDR chipset for more than half a year. Intel didn’t expect that VIA would be fast enough to beat it to the release of i845 (PC133). What Intel certainly didn’t anticipate though, is Wenchi Chen’s gutsy move to simply release P4X266 without clearing the P4-bus license issues with Intel first.

Now in a way P4X266 clearly increases the attractiveness of Pentium 4 by a wide margin. Especially the performance-hungry ones of us with a dislike of Rambus were impatiently waiting for a DDR-platform for Pentium 4. From that point of view Intel should be pleased. OEMs have already stated a strong interest into VIA’s new Pentium 4 chipset. Intel however remains the Moloch it has always been. It wants it all, the processor sales as well as the chipset sales. It might also NOT want DDR-systems for Pentium 4 out now. So we will see what is going to happen. Right now Taiwanese board makers are afraid of Intel’s threat to punish them for producing P4X266 motherboards. My recent editorial is already covering this sad situation. VIA will have to see if Intel will sue it and get an injunction. NVIDIA is waiting for the outcome of that battle as well, because once Intel loosens its grip on the P4-bus license NVIDIA could release an nForce chipset for Pentium 4 as well.

Pentium 4 Gets A New Socket

Today Intel is also introducing the new µPGA Socket478 for the latest and future Pentium 4 processors. The new packaging is much smaller than the previous Socket423, but it comes with 55 more pins.

The above picture shows a comparison of the new Pentium 4 form factor in the middle between the Socket423 Pentium 4 on the left and AMD’s Athlon processor on the right. The Pentium 4 processors at 1.9 and 2 GHz that are released today will ship in both socket versions, while the slower Pentium 4 CPUs will remain as Socket423 versions for the time being. Future Pentium 4 processors will only use the new µPGA Socket478 and Socket423 will finally disappear. We expect that there will be Socket478-to-Socket423 converters available that should give current Socket423 motherboards a prolonged life span.

Pentium 4 Gets A New Socket. Continued

Below you find a picture of Intel’s reference Socket478 motherboard with i850 chipset.

You can see the new cooler retention mechanism which unfortunately requires new coolers as well.

This might be a nuisance for current P4-owners who are looking into an upgrade, but it shows how serious Intel is taking the job of providing a sensible cooling solution for Pentium 4 with a safe and easy retention mechanism.

I wish AMD would take an example and come up with a better solution for their processors.

Just Around The Corner

The Pentium 4 processors released today at 1.9 and 2 GHz core clock are the last ones that are using the 0.18 micron ‘Willamette’ core. The next Pentium 4 processor, which is supposed to arrive in another couple of months as a 2.2 or 2.3 GHz version, will be equipped with the 0.13 micron core ‘Northwood’. This new core will come with several enhancements of which only the increased 512 kB L2-cache size is known right now. It’s the main reason why Intel ‘invented’ Socket478. Initially, Northwood was supposed to be launched at 2 GHz today, but good yields of Willamette at 2 GHz plus problems with Intel’s 0.13 micron process delayed this launch.

Benchmarking

This time I decided against a major benchmarking battle, because the only thing we need to see is if Pentium 4 2 GHz is able to beat AMD’s current top-notch processor Athlon 1400.

Benchmark Setup

Benchmark Results

BAPCo Sysmark 2001

BAPCo’s productivity benchmark shows Pentium 4 2 GHz as the clear performance leader.

Pentium 4 used to perform better than Athlon in this sub-benchmark in previous tests already, so that it doesn’t surprise anyone that Pentium 4 2 GHz is winning this test hands down.

The office performance part of Sysmark2001 used to be Athlon’s stronghold, but once Pentium 4 runs at 2 GHz it is winning this contest as well.

Quake 3 Arena

Quake 3 Arena was always Pentium 4’s big strength. Pentium 4 2 GHz can score an impressive lead over Athlon 1400 at the low resolution, while the high resolution is limited by the performance of the graphics card, making all CPUs perform almost alike.

Under Windows 2000 the picture ain’t much different, but Pentium 4 is able to score a slightly bigger lead.

Quake 3 Arena, Continued

The processor intensive NV15-demo used to give Athlon a better chance against Pentium 4, but at 2 GHz Pentium 4 cannot be beat.

Unreal Tournament

Unreal Tournament used to favor Athlon over Pentium 4 and even at 2 GHz Pentium 4 is not quite able to beat Athlon 1400.

AquaNox AquaMark

The new game AquaNox is already equipped with P4-enhancements, so that Athlon does not stand much of a chance. The results are only so close together, because GeForce2 Ultra is limiting the frame rates here.

3D Mark 2001

This benchmark is more of a graphics card test than a processor benchmark, but Pentium 4 2 GHz is still able to beat the competition.

FlasK MPEG Video Encoding

The heavily P4-optimized iDCT of FlasK has always ensured that Athlon gets badly beaten by Pentium 4, even though AMD did what it could to optimize FlasK for Athlon as well. Pentium 4 2 GHz wins hands down.

CINEMA 4D Ray Tracing

CINEMA 4D used to be Athlon’s big strength, but Pentium 4 2 GHz is able to beat the fastest Athlon processor for the first time in this benchmark.

SiSoft Sandra

Here the usual Sandra-scores of all the tested processor without any further comments:

Pricing [Updated]

Intel has dropped Pentium 4 prices once more, making the Pentium 4 models from 1.5 to 1.7 GHz reasonably attractive.

Let’s also have a look at AMD’s pricing:

AMD just made a major price cut, so that even the fastest Athlon processor has a lower price than the slowest Pentium 4 processor. From that point of view it is obvious which product the majority of people should prefer. AMD continues to offer by far the best bang for the buck.

Conclusion

Benchmarking Pentium 4 against Athlon is a controversial thing. The right choice of applications can either make the one or the other look better or worse. Intel’s new Pentium 4 at 2 GHz however is beating AMD’s fastest Athlon in the majority of frequently used applications and deserves therefore the title ‘fastest PC processor’. Intel won the 2 GHz race and it also retook the crown of the maker of the fastest CPU. I am hesitant, but in a way we have to respect those facts and congratulate Intel.

What remains the same however, is the fact that Pentium 4 is still significantly more expensive than a comparable Athlon processor. AMD’s brand new price cuts make even the cheapest Pentium 4 look overly expensive. The price difference between Athlon 1 GHz and Athlon 1.4 GHz has become so small that almost everyone interested in a high-end system should go for an Athlon 1400. Buying a Pentium 4 would give you only marginally more performance, but for a much higher price.

Two things make it very hard for me to praise Intel any further though. The battle against VIA and its P4X266 chipset is something that I simply don’t appreciate, because for us consumers, P4X266 is certainly a good thing. Basically, if Intel’s managers would be real guys, they wouldn’t fight with VIA in the courtroom, but release i845 with DDR-SDRAM support early and battle against P4X266 on a technology, performance and reliability level. The delay of DDR-i845 plus the threats against Taiwanese motherboard makers show that Intel is utterly unable to play it straight. I really wonder who is responsible for this attitude, since the most Intel people I know (except for a few really unpleasant ones) are honest, straightforward and hard-working guys that deserve everybody’s respect. They also deserve to be represented by a management that sticks to rules of ethics and fairness to the benefit of its customers.

There’s another reason why Intel’s Pentium 4 2 GHz release might not be important after all. So Intel is back making the fastest processor. So Intel has won the 2 GHz race. Who really cares? The majority of people don’t give a rat’s behind about a 2 GHz processor! Who can blame them? Which application would justify the purchase of a 2 GHz monster for more than a tiny minority of people? Intel may have regained some prestige it lost to AMD a while ago. However, the current economical problems, the low NASDAQ and the recession in the PC-business will certainly NOT be solved with Intel’s Pentium 4 2 GHz processor. What a shame!