64 Bit Pentium 4... any future for gaming?

[Overlag]

Originally posted by Mini D
No... I'm saying 64bit is irrelevant to the discussion of gaming. No matter what. It's irrelevant to desktop CPUs on the whole right now. There is not consumer market level support for it. Saying otherwise, at all, is an outright lie.

The 3500+ is the 2.2ghz opteron. Very comparable to price and performance with the P4-550. Both Intel and AMD go up about $200 per 10% gain after that... so you can go from 110 fps with HL 2 to 126fps. Yippy.

3500+ is an A64, NOT a Opteron. Opteron is a 940 socket chip for servers and doesnt have a ratings like that, but has 1xx, 2xx and 8xx...

so  you have a 3500 A64 venice for £199 or a P4 650 for £270, or a P4 550 for £190. what would you choose?

Id choose the 2nd cheapest, and fastest.  A64 3500.... Of coarse for £240 you can get a San Diego 3700 which would be miles faster than any of them, yet still cheaper than that P4 650.

You would however choose anything without 64 in its name/specs? Because you are almost saying in most of your posts that having 64bit now disadvantages you. It doesnt disadvantage you at all. Though saying that i guess it does because "your" chip maker charges extra.......

[Kev367th]

Originally posted by Mini D
The 3500+ is the 2.2ghz opteron

And this is coming from the expert LOLOLOLOL.

[Overlag]

Originally posted by Kev367th
And this is coming from the expert LOLOLOLOL.

thats what i thought

[Kev367th]

Well at least it explains one thing - why Intel have fallen behind - they don't even know what they are up against.

Seriously

In MiniD's opinion a 64 CPU is not worth it because of app/game/OS support. Hmmmmm.

Using AMD only as an example so don't get your panties in a twist MiniD
If I was to spend up to $1000 on a CPU I shouldn't buy an FX-55 then?
Even though it is the best gaming CPU out there?
Instead I should buy the fastest XP CPU i.e. the 3200XP?

MiniD do you actually realise the insanity in what your saying?

P.S. Opterons are NOT really a gaming chip, having to use ECC memory with them hurts their performance.

Oh I get because I said I would buy Intel I'm lieing. Like I said I have 4 other machines in the house, and I checked to make sure.
3 Intel (1 P4, 1 P3, and 1 P2) 1 AMD (XP3000)
I need them because I am a network admin and use them to try out apps before going live with them on the company network.

In fact have just put in 16k worth of new servers/network upgrades all Intel. This is despite the boss thinking about using a blade Opteron. As I explained to him, for servers Intel is still the only tried and trusted solution.

[Mini D]

The 64bit processor is not worth it simply because there is no support for it. It is irrelevant in the grand scheme of things. It's as irrelevant as a processor with "built in multi-core support" that DOESN'T HAVE MULTIPLE CORES.

I can't believe this is such a stretch of the imagination. Dammit guys, stop being obtuse.

[Overlag]

so you want us to buy outdated XPs or crappy ultra long pipelined Prescots? just so we dont get 64bits?

to be fair i dont really care my A64 has 64bit possiblity. its the fastest gaming cpu. The bonus is it runs linux 64 and XP 64.

[Mini D]

64bit is not a reason to purchase a processor right now. The 64bit aspect of any processor being released is irrelevant. The 32bit is the only part that matters. Especially when it comes to gaming. If you don't believe me, try installing XP-64e and see just how much fun you have trying to load programs and hardware on it.

So... continue to read the rags and pretend you know what the hottest thing on the market is and how in tune you are because you read the product roadmaps on anandtech. It might help hide the fact that you haven't applied a lick of comon sense to anything you've said... especially if you're touting 64bit extensions without warning people about Microsoft's 64e operating system.

AMD 64 3500+ (thought that was an opteron...)
Pentium 4 550

Both are good chips at a decent price. That still leaves you money to get a fancy new video card.

Or... go with the 3700 that provides a 3% increase in performance for another $120. Yes... that would be swell. There's some sage advice to be giving.

[Overlag]

when did i advise that about the 3700? I ALWAYS buy the bottom end, ive brought 3 3200s, overclocking them past 3500/3700 ratings.

But right now things are different, Venice and san Diego are out, both offer overclocks upto around 2.8ghz. However the san diego is 1mb vs Venices 512kb. And the 3700 only costs £40 more than the 3500. and only 3% improvement? where the hell you find that info?

I myself HAVE loaded XP64 RC1 and i HAVE played games on it. RC1 sucked though, and ATI's drivers was even worse back then but it still worked.. not bad for RC1.

and what dont i believe you about?

where have i recommend 64bit chips because of there 64bit useage? and anyway, having 64bit support IS a good thing. Or you against extra features?


And i also see your now recommending a A64 yourself...so your going against your own arguement with me and kev?

[Kev367th]

I think your missing the whole point -

Quote -"The 64bit processor is not worth it simply because there is no support for it"

People are buying 64 bit CPU's not for 64 bit support but because they are the fastest gaming CPU's in 32-bit. To advise people that they are not worth getting because of lack of 64-bit support is crazy. When it runs just as happily 32-bit.

Value for money I agree, but a percentage of the population are willing to spend $800+ on a CPU else Intel and AMD wouldn't have them.

No-one has actually said there is a lot of support for 64-bit OR dual core, it will come.

Quote -"It's as irrelevant as a processor with "built in multi-core support" that DOESN'T HAVE MULTIPLE CORES. "
True but the whole idea was that the support for it was already designed into the die and didn't require a redesign or kludge to make it happen.
I think they had to wait for the 90nm process until it could be realised (I may be wrong).
Called providing an upgrade path, in this case an upgrade path that does not require a new motherboard, just a BIOS update for socket 939 boards.
About as irrelevant as a design that has a dual core CPU communicating through the FSB. Even you must admit it's a nasty inefficient hack, but it's the best they could do with the current range.

Any time I have mentioned XP64 I have said do it as a dual boot with a 32 bit OS also. Only app/game I had problems running under XP64 was Norton Anti Virus.
Found drivers for all my stuff apart from one SCSI RAID card which is very old.

[Schutt]

Can anyone point me to the facts of "64bit" for athlon64 and P4 ?

I thought they still work on x86 set of instructions and have an extension to the instructions that allows for 64bit adresses and data?

So to say, the instructions are still 16 and 32 bit long, just a long adress/data is possible?

I expect a real speedup as soon as we finally get a new, clean instruction set tailored to 64bit and a new standard like x86 for that platform, which does away with the old way interrupts are done, using a "system" co processor.

[whels]

http://techreport.com/reviews/2005q1/64-bits/index.x?pg=1

http://techreport.com/reviews/2005q2/athlon64-x2/index.x?pg=1

[MANDO]

In my experience, keep with AMD and Nvidia, flee from ATI and Intel.

[Kev367th]

Originally posted by MANDO
In my experience, keep with AMD and Nvidia, flee from ATI and Intel.

Actually I'll go with whatever gives best value for money, contrary to what MiniD thinks.
If I'm going to spend $xxx amount on a CPU I'll check out whats available and buy the best one. Just so happens at the moment it's AMD, it will swing back again to Intel at some point.

[LePaul]

Ya know, this was a great read up until Kev & Overlag came in to pounce on MiniD for the sheer fact he's an Intel employee.

Sad to see this thread go down as a pigpile.

[Kev367th]

LePaul -
I didn't even know he was an Intel employee, read back a bit you'll see where I mention it after he tells me.

It went into a 'pigpile' after the comments rather than sticking to facts turned into personal attacks, and that WAS NOT started by me.