Will Northwood save the p4?

[oblivion2888]

I'm inclined to believe so. I remember that the transition from 0.25um katmai core to 0.18 coppermine core did boost sales a tad. Northwood will take the current 0.18 p4 down to 0.13. Coupled with the new mPGA socket-478 (which looks mighty spiffy) the Northwood core will lower the cost of making p4s and scale well up to 4 ghz.

 

[Degenerate]

save?? hmmm... Its not "dieing" is it? Its actually quite nice to have a 1.8ghz running...But yeah, the 0.13 tech looks even better

 

[fkloster]

P4's seem to be doing just fine @ .18 socket 423 in my opinion 1.8ghz not too shabby...

 

[oblivion2888]

the new socket-478 packaging looks nice though....could save intel a bundle

 

[NelsonMuntz]

Yeah, it's not too shabby currently if all you look at is clock speed. The problem is that before the 1.8 GHz, Athlon could beat it in several bench tests at a MUCH LOWER clock speed and at much less cost. I think the only thing that is really going to save the P4 is to lose the stupid RDRAM and let the new chipset work with DDR-RAM and watch the sales pick up!

 

[fkloster]

<< ...the new socket-478 packaging looks nice though >>



You got that right!

 

[oblivion2888]

forgot to add the 2x L2 cache = 512kB!!!

 

[fkloster]

<< and let the new chipset work with DDR-RAM and watch the sales pick up >>



Why do people keep bringing up this issue about DDR memory saving the P4.

DDR MEMORY WILL KILL THE P4 WHEN COMPARED TO RAMBUS There. I feel better...P4's need bandwith that DDR cannot deliver. Rambus + i840 + P4 is a perfect marriage...

 

[Jgtdragon]

I agree with fkloster about Rambus killing DDR in performance with the P4.

P4 is made for Rambus with the i850 chipset.

 

[NFS4]

<< P4's seem to be doing just fine @ .18 socket 423 in my opinion 1.8ghz not too shabby... >>


I'm still sticking with a 1.5GHz Palomino and PC2100 DDR memory. Considering that:

1) High-end P4's cost twice as much as high-end Athlons (1.4GHz Athlon, $162 -- 1.8GHz P4, $562). That's a $400 difference. That's the cost of a 1.4GHz Athlon, an AMD760 motherboard, and about 512MB of DDR SDRAM. Even the 1.7GHz P4 is a wallet busting $332.
2) Performance differential (even with a high MHz swing in the P4's favor) is not that big except for QIII
3) i850 boards are still expensive
4) You buy a 1.8GHz P4 now and you're crazy anyway Buy any P4 now and your crazy I like to keep my mobos for at least one CPU upgrade. Socket 423 is a dead end with no future. Long live Northwood
5) Rambus is still outrageous in price:

256MB PC2100, $46 -- 512MB PC2100 (2x 256MB), $92
256MB RDRAM (2x128MB, must be paired), $118 -- 512MB RDRAM (2x256MB, must be paired), $266

 

[fkloster]

<< Socket 423 is a dead end with no future >>



Hehe, Socket 423 has been dead &amp; has had no future, it seems, for a very long time now ay NFS4?

 

[NFS4]

<<

<< Socket 423 is a dead end with no future >>



Hehe, Socket 423 has been dead &amp; has had no future, it seems, for a very long time now ay NFS4? >>


Considering that's the only point that you addressed, I guess you agreed with my other points

Of course I've been saying it for a long time...maybe 3 - 4 months or so

 

[SocrPlyr]

NFS4
i agree w/ you on everything but the RAM issue...
i don't think that RDRAM is that badly priced... i can remember just last summer paying more than that for SDRAM... RDRAM is in high demand (for the ammount that is being made) while memory makers are saturating the market w/ DDR RAM...
basically i am trying to say RDRAM isn't that high priced it is the DDR that is insanely low priced (i can't see how the manufacturers are making money...)

just my ignorance tho--- don't take my word for it...

Josh

 

[dullard]

<<

<< Socket 423 is a dead end with no future. >>



Well if someone bought a 1.3 GHz P4, they will be able to upgrade to at least a 2.0 GHz P4 and probably a 2.2 GHz. I don't think a 54%-70% speed upgrade is a dead end. Most people don't upgrade their processor. A typical computer user starts to feel their computer needs upgrading after 2 years (and don't bother upgrading until 3 years have passed), at that time it is usually far better to buy a new motherboard anyways.

 

[fkloster]

<< Well if someone bought a 1.3 GHz P4, they will be able to upgrade to at least a 2.0 GHz P4 and probably a 2.2 GHz. I don't think a 54%-70% speed upgrade is a dead end. Most people don't upgrade their processor. A typical computer user starts to feel their computer needs upgrading after 2 years (and don't bother upgrading until 3 years have passed), at that time it is usually far better to buy a new motherboard anyways. >>



Nicely stated

 

[circut16]

Personally I am an AMD fan, so I would hope not, But there new chipset is being considered a second BX chipset, so I think the P4 will be a larger threat.

 

[NelsonMuntz]

<< Well if someone bought a 1.3 GHz P4, they will be able to upgrade to at least a 2.0 GHz P4 and probably a 2.2 GHz. I don't think a 54%-70% speed upgrade is a dead end. Most people don't upgrade their processor. A typical computer user starts to feel their computer needs upgrading after 2 years (and don't bother upgrading until 3 years have passed), at that time it is usually far better to buy a new motherboard anyways. >>


What makes you think the 2.0 and 2.2 GHz processors will be available on the socket 423? Intel hasn't brought out anything higher yet for the PIII socket 370 since they released the P4 and that, in my opinion, is lame. I would be surprised if the socket 423 ever goes beyond the 1.8 GHz that just came out.

 

[dullard]

<< What makes you think the 2.0 and 2.2 GHz processors will be available on the socket 423? Intel hasn't brought out anything higher yet for the PIII socket 370 since they released the P4 and that, in my opinion, is lame. I would be surprised if the socket 423 ever goes beyond the 1.8 GHz that just came out. >>



The 2.0 GHz version is right on the intel processor roadmap. The 2.2 GHz is the limit that people are guessing at on these forums (thus it may never materialize). Anyway, a 700 MHz improvement from a 1.3 to a 2.0 GHz is great to me. How many other processors give you 700 MHz or greater improvement without needing a new motherboard?

Now if you buy a 1.9 GHz version, or a 2.0 GHz version then you are at a dead-end.

 

[dullard]

<< What makes you think the 2.0 and 2.2 GHz processors will be available on the socket 423? Intel hasn't brought out anything higher yet for the PIII socket 370 since they released the P4 and that, in my opinion, is lame. I would be surprised if the socket 423 ever goes beyond the 1.8 GHz that just came out. >>



The 2.0 GHz version is right on the intel processor roadmap. The 2.2 GHz is the limit that people are guessing at on these forums (thus it may never materialize). Anyway, a 700 MHz improvement from a 1.3 to a 2.0 GHz is great to me. How many other processors give you 700 MHz or greater improvement without needing a new motherboard?

Now if you buy a 1.9 GHz version, or a 2.0 GHz version then you are at a dead-end.

 

[NFS4]

<<

<<

<< Socket 423 is a dead end with no future. >>



Well if someone bought a 1.3 GHz P4, they will be able to upgrade to at least a 2.0 GHz P4 and probably a 2.2 GHz. I don't think a 54%-70% speed upgrade is a dead end. Most people don't upgrade their processor. A typical computer user starts to feel their computer needs upgrading after 2 years (and don't bother upgrading until 3 years have passed), at that time it is usually far better to buy a new motherboard anyways. >>


I seriously doubt that someone &quot;bought&quot; a 1.3GHz P4, seeing how close it is in performance to the PIII. The 1.3GHz P4 is more for OEM's like Dell and Gateway. Besides, the 1.3GHz P4 came out AFTER the 1.4 and 1.5GHz Pentium 4's. And even then, most chose the 1.5 over the 1.4.

So going from a 1.5GHz P4 to a 1.8GHz P4 is not that big of a leap if you ask me. And even if 2.0GHz is the last 423 P4, it doesn't really make sense to get it as the 478 will be close by offering higher clock speeds, reduced power consumption, and 512k L2 cache.

But if you think that a motherboard that supports a 1.3GHz P4 is going to support a 2.2GHz P4, you are sorely mistaken


<< i don't think that RDRAM is that badly priced... i can remember just last summer paying more than that for SDRAM... >>


True, but this isn't last summer. This is NOW And compared to the competition, it's not a smoking bargain Besides, DDR SDRAM has had a lot shorter amount of time to flood the market. RDRAM has been around for a LONG while and it is still priced higher than competing solutions.

Regardless of what the market did/will do, DDR SDRAM RIGHT NOW is the ticket if you're building a system.

 

[Akaz1976]

<< basically i am trying to say RDRAM isn't that high priced it is the DDR that is insanely low priced (i can't see how the manufacturers are making money...)
>>



They are not making money. Its just that hardware demand has fallen of the cliff while memory makers have huge inventories to get rid off. RDRAM demand and inventories have been better matched.

Expect DDR RAM prices to increase dramatically once demand picks up. while RDRAM prices should continue to fall at a slow steady rate (as is normal with most hardware)

Akaz

 

[NelsonMuntz]

<< Why do people keep bringing up this issue about DDR memory saving the P4.

DDR MEMORY WILL KILL THE P4 WHEN COMPARED TO RAMBUS There. I feel better...P4's
need bandwith that DDR cannot deliver. Rambus + i840 + P4 is a perfect marriage... >>




<< Pentium 4 likes high bandwidth or it can at least take advantage of it, due to the high bandwidth of its processor bus. The 100 MHz clocked and quad-pumped P4-bus has a bandwidth of 3.2 GB/s, which is just as high as the dual-channel RDRAM memory configuration of the i850 chipset. The 1 GB/s of i845 with PC133 SDRAM are significantly less than what Pentium 4 would be able to compute, which is why even the very low latency of PC133 won't be able to make up for it.

Unfortunately it has become common belief that Pentium 4 was 'designed for RDRAM'. This is of course nonsense. Intel would be rather crazy if it would indeed design its processors for one particular memory. RDRAM memory would be a extremely bad choice, since its acceptance in the market still remains very low, partly due to Rambus unethical actions of listening to ideas in JEDEC-conferences and then patenting them as their own inventions and milking JEDEC members with demands for license fees.

Pentium 4 has been designed for high memory bandwidth. This can also be provided by DDR-SDRAM and especially by dual-channel DDR solutions as just realized by NVIDIA in form of the nForce chipset. We will see that Pentium 4 suffers from the low performance of PC133 SDRAM. However, the story might well be very different with DDR-SDRAM. Industry sources are already talking of the superior performance of i845/DDR solutions in some applications, while others claim that VIA's upcoming P4X Pentium 4 DDR-chipset will outperform i845/DDR as well as i850. I won't believe that Pentium 4 'requires' RDRAM until I have seen it with my own eyes. So far Intel is trying its hardest to ensure that RDRAM does indeed remain the best performing memory type for Pentium 4. However, sooner or later someone will run Pentium 4 with something that is faster than PC133 memory. We will see if RDRAM will remain the best P4-memory then. >>


That is quote from Tom's Hardware Guide's article about the 845 chipset and explains why I brought up the DDR issue. I apologize if you don't agree, but if DDR can be 2X as fast as 1.0 MB/s SDR and if it is dual channel like the nForce, that makes 4.0 MB/s which is more bandwidth than the current RDRAM solutions and with a lower latency to boot.

 

[Alkaline5]

<<

<< and let the new chipset work with DDR-RAM and watch the sales pick up >>



Why do people keep bringing up this issue about DDR memory saving the P4.

DDR MEMORY WILL KILL THE P4 WHEN COMPARED TO RAMBUS There. I feel better...P4's need bandwith that DDR cannot deliver. Rambus + i840 + P4 is a perfect marriage... >>



Dude, dual channel DDR RAM has an extra 1GB/s advantage over dual chanell RAMBUS. Not to mention much better latencies. Think about it.

 

[NFS4]

<< That is quote from Tom's Hardware Guide's article about the 845 chipset and explains why I brought up the DDR issue. I apologize if you don't agree, but if DDR can be 2X as fast as 1.0 MB/s SDR and if it is dual channel like the nForce, that makes 4.0 MB/s which is more bandwidth than the current RDRAM solutions and with a lower latency to boot. >>


Yep, I was wondering why you got &quot;slammed&quot; for that :Q

 

[mchammer187]

with regard to the original post i would say its possible but to do so I think the P4 must be brought to a price/performance ratio close to the Thunderbird who is going to pay 3x to 4x more for a 1.8 with RAMBUS for marginal performance over a 1.4 Tbird with DDR. .13 will help but i dont think that that alone will do it. I'm sure intel has tricks up its sleeve tho and if the price of RD RAMM continues to decline then anything could happen. For right now I am hoping to get 1.5 Palo paired with Nforce before I leave for school and in 6 - 12 months we'll see.