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Which AMD processor do you recommend me to buy? I use my workstation for watching movies, browse the Internet, office, and as a development machine. I am planning to have 1GB of RAM and to install Slackware.
My main machine has
- AMD Athlon XP 2500 (Barton)
- 1 GB DDR RAM
- 2 x 80 GB Seagate IDE harddisc.
I use it for
- desktop work light word processing
- software development (Java with big IDEs like NetBeans and Eclipse)
- Web browsing and Email
- Fax server and client
- Database server (PostgreSQL)
- image processing (Astronomical data and photography)
- everything else
and it is really, really fast, even with more than one user working on it. I have this machine about a year now, and I use it daily, and there were only very few situations when the CPU load was at maximum for more then a minute. In fact, this is the first hardware that fully satisfies me. Certainly more than good enough for the tasks you mention.
I just recommend a few things, especially when you choose an AMD CPU:
- Get yourself a good computer case with noise reduction.
AMD CPUs get really hot. You need good cooling. Effective cooling means noise in most cases.
- Purchase high-quality, low-noise coolers.
Cheap coolers go bust, and as a consequence your CPU may be in danger, too. It may make sense to buy a temperature sensor with an external display, so that you can see how hot your CPU currently is. But it's not necessary, when you select good quality coolers. Again, try to find low-noise coolers. They are significantly more expensive, but you won't regret it, at least, if the machine is standing close to your desk.
- Select low-noise harddiscs.
This point is very often underestimated: Harddiscs can be *very* loud. Some start to scream at high frequencies when they get older. If the machine is used mainly for desktop purposes like the things you mention, avoid server harddiscs, as they designed for use in server rooms, not in offices (or living rooms) with human beings. That's why they are the loudest.
A great place about everything AMD. The forum is also a great place to find out which motherboards are lemons, which one's work well with linux, which are a pain.
If you're getting an AMD64 processor I'd suggest getting any motherboard with a VIA K8M800 chipset. I have this one with my 3200+ 1m L2 cache proc and it's *very* nice. I researched for 3 months before buying this box. I'm the type that makes sure there's no quirky suprises and that everything is fully supported. I don't like those kind of surprises. So far, no suprises and I've been using this box for, dang, almost a year now. Plus, SATA HDD's are mighty nice as well and fairly cheap now too. IDE is still cheaper but I just love the SATA connections as well. It's so much smaller and convenient plus no worrying about master/slave settings.
Also, http://tomshardware.com is a great place to find benchmarks or reviews for everything computers.
I went with the budget board, but since the last time I'd used one it had improved immensely. The accursed ECS board actually works! I got the motherboard cpu combo from Fry's electronics for $170. I picked up two sticks of 512 discount RAM that works excellently from newegg (the RAM is wintech, give it a try) for $35 each or something. Also, a 400 Watt 12v at 25 amps power supply for $16 (also from newegg) It was atadc powerking. The discount stuff actually worked, but I might just be lucky. My AMD Athlon 64 3200+ smokes, hope yours does too. BTW, it's my recommendation (3200+ 64)
If you do go 64 bit, be sure to check out Slamd64, the unnofficial 64 bit port of slackware. (you could still run 32 bit slack of course)
This is the output in slackware 32 bitness (What I got now):
processor : 0
vendor_id : AuthenticAMD
cpu family : 15
model : 12
model name : AMD Athlon(tm) 64 Processor 3200+
stepping : 0
cpu MHz : 2199.415
cache size : 512 KB
fdiv_bug : no
hlt_bug : no
f00f_bug : no
coma_bug : no
fpu : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 1
wp : yes
flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush mmxfxsr sse sse2 syscall mmxext lm 3dnowext 3dnow
bogomips : 4390.91
to answer your question, I've got a brother who's been using his Athlon 2200+ for a couple years and it performs well. All AMD chips will do, but for woopah and an investment in the future go 64 bit. Games and some programs are getting up to requiring the clock speed though.
Slamd 64 boots like a monkey! (excuse me). it boots really fast, out of the box (so to speak) {more like off the internet}. 32 bit slack is a bit slower (actually alot on the same 64 bit processor) Slackware is made for i486 and some i686. Those are pentiums and older stuff that it's optimized for. Slamd 64 however, has recompiled all the (actually most) of the programs that come with the distro to be made x86_64. It's quick!
Hmmm, I have all the slamd64 iso's sitting on my server. Maybe should do something with it.
Did you get the 3200+ with 512kb L2 cache or 1mb? Only reason I ask is because oddly, shortly after I bought mine with 1m I couldn't find the 3200+ sold with 1m L2 cache. At least not on newegg.com
Ah I see yours does have 512kb. Eh, just wondering.
Hey, guys, those aren't really performance comparisons. If so, you need to get a 2600+ Barton like I've got here
Code:
mingdao@james:~$ cat /proc/cpuinfo
processor : 0
vendor_id : AuthenticAMD
cpu family : 6
model : 10
model name : AMD Athlon(TM) XP 2600+
stepping : 0
cpu MHz : 2301.180
cache size : 512 KB
fdiv_bug : no
hlt_bug : no
f00f_bug : no
coma_bug : no
fpu : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 1
wp : yes
flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 mmx fxsr sse syscall mmxext 3dnowext 3dnow
bogomips : 4521.98
cause in these tables it's eating the lunch of that 64-bit and the Sempron.
And what about this? You know a Celery with L2 Cache of 128K isn't going to outperform that Barton core CPU
Code:
mingdao@titus:~$ cat /proc/cpuinfo
processor : 0
vendor_id : GenuineIntel
cpu family : 15
model : 2
model name : Intel(R) Celeron(R) CPU 2.80GHz
stepping : 9
cpu MHz : 2800.945
cache size : 128 KB
fdiv_bug : no
hlt_bug : no
f00f_bug : no
coma_bug : no
fpu : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 2
wp : yes
flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss ht tm pbe cid xtpr
bogomips : 5554.17
but from looking at bogomips (bogo = bogus in case you didn't know) and the cpu Mhz you'd think it would.
Now, here's one real test of the CPUs on "tar", a fairly CPU intensive operation. First, the AMD AthlonXP 2600+ Barton
Code:
mingdao@james:~/build$ time tar -xvjf linux-2.6.12.3.tar.bz2
real 0m41.260s
user 0m28.033s
sys 0m5.423s
And now for the Intel Celery 2.80 GHz
Code:
mingdao@titus:~/build$ time tar -xvjf linux-2.6.12.3.tar.bz2
real 3m2.495s
user 2m8.253s
sys 0m25.283s
Well, Intel chokes again. The Celeron 2800 tar took over 3 minutes, while the AMD 2300 took 41 seconds. I'll bet you can see a difference in that L2 Cache...
Or how about this one...running "make" on the 2.6.12.3 kernel after "make oldconfig" on the 2600+ Barton
Code:
mingdao@james:~/build/linux-2.6.12.3$ time make
real 7m5.266s
user 5m52.104s
sys 0m39.248s
and on the Celery 2800
Code:
mingdao@titus:~/build/linux-2.6.12.3$ time make
real 51m41.521s
user 42m28.394s
sys 4m8.521s
There are other ways to test performance, and perhaps someone more knowledgable will give us insight. But I do know that CPU speed and bogomips aren't anywhere reliable when comparing my 5 computers.
NB: From another LQ thread, and someone more knowledgable than I ...
The time values are:
Real time is the actual number of elapsed seconds. This includes time spent waiting as well as time spent working.
User time is the amount of CPU-time spent in "user mode," that is, executing the actual code of your application.
Sys time is the amount of time spent in "system mode," executing operating-system code directly on behalf of your application.
See: man time. There is considerably more information that can be presented. All of the figures relate to "this process" ... the one being timed.
Originally posted by keefaz Chinaman, you did overclock your athlon XP 2600+ barton, right ?
The original CPU freq is 1920.783 MHz
Man, am I embarrassed...and a bit confused. I didn't intentionally overclock it, but here's some truth's coming out. First, I just put a new HSF on here Saturday, and the CPU has 2600 on the die; plus one of the three AMD boxes I have here has 2600+ on it, so I know that is this CPU. (While building comps I sometimes save boxes and get confused.)
Second, I added 2600+ in my first post in this thread, because I knew that was the chipset, but it didn't show up in /proc/cpuinfo. Sometimes when I boot it says it, and sometimes it says the CPU Mhz. Once I changed the settings in CMOS, it displays 2600+ in /proc/cpuinfo.
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