I'm interested im buying a laptop I've found, it has the new AMD athlon 64 bit processor in it. I've always been an Intel guy, and my question is this. What's all the hype about how powerful this processor is, if it's rated at 1.8 ghz? Is it comparable to around 3 ghz or something? If anyone has any info on this processor, I'd be pleased to be educated

Shorter pipeline.

more registers, ability to efficiently access more than 4GB of ram, a 64 bit processor wont gain you much in performance compared to a 32 bit one the only real difference that allows the amd64 processors to get the same performance with a lower clock speed over its XP brothers would be the added registers, go with an AthlonXP for a notebook or better yet a Pentium M I dont know exactly what the processor your talking about would be comparable to but my guess is a p4 2.7-3.4 Ghz a 1.3 Ghz Pentium M is comparable to about a 2Ghz Pentium 4 gives double the battery life and runs much cooler

I had a emachines AMD64 laptop and it is veeerry fast.The problem there lies more with apic and acpi and the unavailability of radeon 64 bit drivers - almost all AMD64 laptops have radeon 9600 graphics except HP,Compaq and Asus (but the Asus isn't even listed on their website).
If you check price versus an Intel 3 Ghz there is no contest - you can get the Amd for about 1400,-- after rebates and an Intel will set you back around 2000,-- with the same configuration and still be slower.

Amd's run burning hot as it is... Put an amd into a laptop? No thanks...

Oh - yeah? http://users.erols.com/chare/elec.htm

And what are you trying to prove with the maximum die to heatsink temperature? The fact your processor wont die but will burn your lap?

Nothing - besides that there are people that only stare at one number and that I forgot to switch the general forum off.

can someone tell me what is the big deal with 64 bit processors?, they cost like $300 while i could get a amd athlon 2500+ for $100

(note: those are all rounded up, but still....),, but in a laptop id say a Intel would be best (lower temp ratings)

The big deal is that the marketing departement wants to sell you something expensive that pretty much no one has a use for... 32-bits limits you to 4 gigs of ram oh no i need 64-bits so i can use my 512mb of ram Second a fair bit of applications wont even compile/run properly on machines that have 64-bit registers. We will be needing 64-bits processors when you will actually need/can afford over 4 gigs of ram. Lastly i dont get the big deal with amd 64. It really is no big deal and sure as hell is not the first 64-bit processor(first was in 1970's iirc).

Yeah, actually the laptop I was looking at was an Emachines 64bit AMD with radeon 9600 pro graphics. Really interested investing in one.

hmm, i still think 64 bits would be best for games,

and also shouldn't the compiler handle all the register stuff?, i can see were some programs would have problems,, but isn't gcc supposed to try and solve them when it compiles things?

The thing is that people need to take several things into account when considering the viability of the 64 bit processor.

There is more to this than simply high register numbers and RAM size. It's impressive to see a 1.8ghz machine benchmark out at 3.0, sure. However, 64-bit also gives something to us on a very deep level: the kernel stack. The kernel has a fixed-size stack, something that is non-volatile and therefore not dynamic. The kernel stack is one size, and one size only, no matter how much RAM you have, or what have you. This means that, if instructions fill up this FIFO buffer, your kernel will immediately have latency and real-time apps such as audio playback will skip. Nobody notices this, of course, because of Linux's wonderful task priority management system, which allows for real time applications to be set at a higher priority than, say, a kernel compile. Pre-emptable kernels help with this as well.

64-bit computing is also tremendous for audio processing. It allows for higher 'resolution' in sound, and therefore higher quality. I can nearly guarentee that people who remember the transition from the 16-bit intel chips to the 32-bit chips are <i>not</i> among those making these posts--they saw firsthand what the results of such an architecture advancement can be.

Perhaps there is no use for it--now. But think about it. We're reaching the ceiling of what 32-bit systems can do. Even in applications where we are not pushing the boarder, we are getting close. Is it so unreasonable to adopt a system that gives us breathing room for when such things as six gigs of RAM are commonplace in desktop systems? Many people still working in the computer business today have owned systems where RAM was measured in kilobytes, and where registers could never handle 32 megs of RAM, let alone four gigs.

In short: While it is true that the potential of the x86_64 architecture is yet to be fully put to use in desktop systems, it is expanding the boundaries of computing so that operating systems and application development will have room to reach for the sky. Is it overkill now? Perhaps. Will the people who now pledge themselves to 32-bit be the ones searching for applications compiled for their architecture in a few years? Probably.

~Treth

I doubt people here are pledging their allegiance to 32 bit processors, they are only saying that hype and marketing PR are leading to excessive overkill when, with todays applications leads to little or no more performance, yes we will have more breathing room in places like the kernel stack, however at this time it isnt necessary, in the future it will be and while these 64bit processors will be able to handle it they will likely be the "old" machine in the corner replaced then by a new 64bit computer which is far faster to meet the expectations of tomorrows applications, the benefits of 64bit computing at the home level are not being used, so spending the extra money will only be bragging rights, spend less on this computer and get the same performance then go out and buy your 64bit computer next year, or maybe that will only be viable in several years, either way I dont deny that it will come, and that 32bit processors will be a thing of the past but that time just isnt now

Another thought, limited hardware presents us with challenges that lead to creative solutions, linux code runs well and it runs fast, that does not mean there is no room for improvement, fast code comes from slow machines where it is most useful but benefits everyone more streamlined code and a smaller footprint mean we can spend less on hardware for the same performance and get more out of our monster machines, much like getting 4 gigs of ram in a word processing station and only using 200mb a 64 bit computer is just extra that you wont use anyways