We’re getting a new computer and have been getting contradictory advice. We were told “don’t get an AMD processor,” and later, that it’s better than a pentium. Is there a factual answer to this? Does a pentium really provide more stability? We have a pentium III now, and it freezes up with great regularity and always has. I have no experience with AMD processors. (BTW, we’re going to get the Media Center variety of computer). Thoughts and opinions anyone?
[Moderator Underoos On]If you mention Mac, Apple or any variation thereof you will get an official Moderator Warning.[/Moderator Underoos On]
AMD has recently been touted as a “buy” stock because of their (as I understand it) dual processor technology, which is being used in a product which I apparently am unable to name here (just why is that?). While a distant second to the big guy, AMD has apparently greatly improved their product.
AMD makes a very good product. When I bought my last computer, it had the clear lead in performance/price ratio, but I cannot tell you if Intel has closed that gap recently. I have heard some people swear up and down that Intels are more stable, but I’ve never seen any evidence that that’s the case. I’ve got an AMD cpu in my machine, and it regularly records multiple weeks of consecutive uptime without reboot.
In short, there’s no reason to hesitate to buy either AMD or Intel just because they’re AMD and Intel. They’ll both do just fine. Buy whatever the best deal is, is my advice.
They are both very good and they swap the lead pretty often. I would say that AMD has both the performance edge and the cost edge at this time with the Athlon 64’s. I guess that would make it better overall at the moment. The overall product isn’t THAT much better but when you combine it with better prices then it starts to become compelling. You can do the same stuff with either brand however.
One more thing. I work in IT and have had IT coworkers say seriously bad things about Windows XP Media edition. They are very knowledgable people but I don’t know the details because I have never even seen a computer with it.
As a former system builder, my personal experience and opinion is that AMD is a bad idea. Yes, it’s cheaper, but they run very hot. I’ve seen AMD chips run so hot that the bracket for the cooling fan and heatsink melts and then the motherboard catches on fire.
Recently, my celeron 2.4 GHz chip did a similar thing, but there was no fire…the bracket cracked, which probably had something to do with the fact that the heatsink was packed with dust and I’d spent most of the weekend playing a graphics/processor intensive game. I ended up going up to a P4 2.4 GHz when it was all said and done.
This link details what happens to different kinds of processors when the heatsync and fan are removed in the middle of a game of “Quake”. The AMD chips didn’t fare well.
Now this is a couple of years old…the P4 2.0GHz had just been introduced when they did this. I don’t know how AMD is handling their thermal design nowadays.
I find this comment very odd, since most recent Intel chips have had substantially higher power draws than comparable AMD chips, and of course higher power draw entails more heat to be disipated. With appropriate heatsinks, AMDs should generally run cooler than Intels, not hotter.
From what I can tell, people who insist that Intel is “better” are either corporate lackeys or just talking out their butt. While power and heat were actually serious issues with AMD not too long ago, I think Intel now has similar issues (unless you’re looking at a Pentium M; don’t know how that compares with AMD’s mobile processor). Similar with speed issues – awhile back, Intel was clearly faster, but then AMD was benchmarked with better performance (at least in certain areas, e.g., floating point computation). Now, I think they’re essentially in the same ballpark.
What I can say is that I’ve bought three computers with AMD processors in the past few years (they were so much cheaper!), and all are still fine.
With the new AMD X2 (dual core 64-bit CPUs) heat is a non-issue. Dual cores equals two CPUs basically splitting the work, so each one gets considerably less hot than a single CPU would. Power used and heat produced is not a perfect .inear scale, so two CPUs each consuming half the power still make less heat than one CPU consuming all of it. For sometihng like a media center PC, where you might be enconding video while browsing the internet or doing something else, dual core is a God send, multi-tasking is what they excell at.
Chefguy, you’re confused. Intel’s chips are being used in the new line of fruit related computers, not AMD.
I’d say if you’re building your own, AMD is the better way to go. If you’re buying a name-brand computer though, the price/feature ratio of the system is much more important than what brand the processor is. Just go for the best deal.
Not true. Intel chips now run hotter than AMD. Before putting together a MythTV box, I did some research on building the quietest, coolest machine possible. (Useful resource: Silent PC Review Forums.) Intel chips, particularly those with the Prescott core, are pretty universally abhorred for being too hot to cool quietly and easily. AMD chips with the Venice core were the processor of choice.
As for the OP, provided you cool whatever cpu you get adequately, you won’t see any stability difference between AMD and Intel. Any stability problems you observe are far more likely to be caused by software problems (buggy drivers, spyware, etc.) than inherent flaws in your cpu architecture. Buy whatever cpu has the best performance for the money. Don’t bother with a dual-core chip, the software won’t be able to use it for a while yet.
That’s how I see it as well. I built my latest computer and stuck an AMD Athlon 64 in there, even though I’m still not using a 64-bit OS or 64-bit programs yet. But if I go and buy a laptop, I’ll take what I can get for a good price with the features I want and not worry about the CPU.
First of all, you don’t say what you are using it for; I assume a desktop machine, but a lot of mondo game playing, high end graphics, HPC work, what?
At work, we’ve built our latest HPC (high performance computing) systems based upon AMD Opterons. We’ve found that they run cooler, tend to be better supported by the analysis codes we use, have better throughput and memory access for the same motherboard, and of course are a better price vs. performance deal, even based upon nominal performance specs and ignoring the disappointing real world performance of the Itanium. We still use Intel Xeon- and Celeron-based workstations for desktop use but that’s because corporate IT has us chained to the hip with Dell. When it comes to Linux/Unix/FreeBSD/OpenBSD machines we’re more or less free (after going though an officious waiver process) to select the machines we like.
As for stability: without getting into a religious war, I’ve found that even with alleged improvements to Microsoft kernel architectures, their OSs are still prone to memory leakage, overactivity, and general defectiveness. I don’t know if you can consider other OSs but I’ve gone almost exlusively to Linux- and BSD-based operating systems with little loss of functionality. Of course, I’m not a gamer, and that niche requires a Microsoft OS, but I’ve started putting together quite a decent multimedia machine (eventually to become the nucleus of a home entertainment system) using a certain open source OS. Some of these, like Ubuntu or DesktopBSD are really quite friendly and nearly as seamless to install as Microsoft products.
C’est la merde! When did that topic become verboten?
Stranger
I’ve used both and both work fine. Right now if you’re a ‘gamer’ AMD has the benchmark/price lead so go that way.
Just trying to avoid the inevitable and off-topic “Neither one, dood! Dump that crap and get an iMac!” type of comment.
I sympathize with the desire to avoid a religious war, but with Apple offering Intel Macs it is a legitmate point, particularly since the OP decries the (probably OS-related) chronic failure of his current Pentium III. Nonetheless, I’ll defer to the moderator’s wisdom on this point and say no more. If the desire of the OP is to stick with a Microsoft OS (or an open source Linux/BSD OS) then AMD definitely has the best price for the processor. But as others have noted, you have to look at the cost of the whole system; an Intel Dell might end up being cheaper than a comperable AMD-based Alienware.
Another point to consider; for our HPC machines, we’ve found that for our (memory-intensive) applications like FEA and CFD solvers, the dual core machines don’t scale nearly as well as seperate processors on a single motherboard. While the price is nice compared with independent single core processors, the performance just isn’t there. I suspect game machines and real-time rendering MPI-compatible applications may see good performance scaling while computational and rendering applications won’t scale well with dual cores. YMMV.
Stranger
If you read my previous comment, I just wanted to mention that I’m NOT dead-set against AMD, it’s just that from prior experience, I had problems.
Another problem I’ve run into in the past 6 months is that in 3 different instances, some software just wouldn’t operate if there was an AMD processor installed. One is the AMF BOSS bowling software that a modern bowling alley with AMF scoring operates on. It just won’t work. I don’t know why.
There were also 2 different accounting softwares that strictly prohibited AMD processors. In one instance, we tried to use it on a brand new system with an AMD processor and it just wouldn’t operate. The software loaded and got to the main screen and then the computer froze. The other computer we had available was a Pentium 2 with 64 megs of RAM, well below the system requirements. We installed it on there and it worked just fine…it was slow as molasses, but it worked. They finally settled on a P4 2.6GHz and that’s what they still use today. I can’t remember the name of the software but I think it was accounting & inventory software custom tailored for use in jewelry manufacturing.
The other accounting software prohibited it in the system requirements and we never tried to run it on an AMD.
In the past, I’ve run my business on an AMD processor and had no problems. I routinely use MS Office, Quickbooks, CorelDraw, Adobe Photoshop and Adobe Pagemaker. No problems except that Corel was slow enough to be difficult to work with. I currently have P4 in everything and no problems at all.
I’m having a hard time taking this seriously… if you have had CPU’s run so hot that they actually melted other components, then the system is in some way not correctly assembled, configured, or maintained, or you’ve chosen poor case/cooling components, or you’ve overclocked it irresponsibly. Or all of the above.
You’re not supposed to let your heatsink fill up with dust. Get a filter or stop keeping it on the floor.
That’s very interesting, I was just wondering if I could get that extra gaming edge by disassembling the core components in the middle of gameplay. Now I’ll know not to do that, thanks.
jasonh300, if the software isn’t working on an AMD CPU, it’s not AMD’s fault, it’s the software developers for making software that won’t work with it. Did the software say anwhere that it didn’t work with AMDs?
One thing you should know about AMDs, pohjonen, in case you don’t already know, is that at first glance it seems they are pricier than Intels, but that’s only more expensive for the same clock speed. AMDs have greater performance at the same clock speed, and therefore the same performance at a lower clock speed. Their naming scheme in theory accomodates this (for instance, a 3800 is in theory as good a 3.8 GHz) but I think they might be a bit overzealous. Still, though, they do out perform at the same clockspeed so it’s an important thing to know about.