How much perceivable performace difference would there be between a P2-450 and a P3-450? A friend has an old P3-450, I am using a P2-450. Would it be worth the effort to try and switch?
With the rapid advance of CPUs in the last few years I have to admit that I’m not sure if there is any compatability between PII and PIII. If by chance they are pin compatible I can’t recall if they are architecture compatible. The two would likely go hand in hand.
As far as perceptible difference in performance I would have to say there likely would be.
You should probably do a bit of googling to get better info on this. I do know that both of those chips are still viable processors for running standard business apps. The servers we have here at work are all either PII or PIII and rock steady. Slow, but rock steady.
I know it won’t be a simple cpu swap, I’ll definitely need a new motherboard, but I’m just wondering if the effort would be worth it. I’ll be able to reuse the hard drive CD and DVD drives, modem etc.
I don’t think that the PIII was that big a step up, architecture-wise, then the PII. In fact I think you’d find little performance increase in a same-speed PIII. Certainly not enough to justify buying anything.
-lv
My experience with a similar situation: going from AMD K6-II 500 to I-PIII 500 is about a 30-40% speed up. Nice-ish, but not a lot. BTW, the MB with the Pentium is a PII MB and isn’t supposed to run a PIII. But it does. (Slot 1, too.) The MB has some other nice features so I still use it (as in “right now”).
Don’t throw money at that CPU swap. Consider spending more for a MB with integrated video if needed, get some new RAM and the rest should work in a new system.
Not necessarily. There are a lot of motherboards that will run either P II or P III CPUs. Is this a bought machine (like HP or Compaq) or one that someone built using non-proprietary parts? You should be able to find out what CPUs the motherboard will support on the web site of either the system manufacturer or of the motherboard manufacturer.
If there’s little to no money involved in the swap, by all means go for the upgrade.
My current machine (Gateway P2-450) is not a slot 1 and the other cpu is (the one I have is the big wide card and the other is the small square). That means a new MB, correct? I’m assuming the new MB would be rather inexpensive, so I’m going to look into it.
As i understand ftg that AMD K6 chip was a turd. And this from a guy who is a huge AMD fan, and stock-holder. So I’m not
surprised you saw an improvement.
And thanks for the input.
It is not worth it… even if the motherboard is cheap…
You are not going to notcie much change between the 2.
You could also bump up the RAM a bit… that would help speed…
I would get a cheap Athlon 1500+ with a cheap motherboard for like $80 and you will notice a huge difference…
http://www6.tomshardware.com/cpu/20030217/index.html
This should help.