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Upgrading AMD XP Processor

schi0249 - Apr 22, 2005

		schi0249		Apr 22, 2005
			I currently have an AMD Athalon XP 1800. I was looking at upgrading it. Looking at what my system board supports (Gigabyte nForce 2)... I am curious about the differences. Whats the difference between an Athalon XP Barton, Athtlon XP Thoroughbred, and a K7 Sempron? Which is best for gaming?

		Quakester2000		Apr 22, 2005
			Barton and Thoroughbread are the different cores i think the barton is the newest core and is used in the new Athlon XPs from 2600+ onwards. As for semepron its pretty much a Athlon XP but with a reduced cache it uses the most up to date core. Since Socket A is going to be phased out by the end of the year its being used as the Budget processor range so semperon is the name. Socket 754 will be where the Semperons will be going when the Socket A boards are phased out and Athlon is only given to AMDS top processors e.g. Athlon 64/FX which run on socket 939.

		Scared0o0Rabbit		Apr 22, 2005
			Barton core is supposedly the way to go, I know it's what all the overclockers favor. Barton core cpus started at atleast 2500+, not sure about before then, and there are tbreds to atleast 2600+. The bartons tend to have more cache I think. I know in the 2500+ 2600+ range there are a few different cpus that use different speed memory but are rated to the same speed (atleast according to amd), for instance when I bought my old tbred 2600+ I had the choice between 266mhz fsb version and 33mhz fsb version. I was stupid at the time and didn't know that a 2500+ barton would be a better cpu for the same price. In any case, just make sure you get the speed of ram you need.

		IceDigger		Apr 22, 2005
			Go for the highest XP one you can get. Stay away from Semprons, they are like celerons.

		ExCyber		Apr 22, 2005
			Current Socket A Semprons are actually just standard Thoroughbred, no cache reduction or anything. Essentially all they did was rename the low end of Athlon to keep the "Athlon" name for mainstream gaming/power user processors. Just keep in mind that the model numbers are scaled for competing with Celeron D rather than Pentium 4, so for example Sempron 2800+ = Athlon 2400+. And the Socket 754 Sempron processors are in fact stripped Athlon 64 cores of some type (not sure which is the basis).

		schi0249		Apr 23, 2005
			Thanks to all. I'm just gonna max it out with an Athlon XP 3200. That should give me some head room for awhile. I'm also gonna bump my ram up to 2GB, I currently have 1GB.

		Scared0o0Rabbit		Apr 24, 2005
			just make sure your motherboard can handle the speeds before you buy.

		Drenholm		Apr 24, 2005
			I have a Barton 2500+ with a standard FSB of 333MHz (default clock speed 1833MHz). Bumping my motherboard's FSB setting up to 400MHz to match my (admittedly bad 256 MB of) RAM resulted in a nice jump to 2200MHz - an Athlon XP 3200+ for a nicely reduced price!

		IceDigger		Apr 25, 2005
			True, just about every 2500 barton can overclock to 3200 speeds on regular cooling.

		Scared0o0Rabbit		Apr 25, 2005
			I wish OCing athlon MP cpus was easier =/ Gotta do it all by multiplier.

		morlock		Apr 30, 2005
			Get an Athlon XP Mobile, The multiplyer is not locked, which makes it easy to overclock. I upgraded a system last year with a new Motherboard, Processor and memory. The Athlon XP 2500 Mobile was able to run at the same speed as an Athlon XP 3200, 2.2GHz (200 * 11) with a 1 degree C increase in temp. Since the multiplyer can be changed freely there are no timing issues that can can cause instabilities usually associated with overclocking. I got a Thermaltake ALX-800 heat sink for $16, the processor cost $89, DFI Infinity N Force 2 Ultra MOBO for $90, and 1 GB Corsair XMS TwinX 2-2-2-5 low latency DDR 400 memory for $160. Have fun

		Scared0o0Rabbit		Apr 30, 2005
			Athlon XP Mobiles are good stuff, they're a bit more expensive, but if you're not overclocking it makes little difference. As for cooling, thermaltake products are generally overly noisy for your performance which is rather subpar. I'm a former thermaltake user and was converted. If you take a look at overclockers.com you can look at a comparison for thermal ratings for all kinds of heatsinks, and thermaltake is fairly low down the list. If you want extreme cooling your best bet is liquid, barring that a thermalright with a panaflo fan is going to be more expensive, but will be quieter and cooler than any of thermaltakes offerings.

		mal		Apr 30, 2005
			I'm running a mobile Athlon 2200(?) at 1500MHz (333 FSB) with a Thermalright SI-97 without a fan.

		Scared0o0Rabbit		May 1, 2005
			Really? Hmmm I'm going to have to look into that heatsink. Currently the slk series is getting rather difficult to find. I run a couple slk900's on this computer, but I couldn't find one for my most recent build and had to use an 800.

		dhau		Jun 1, 2005
			I must admit I use Barton 2500 @ 200MHz FSB (as XP 3200), and it does indeed works beautifully. No problems whatsoever. Temperature is at 46c with Zalman 7000Cu. Ram is some low-end model dual ddr kit from OCZ (2.5-3-3-7). Mobo is an ASUS A7N8X-E Deluxe (I might be wrong a bit). Never had any issues since I ditched Radeon 9800 Pro in favour of GeForce 6600GT. Performance and stability in games is outstanding