From owner-freebsd-questions Fri Apr 20 0:56:40 2001 Delivered-To: freebsd-questions@freebsd.org Received: from oahu.WURLDLINK.NET (oahu.WURLDLINK.NET [216.235.52.1]) by hub.freebsd.org (Postfix) with ESMTP id 0DC6B37B424 for ; Fri, 20 Apr 2001 00:56:36 -0700 (PDT) (envelope-from vince@oahu.WURLDLINK.NET) Received: from localhost (vince@localhost) by oahu.WURLDLINK.NET (8.9.3/8.9.3) with ESMTP id VAA10708; Thu, 19 Apr 2001 21:56:23 -1000 (HST) (envelope-from vince@oahu.WURLDLINK.NET) Date: Thu, 19 Apr 2001 21:56:22 -1000 (HST) From: Vincent Poy To: Charles Burns Cc: , , , , , , Subject: Re: the AMD factor in FreeBSD In-Reply-To: Message-ID: MIME-Version: 1.0 Content-Type: TEXT/PLAIN; charset=US-ASCII Sender: owner-freebsd-questions@FreeBSD.ORG Precedence: bulk X-Loop: FreeBSD.ORG On Fri, 20 Apr 2001, Charles Burns wrote: > > > >These are the only differences between the chips from my understanding > >(if > > > >I am > > > >wrong I am sure someone here will set me straight) > > > > > > Right except the FSB is the same on both. FSB speed differs only between > > > Intel chips. > > > > True except lots have been saying the Intel Celeron II 800 is > >really the Celeron 533 overclocked. > > Well, yes, of course it is.Do you think there is any physical difference > between the two besides labelling? > Intel/AMD make their chips en masse. > > Bob's Athlon 1000 may well have been on the exact same silicon wafer as > Joe's Athlon 1300 and Sam's Athlon 800. They test each chip and then mark > them accordingly. Not really... > If there is suddenly a huge demand for 900MHz Athlons and nobody wants the > 1200's, AMD will sell 1200's as 900s. They are all the same chips made at > the same time from the same plant (other than Durons) and all cost the same > to manufacture. Maybe the ones that don't past certain tests are relabeled as the lower end ones... > My computer--an Athlon classic week 42 (good week, heh) was sold as 500MHz, > is marked as 600MHz, works at 700MHz just fine and with voltage boost will > run at 800 rock-solid. Hehe. I just hope you didn't get charged a 600Mhz prive for a 500Mhz chip.. > There are several factors that determine what your chip runs at by default. > Some are: > *What it was tested to run at > *What the market wants > *What week the chip was manufactured in. AMD and Intel tweak their > manufacturing process weekly and often get better yields later on. That's > why the first Athlon's would be hard pressed to surpass 800 but can now > often surpass 1500. > *What size the transistors are (.18 micron, .25 micron, etc.) > *What plant they were manufactured in > *What metal is being used to connect the transistors (i.e. copper, aluminum) > Chips that are close to the center of the silicon wafer (which is from 6 to > 12 inches in diameter) tend to be better than those closer to the outside. > *What semiconductor material is used. Some exotic chips use Gallium Arsenide > or Germanium rather than silicon. Don't worry about this unless you are > playing with Cray-class puters though. > > The final official clockspeed is usually more a matter of market conditions > than what the chip is really capable of. The exception is that if you get a > top of the line chip it is usually close to it's limit. The latest Athlons > seem to be doing quite well as far as "overclocking" goes though. Yep, if they can do those speeds then it must be working. Cheers, Vince - vince@WURLDLINK.NET - Vice President ________ __ ____ Unix Networking Operations - FreeBSD-Real Unix for Free / / / / | / |[__ ] WurldLink Corporation / / / / | / | __] ] San Francisco - Honolulu - Hong Kong / / / / / |/ / | __] ] HongKong Stars/Gravis UltraSound Mailing Lists Admin /_/_/_/_/|___/|_|[____] Almighty1@IRC - oahu.DAL.NET Hawaii's DALnet IRC Network Server Admin To Unsubscribe: send mail to majordomo@FreeBSD.org with "unsubscribe freebsd-questions" in the body of the message