It's amazing you researched the plus models of the K6 and came to the conclusion that they are valued because they boost performance.

Have you tried running 3D-Mark-99 ? I think you will get a totally different score. 😉

Running without L2 makes a ''+" cpu on a super socket 7 board about 5% slower. I guess it's the same on your Intel board so keep it enabled!

And even with that bit of performance loss it's STILL a good 5%-10% faster as your old scores. On a good day (right bench/game) the k6-2+ kan be around 20% quicker compared to the normal k6-2. The k6-3+ can hit 30% and maybe even a bit higher in some cases. On a super 7 the extra bonus is the overclocking headroom, making 550/600mhz a breeze.

So: You can't overclock it, you run it without L2, and it's the k6-2+ not the k6-3+..... I think your cpu is performing fine!

Also, thinking that a stuttering part of the benchmark will be fixed by a faster cpu is a tiny mistake: let's say it runs 12fps and you place a 20% faster cpu. It's max would still only be 14fps and since your ram, video etc. is not getting the 20% boost it will probably be only 13fps. Not really a jump in performance.

Phils computer lab has some programs and a CPU tools CD you can download and burn.
Has some good tools for benchmarking CPU, Cache, BUS, Memory, Harddrives, etc.

https://www.philscomputerlab.com/k6-2-2-3-resources.html

Burn to cdrom dosbench. Boot off dos diskette and then run these tools.
https://www.philscomputerlab.com/dos-benchmark-pack.html

Yeah I got exited when I saw a few benchmarks between the 2 different CPU's and since I'm stuck at 500mhz (6 x 83mhz is the max) I thought the k6plus would be a worth while upgrade.
The thing I'm still stuck on is the minor inconsistencies reported by ctcm and setk6?
I've tried setk6v2 and v3 and get the same result.

I don't think putting more ram in the system will boost fps much further, maybe a better video card but I love my voodoo 3.

BTW does anybody know what the 'm' in ACZM means? As far as I know its exactly the same as a k6 ACZ?

Thanks for the link to the dos benchmarks, I keep finding new info every time I go to Phil's website.

Report back what you find to be a better setup for the AMD K6 as I plan on building some K62 and K63 builds in the future too.

I'll test with the mobo cache enabled and see if it makes any difference.
I'm guessing I'll have to put the tag ram IC back in? Or will it conflict with the k6-2+?

Briggz wrote:

I'll test with the mobo cache enabled and see if it makes any difference.
I'm guessing I'll have to put the tag ram IC back in? Or will it conflict with the k6-2+?

Nope, it purely relates to the L2 (now L3) cache. The K6-2+ tags its own cache.

I've put the tag back in and re enabled external cache in the bios however cpu-z and crystalcpuid both have L3 cache greyed out? Ctcm doesn't show L3 either?
I know the onboard cache works because it was showing when I had the old k6-2 in?

I'll run some benchmarks now.

I believe your motherboard can already cache >64MB RAM, if that's indeed the case you really had no use for a K6-2+ to be honest, bad investment..

appiah4 wrote:

I believe your motherboard can already cache >64MB RAM, if that's indeed the case you really had no use for a K6-2+ to be honest, bad investment..

Not really, on-chip L2 cache is much faster than 83MHz motherboard L2 cache.

xjas wrote:

Not really, on-chip L2 cache is much faster than 83MHz motherboard L2 cache.

Indeed, it's the other way round - the added value of external cache is much smaller with a CPU with on-die L2.

This topic inspired me to order a K6-2 500. I already have a K6-3+, and expect a K6-2+ any day by post. Even though a K6-2+ isn't a speed wonder, I'm puzzled by the minimal speed delta here. I have a nice P5A, so can try lots of FSB options...

I can confirm enabling the onboard cache does help performance wise, I've only run 1 benchmark so far...

3Dmark99max
2385 3D marks
5137 cpu marks

Already an improvement compared to no onboard cache.

I just downloaded a benchmark package from this site which contains a lot more programs to try out, so I'll give them a shot also.

I think there was no such thing as L3 cache on asus motherboards back in 1996? so maybe that's why cpu-z reports no L3 cache? just a guess

Also a quick note, K6-2+ were meant to be run at 100mhz fsb but I can only go as high as 83mhz, it could explain the not so high performance increase.

Good to see your performance is up.

L2 on the motherboard becomes L3 when the cpu already has L2 of his own. So your Asus does have L3. I don't know why it isn't showing as enabled but as long as it works..... that's the main thing right?

And you talked about maybe a better graphics card: the voodoo3 is already too fast and is simply waiting for the motherboard/cpu to give it instructions so any card that's even faster is really a waste.
Even a single voodoo2 will not get fully up to speed on a k6 plaform. 3dfx cards do however work fine and are preferred on such platforms.

Just a quick update,
I changed a few ram settings in my BIOS last night and have received quiet a big performance increase in 3dmark99.
All these years I've been using the auto 60ns settings in my award bios, I remember playing with these settings at one stage and getting some instability under windows 98 so I just reverted back to default auto settings and never really looked into it again.

RAM sticks: 4 x 64mb 72 pin EDO 60ns

Auto configuration: Disabled
DRAM read burst timing: x222
DRAM write burst timing: x222
RAS to CAS delay: 2T
DRAM R/W leadoff timing: 6T/5T
DRAM: turbo read leadoff: disabled
DRAM speculative leadoff: enabled
Turn around insertion: disabled
Turbo read pipelining: disabled

Before ram setting changes my best 3dmark scores were,
3Dmarks: 2388
CPUmarks: 5164

After with new ram settings 3dmark99 max scores,
3Dmarks: 2874
CPUmarks: 6070

A nice improvement 😀
I sat down last night and played need for speed 3 and shadows of the empire, both games perform incredibly well and I experienced no instability or crashing under the new ram settings.

Side note:
I e-mailed Jan Steunebrink who wrote all of the patched bios files to support K6-2+ & k6-3+,
I asked why L3 cache was not being shown in ctcm and cpu-z for example and his reply was those utilities only show L1,L2,L3 cache of the cpu and not whats on the motherboard. He said an older version of cpu-z might of shown motherboard cache but he's not sure.
I ran sandra sisoft 99 and it does indeed show my motherboard cache size and that it is present.