Hoping wrote on 2023-01-30, 18:51:

The worst thing about AMD chipsets for AM2, I think it was the south bridge, the SATA interface always seemed slower to me than Intel chipsets, making the whole system seem slower, at the time the only solution I found was to use RAID 0 until SSDs became common and "affordable".
But it didn't surprise me either since I started using RAID 0 with an A7N8X deluxe and I could never stop using it until the advent of SSDs.

With an SSD, I can't find a difference between the AMD, Nvidia or Intel chipsets of the time, it may be seen in benchmarks, but I don't notice the difference that I did at the time.

Might be because desktop commodity spindle drives seem to flat spot at around 70MB/sec sustained for several years, only creeping a little higher, causing comment that there was little need for SATA 1, because single drives weren't even saturating ATA133, RAID 0 was the more economical way to go (like 2 $80 drives vs 1 $250 rocket ship that was only 20% faster) until SSD became bigger and cheaper. Anyway, you got the problem of CPU performance and RAM capacity quadrupling while the drives stayed more or less the same for the same period, and also going 32 to 64 bit didn't help. I think at first also more AMD were set up 64 bit, because AMD initiated it, and it was THE 64 bit implementation, if you particularly wanted 64bit you went for the original maybe, whereas Intel users both ore conservative in sticking with proven 32 bit and Intel, and having doubt if Intels EMT64 was a cheap imitation and not the real deal. Also there was some early confusion on the intel side as to whether the motherboards fully supported 64bit or not, that intel 64bit CPUs could be run on. So, AMD set up to 64 bit against intel on 32 bit would seem to be a tad more sluggish in i/o because 64bit software was a bit more bulky so more bits loaded vs 32bit version.

Well, with Nvidia chipsets that is actually opposite, because SATA is in MCP and "south bridge" was just more PCIe lanes for SLI.

A little bit of love. I prefer Core2Duo for most of my XP era builds, but I do have a AM2 build with a 45W Athlon X2, which come in E/B lower power classes. It allows for a compact HTPC style PC build , which is my most compact XP build. It does not produce much heat or require too much cooling, just one exhaust fan which is also the CPU cooler. I am not aware of such lower-power desktop CPUs for s775. The build overall has:

Athlon X2 4850e (45W class)
Some AM2 mobo (mATX)
Radeon HD 5770
X-Fi PCI sound card
SSHD
Compact HTPC style case

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_AMD_Ath … n_X2_processors

kolderman wrote on 2023-02-24, 13:13:

A little bit of love. I prefer Core2Duo for most of my XP era builds, but I do have a AM2 build with a 45W Athlon X2, which come […]
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A little bit of love. I prefer Core2Duo for most of my XP era builds, but I do have a AM2 build with a 45W Athlon X2, which come in E/B lower power classes. It allows for a compact HTPC style PC build , which is my most compact XP build. It does not produce much heat or require too much cooling, just one exhaust fan which is also the CPU cooler. I am not aware of such lower-power desktop CPUs for s775. The build overall has:

Athlon X2 4850e (45W class)
Some AM2 mobo (mATX)
Radeon HD 5770
X-Fi PCI sound card
SSHD
Compact HTPC style case

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_AMD_Ath … n_X2_processors

That GPU may be too much for an HTPC and has a maximum TDP that is around double than that CPU 😉, but why not....
I had an HD5570 on my HTPC for years, but the CPUs are two Opterom 2384 (115W) so I did it worse 😀. Now I'm using a Geforce 210, and it is enough, but I want to get an FM2 board with six SATA ports because I also use that computer as a NAS server and I think that there are interesting FM2 APUs for an HTPC if you don't want to use 4K, I don't think that a low power FM2 APU can handle 4K.

Well, the tiny Shuttle XPC machines have up to at least a 500w PSU.

I have the old Socket A model but have purchased the Intel Z270 based board and was hoping to swap it into that system and run a 7700k for the CPU and a GeForce PCX 5900 for the video card for a crazy Windows 98 build.

The 500w PSU will fit just fine with a tiny bit of case modding, but the Z270 motherboard is a tiny bit too long and I am unsure if I will be able to use it in that case.

The XPC systems support full sized modern video cards so as long as it is the type that has a blower fan cooler, it should be fine.

As for AM2 systems, I have plans on building one when I get a chance. I was able to get an AM2 Athlon 64 x2 6400+ a while ago.

6400+ is a killer of weak motherboards, need it on something really stout. It's like the X2 era K6-233 3.2V

Unless you're specifically trying to shove it into low-end MicroATX board with 3-phase VRM without any cooling - 6400+ is fine. 125W is less than overclocked 939 dual-core or some high-end Pentium D.

the power usage of the 6400 is not much different than one of the original Phenom II x4s
so yeah, not good for ultra cheap boards, but fine for the better ones.

Hoping wrote on 2023-01-30, 18:51:

The worst thing about AMD chipsets for AM2, I think it was the south bridge, the SATA interface always seemed slower to me than Intel chipsets, making the whole system seem slower, at the time the only solution I found was to use RAID 0 until SSDs became common and "affordable".
But it didn't surprise me either since I started using RAID 0 with an A7N8X deluxe and I could never stop using it until the advent of SSDs.

With an SSD, I can't find a difference between the AMD, Nvidia or Intel chipsets of the time, it may be seen in benchmarks, but I don't notice the difference that I did at the time.

The SATA controller incorporated in the SB600 forward was okay, especially with the right AHCI driver. USB performance, on the other hand, was extremely lackluster.

kolderman wrote on 2023-02-24, 13:13:

I am not aware of such lower-power desktop CPUs for s775.

Most of the 45nm Core 2 Duo are under 45W. Not in paper specs but in reality they are very power efficient.
For example E7200 is only about 20W in full load and performance is much better than any Athlon 64 X2.

The same thing goes for the BE and e core X2s though, my 5050e was only pulling 35W at the wall for the system on a GF6100 board, "95W" X2 were only showing 65W at the wall. I didn't believe the watt meter built into a UPS type thing so I used an amp clamp did the math and got the same numbers.

edit: the 95W was a brisbane btw, got a feeling that after the shrink AMD left the quoted TDP quote high to give it some leeway in getting rid of marginal cores or cheaping out the process or something.

Important thing is, if you can get a very newer low power GPU that supports VP9 and handbrake and other acceleration support, for encoding and decoding video, then needed to do that.

CPU also need to have support for decoding video on the fly. Usually starts with haswell and you can get a low power CPU intel T series like i5-4670T in 35W package. AMD CPU had to be newer than this too, so had to be AM4 since, AMD is very late to the decoding support.

If the processor is newer enough, you might just skip the video card instead.

Cheers,

prime 95 numbers (so typical is much nicer)
4850e seems to be the sweet spot for 64 X2?

SPBHM wrote on 2023-02-27, 21:37:

prime 95 numbers (so typical is much nicer)
4850e seems to be the sweet spot for 64 X2?

IMO yes, it is.
After some reviews at the time I, after some time, refused to buy a 6400+ from a friend.
Later I changed platform altogether, went for a C2D.

BitWrangler wrote on 2023-02-27, 15:05:

The same thing goes for the BE and e core X2s though, my 5050e was only pulling 35W at the wall for the system on a GF6100 board, "95W" X2 were only showing 65W at the wall. I didn't believe the watt meter built into a UPS type thing so I used an amp clamp did the math and got the same numbers.

edit: the 95W was a brisbane btw, got a feeling that after the shrink AMD left the quoted TDP quote high to give it some leeway in getting rid of marginal cores or cheaping out the process or something.

X2 4850e is in my upcoming benchmark project, so I have accurate numbers at hand.

........................4850e....... E7200......E8400
CPU idle............3W................2W.............4W
System idle......54W..............58W...........66W
CPU load...........36W................20W.............37W
System load.....86W..............86W...........100W

So the power consumption is very similar, but of course performance is not. E7200 is like +50% performance and E8400 almost double of the 4850e.

havli wrote on 2023-02-27, 22:36:

X2 4850e is in my upcoming benchmark project, so I have accurate numbers at hand. […]
Show full quote

BitWrangler wrote on 2023-02-27, 15:05:

The same thing goes for the BE and e core X2s though, my 5050e was only pulling 35W at the wall for the system on a GF6100 board, "95W" X2 were only showing 65W at the wall. I didn't believe the watt meter built into a UPS type thing so I used an amp clamp did the math and got the same numbers.

edit: the 95W was a brisbane btw, got a feeling that after the shrink AMD left the quoted TDP quote high to give it some leeway in getting rid of marginal cores or cheaping out the process or something.

X2 4850e is in my upcoming benchmark project, so I have accurate numbers at hand.

........................4850e....... E7200......E8400
CPU idle............3W................2W.............4W
System idle......54W..............58W...........66W
CPU load...........36W................20W.............37W
System load.....86W..............86W...........100W

So the power consumption is very similar, but of course performance is not. E7200 is like +50% performance and E8400 almost double of the 4850e.

Early C2D and Pentium are the match, 6/7/8000 are too far high.

havli wrote on 2023-02-27, 22:36:

X2 4850e is in my upcoming benchmark project, so I have accurate numbers at hand. […]
Show full quote

BitWrangler wrote on 2023-02-27, 15:05:

The same thing goes for the BE and e core X2s though, my 5050e was only pulling 35W at the wall for the system on a GF6100 board, "95W" X2 were only showing 65W at the wall. I didn't believe the watt meter built into a UPS type thing so I used an amp clamp did the math and got the same numbers.

edit: the 95W was a brisbane btw, got a feeling that after the shrink AMD left the quoted TDP quote high to give it some leeway in getting rid of marginal cores or cheaping out the process or something.

X2 4850e is in my upcoming benchmark project, so I have accurate numbers at hand.

........................4850e....... E7200......E8400
CPU idle............3W................2W.............4W
System idle......54W..............58W...........66W
CPU load...........36W................20W.............37W
System load.....86W..............86W...........100W

So the power consumption is very similar, but of course performance is not. E7200 is like +50% performance and E8400 almost double of the 4850e.

since k8 integrates the memory controller and the Core 2s don't that something to consider when isolating cpu power

Actually, the 4850e launched in March 2008 and E7200 launched in April 2008.

Sure, you can compare it to Pentium E2200 for instance, but this one are also faster and more efficient.

In my opinion AM2 only got interesting with Phenom launch, before it was just slower and power hungry alternative to Core2.

It's 10-15 years ago again, checking Tom's reviews and other tests 😀