I wouldn't. The CPU is too slow for XP era games the GPU is ok for early XP games. Will it run sure will XP era games be playable framerates probably not.

Definitely the wrong CPU for that system. I can't think of any games or programs that I would recommend a K6-III for that I would also recommend a Radeon 9800 Pro for... there's practically no overlap.

To match a 9800 Pro I would use a fast Athlon XP Barton or Thorton core, late Pentium 4 or even an Athlon 64.

You could get by with a fast Pentium III as well, though it's not really the best match for such a powerful AGP card and the platform\board will be much less up to date than one for a later Athlon XP, P4 or A64.

This system would be really good for games from maybe 2000-2004, roughly speaking. Any older and the Radeon may have compatibility issues. Any newer and you would probably be better suited by a PCI-E system and a much faster GPU.

Agreed this is not a good choice of cpu. I'm actually building a 9800 pro rig right now. I went with an athlon XP 3000+ and using an Asus a7n8x-x nforce 2 motherboard

X86 wrote on 2022-11-25, 00:29:

Agreed this is not a good choice of cpu. I'm actually building a 9800 pro rig right now. I went with an athlon XP 3000+ and using an Asus a7n8x-x nforce 2 motherboard

Yep, this is exactly the kind of setup I was thinking of.

I still have an Athlon XP 1700+ (overclocked from 1.47 to 2Ghz with 400Mhz FSB, which is very close to a 3000+) in an Abit NF7-S 2.0 nforce 2 Ultra 400 board, and back in 2003 I ran it with a Tyan 9600 Pro and later in 2004 managed to get a smoking deal on a BFG 6800GT on release day. That was a great setup for early 2000s games. The OP will want a similar setup if that's his goal.

Agree ! Do not use a socket 7 board for XP (not that you can not make it work). A slot1 or slot A be so much better. If you do not plan on running any DOS/Win3x games then a P4 or Athlon 64 are much better choices.................

Ozzuneoj wrote on 2022-11-24, 22:11:

To match a 9800 Pro I would use a fast Athlon XP Barton or Thorton core, late Pentium 4 or even an Athlon 64.

I am taking everyone's advice. Which of these CPUs is the fastest, and what kind of socket does it use?

a64 is the fastest, but the athalon xp is a better match for that gpu. p4 northwood core would also be fine match. happy to help but you should be able to figure out what sockets those cpus have.

Honestly, this all greatly depends what you plan to run on it. You can build a system specifically to match a certain GPU, but if you play a game that's CPU heavy you might as well have the strongest CPU that doesn't break compatibility with other software you plan to run. If you're almost entirely playing games from 2001 or later, it's hard to justify NOT running the fastest system you can find in your price range since compatibility is far less of an issue. Newer stuff may very well be cheaper and more reliable too.

That said, if the 9800 Pro is set in stone, you will have to stick to AGP boards obviously, and it can be tough to find late AGP boards without bad caps or other issues, so be careful of that.. You'll probably just want to look at your usual marketplaces (online or otherwise) for the best looking AGP board you can find, ask about it here and if it's a good platform you can get that and build the rest of your machine from there.

Most likely a fast Athlon XP (3000+... 2Ghz or better) of any kind will be sufficient, but you really need to have the board picked out first to know which CPU will work best in it. There's a pretty wide variety of chipsets and FSB speeds you have to match up for Athlon XP CPUs. Same for Pentium 4.

The Radeon 9800 is more like a high-end Windows98 overlapping with early XP GPU, the K6-III is firmly in mid-Win98 performance range. These are both mismatched an underpowered for XP era games. Based on your choice of hardware, I wouldn't assume you are on a tight budget so if you have to decide what exactly you want. If it's about Late W98 with XP, go Socket939 or LGA775. If you focus on XP, you can have a dual core CPU with a fast PCI-e graphics card and entrust Windows 98 compatibility to a PCI card, something like an MX440. It won't be the best W98 PC, but it should be alright, while it will be perfectly adequate for XP.

There are also some unicorn boards with both 16x PCI-e and AGP (though I assume with questionable stability), but you have better chance winning the lottery, than finding one.

Phileholic wrote on 2022-11-25, 03:17:

Ozzuneoj wrote on 2022-11-24, 22:11:

To match a 9800 Pro I would use a fast Athlon XP Barton or Thorton core, late Pentium 4 or even an Athlon 64.

I am taking everyone's advice. Which of these CPUs is the fastest, and what kind of socket does it use?

I would get Athlon 64 for socket 939 or 754. Both are fast and the best thing about those Athlon 64s is that they run much cooler than Athlon XP or Pentium 4.

If you can find a CPU motherboard combo that would definitely take some of the guess work out. I'd go socket 478 for a P4. Athlon XP are socket 462 or also referred to as socket A. I see a lot of mother boards for sale online that have a CPU in the socket. Always Leary about purchasing unless seller has good photos to see the caps and nice to see function test pictures too.

janih wrote on 2022-11-25, 07:13:

Phileholic wrote on 2022-11-25, 03:17:

Ozzuneoj wrote on 2022-11-24, 22:11:

To match a 9800 Pro I would use a fast Athlon XP Barton or Thorton core, late Pentium 4 or even an Athlon 64.

I am taking everyone's advice. Which of these CPUs is the fastest, and what kind of socket does it use?

I would get Athlon 64 for socket 939 or 754. Both are fast and the best thing about those Athlon 64s is that they run much cooler than Athlon XP or Pentium 4.

True I could use my pentium 4 rig to heat a small room if needed 🤣

Phileholic wrote on 2022-11-24, 21:23:

I will be building a WinXP-based PC to use an ATI All in Wonder 9800Pro. I haven't figured out the full specs yet, but the CPU I'll be using is an AMD K6-III 450 with one of these models for the HDD so I'll be needing a motherboard with AGP (Pro) and Super Socket 7.

IMHO this would be an excellent Win98SE platform but would be really awful for WinXP; I wouldn't even bother using combinations of MB/CPU of Socket 478 or 462 era with WinXP for a practical (i.e. not for collecting or benchmarking) gaming rig. Capable of handling multiple cores and threads, a WinXP build should start with an LGA 775 MB and corresponding Core 2 Duo/Quad/Extreme CPU, which should be plenty and cheap on used markets.

Stick with 865 series chipset and 65nm CPU if you really need Win98SE compatibility on the same rig -- at the price of 2GB (1+1) DDR RAM limit and probably AGP-only graphic card; otherwise go for newer chipsets capable of 4GB DDR2 (2+2), 45nm CPU, and much newer graphics e.g. GeForce 780 or 960.

Would a Pentium 4 519K be a good choice, or an Athlon XP 3200?

X86 wrote on 2022-11-25, 00:29:

Agreed this is not a good choice of cpu. I'm actually building a 9800 pro rig right now. I went with an athlon XP 3000+ and using an Asus a7n8x-x nforce 2 motherboard

Just of note, you can get very good DOS sound compatibility with the KM890 instead + ESS Solo 1 : MSI MS-7253 / K9VGM-V (KM890, VIA8237A) , Athlon 64 X2 5050e, Radeon X800 XL

HP z800

Phileholic wrote on 2022-11-26, 10:53:

Would a Pentium 4 519K be a good choice, or an Athlon XP 3200?

Looking at the specs, I see that a Pentium 4 is better than an Athlon XP

Intel Pentium 4 Extreme Edition 3.4
Clock Frequency - 3.4 GHz
L2 Cache - 512 kb
FSB - 800 MT/s
Clock Multiplier - 17x
Voltage - 1.575 V
TDP - 102.9 W

AMD Athlon XP 3200+
Clock Frequency - 2333 MHz
L2 Cache - 512 kb
FSB - 333 MT/s
Clock Multiplier - 14x
Voltage - 1.65 V
TDP - 79.2 W

Phileholic wrote on 2022-11-26, 15:51:

Looking at the specs, I see that a Pentium 4 is better than an Athlon XP […]
Show full quote

Phileholic wrote on 2022-11-26, 10:53:

Would a Pentium 4 519K be a good choice, or an Athlon XP 3200?

Looking at the specs, I see that a Pentium 4 is better than an Athlon XP

Intel Pentium 4 Extreme Edition 3.4
Clock Frequency - 3.4 GHz
L2 Cache - 512 kb
FSB - 800 MT/s
Clock Multiplier - 17x
Voltage - 1.575 V
TDP - 102.9 W

AMD Athlon XP 3200+
Clock Frequency - 2333 MHz
L2 Cache - 512 kb
FSB - 333 MT/s
Clock Multiplier - 14x
Voltage - 1.65 V
TDP - 79.2 W

Sure they would be better than Socket 7 builds but nowhere near Core 2 with 65/45nm lithography at 65W TDP. P4EE CPUs consume a lot of power but provide only mediocre performance under WinXP when compared with Core 2 CPUs. Not to mention those were rare items then and now.

Unless you were collecting CPUs for a specific time period then you could just ignore what I've said.

Phileholic wrote on 2022-11-26, 15:51:

Looking at the specs, I see that a Pentium 4 is better than an Athlon XP […]
Show full quote

Phileholic wrote on 2022-11-26, 10:53:

Would a Pentium 4 519K be a good choice, or an Athlon XP 3200?

Looking at the specs, I see that a Pentium 4 is better than an Athlon XP

Intel Pentium 4 Extreme Edition 3.4
Clock Frequency - 3.4 GHz
L2 Cache - 512 kb
FSB - 800 MT/s
Clock Multiplier - 17x
Voltage - 1.575 V
TDP - 102.9 W

AMD Athlon XP 3200+
Clock Frequency - 2333 MHz
L2 Cache - 512 kb
FSB - 333 MT/s
Clock Multiplier - 14x
Voltage - 1.65 V
TDP - 79.2 W

back then the p4 EE was extreemly expensive, and when comparing value to performance AMD was very competitive to intel. Simaraly priced AMDs to intels in those price brackets often costed less and outperfomed intel at the time. Then AMD came out with the A64 and it destroyed the P4. It wasn't untill like 2006 with core duos came out that Intel beat AMD in anything other than Clockspeed numbers. High clockpeed numbers for p4 was a marketing gimmick. AMD running at like 2 ghz was equivlent to Intel at 3ghz. Intels own laptop chip the Pentium M runninging at 2.4ghz was about equal performance to a Etreme edition p4.

The p4 EE is acttually not better it was a piece of shit.