P4 vs Celeron performance

[Maintane]

I am going to build a PC for my mom for Christmas, to be mainly used for
surfing, email, pictures, limited scanning and printing. I want to try and
hold the cost down a little and was considering using a $69 2.4g 128k 400
MHz Celeron vs the $150 or so 2.4 P4 512k 533 MHz...How much of a
performance hit am I going to see with this when coupled with a nice MB, and
DDR. I will probably use a low end AGP vidcard or possibly a 128k Rage
vidcard I have in my closet, and a 30g 7200 HD removed from my build.

Also looking for recommendations on Intel MB. I want stability, as she lives
too far for me to be making repair calls.

Thanks for your input.

Mike


______________________________________________________

"There are three kinds of men. The one that learns by reading. The few
who learn by observation. The rest of them have to pee on the
electric fence for themselves."

- From 'The Wisdom of Will Rogers'

 

[Nick Le Lievre]

I am going to build a PC for my mom for Christmas, to be mainly used for
surfing, email, pictures, limited scanning and printing. I want to try and
hold the cost down a little and was considering using a $69 2.4g 128k 400
MHz Celeron vs the $150 or so 2.4 P4 512k 533 MHz...How much of a
performance hit am I going to see with this when coupled with a nice MB, and
DDR. I will probably use a low end AGP vidcard or possibly a 128k Rage
vidcard I have in my closet, and a 30g 7200 HD removed from my build.

Also looking for recommendations on Intel MB. I want stability, as she lives
too far for me to be making repair calls.

If you want stability my best tips are make sure APIC mode always remains
disabled in the BIOS and buy quality matched RAM also make sure she has up
to date antivirus and all service packs and windows updates for her os and
that its setup to auto update if poss and get a decent sound card.

 

[Jan Alter]

Hi,

My feeling is very little impact will be felt with your using a Celeron
to a P4 for the kind of computing you list. Good mbs that I've had good luck
with over the past 10 years include Intel, Asus, Abit among some others.
Again, you don't need the best or the fastest here to achieve dependable
solid computing. And I'm in agreement with you that an ATI Rage or Rage Pro
card with at least 8 mb of vid RAM should be enough for a decent run of the
mill system. Do consider a mb with an onboard network connector. Within a
few years many folks will be opting for DSL or cable if the price drops a
little more and having that option handy is nice.
Finally, if you're in the U.S. consider checking out newegg.com to look
at the boards available. They have both good prices, very reliable service
and speedy delivery.

 

[Nicolas The Great]

I am going to build a PC for my mom for Christmas, to be mainly used for
surfing, email, pictures, limited scanning and printing. I want to try and
hold the cost down a little and was considering using a $69 2.4g 128k 400
MHz Celeron vs the $150 or so 2.4 P4 512k 533 MHz...How much of a
performance hit am I going to see with this when coupled with a nice MB, and
DDR. I will probably use a low end AGP vidcard or possibly a 128k Rage
vidcard I have in my closet, and a 30g 7200 HD removed from my build.

Also looking for recommendations on Intel MB. I want stability, as she lives
too far for me to be making repair calls.

Thanks for your input.

Mike


______________________________________________________

"There are three kinds of men. The one that learns by reading. The few
who learn by observation. The rest of them have to pee on the
electric fence for themselves."

- From 'The Wisdom of Will Rogers'

I got the Celeron 1.7 for $50 at newegg and that's what I would go with
if you're on a budget. I've asked around every forum if an upgrade to
a P4 2.0 would be worth it and everyone says NO. In gaming you would
see a difference but that's it. But if you can afford to spend $130
for a P4 then go for it.

Nick

 

[Nicolas The Great]

I am going to build a PC for my mom for Christmas, to be mainly used for
surfing, email, pictures, limited scanning and printing. I want to try and
hold the cost down a little and was considering using a $69 2.4g 128k 400
MHz Celeron vs the $150 or so 2.4 P4 512k 533 MHz...How much of a
performance hit am I going to see with this when coupled with a nice MB, and
DDR. I will probably use a low end AGP vidcard or possibly a 128k Rage
vidcard I have in my closet, and a 30g 7200 HD removed from my build.

Also looking for recommendations on Intel MB. I want stability, as she lives
too far for me to be making repair calls.

Thanks for your input.

Mike


______________________________________________________

"There are three kinds of men. The one that learns by reading. The few
who learn by observation. The rest of them have to pee on the
electric fence for themselves."

- From 'The Wisdom of Will Rogers'

I used my Celeron in an MSI mobo. Last year it cost around $90 today
you can get the same one for $67 at newegg. Check it out.It's not
super great board but it's stable since I've had NO problems.

http://www.msi.com.tw/program/products/mainboard/mbd/pro_mbd_detail.
php?UID=313&MODEL=MS-6566E

Nick

 

[JustMe]

If you want stability my best tips are make sure APIC mode always remains
disabled in the BIOS and buy quality matched RAM also make sure she has up
to date antivirus and all service packs and windows updates for her os and
that its setup to auto update if poss and get a decent sound card.

Hi:

What is APIC Mode ?

TIA

 

[Nick Le Lievre]

Hi:

What is APIC Mode ?

TIA

If you need to ask disable it - if your system is running ok then don`t if
not prepare for an In-Place upgrade or re-install if running XP.

 

[Maintane]

I am going to build a PC for my mom for Christmas, to be mainly used

for has

Thanks for the input...I plan to puchase an Intel 865GLC MB, 2.4 Cleron,
InWin V506G case, 256 meg PC2100 DDR, and Sony CD-Rom for $250 from Newegg.
Will use onboard video and sound, and 7200 30g WD drive and floopy from
spares.

 

[Ancra]

I am going to build a PC for my mom for Christmas, to be mainly used for
surfing, email, pictures, limited scanning and printing. I want to try and
hold the cost down a little and was considering using a $69 2.4g 128k 400
MHz Celeron vs the $150 or so 2.4 P4 512k 533 MHz...How much of a
performance hit am I going to see with this when coupled with a nice MB, and
DDR. I will probably use a low end AGP vidcard or possibly a 128k Rage
vidcard I have in my closet, and a 30g 7200 HD removed from my build.

The performance hit is going to be gruesome. Check out these pages for
a guide to Celeron (non-) performance. There's certainly a very good
reason for those $80 difference, even if the Celeron is still vastly
overpriced and poor value.
As for MB, DDR and overclocking, nothing you ever do around a Celeron
matter much. Itself, that is the bottleneck. Same goes for P4A.

The 2.4 P4 is not included, but as a rough guide I offer:

2.4 P4@533 performance on business winstone2002 compares to AthlonXP
1700+.
2.4 P4@533 performance on content creation winstone2003 is about 10%
better than the AthlonXP 2600+.
2.4 P4@533 game performance averages out at about AthlonXP 2400+.

(Winstone 2002 and 2003 are somewhat more Intel biased than Winstone
2004, but should still give you a good clue.)
So as you see from the pages below, the 2.4 P4@533 should be
_WAY_MUCH_ better than the Celeron 2.4!!

price comparision:
http://www.anandtech.com/cpu/showdoc.html?i=1927&p=2

business winstone2004:
http://www.anandtech.com/cpu/showdoc.html?i=1927&p=4

content creation winstone2004:
http://www.anandtech.com/cpu/showdoc.html?i=1927&p=5

div x encoding:
http://www.anandtech.com/cpu/showdoc.html?i=1927&p=6

3D-rendering:
http://www.anandtech.com/cpu/showdoc.html?i=1927&p=7

VisualC++ compile times:
http://www.anandtech.com/cpu/showdoc.html?i=1927&p=8

various game benchmarks:
http://www.anandtech.com/cpu/showdoc.html?i=1927&p=9
http://www.anandtech.com/cpu/showdoc.html?i=1927&p=10
http://www.anandtech.com/cpu/showdoc.html?i=1927&p=11
http://www.anandtech.com/cpu/showdoc.html?i=1927&p=12
http://www.anandtech.com/cpu/showdoc.html?i=1927&p=13
http://www.anandtech.com/cpu/showdoc.html?i=1927&p=14
http://www.anandtech.com/cpu/showdoc.html?i=1927&p=15
http://www.anandtech.com/cpu/showdoc.html?i=1927&p=16
http://www.anandtech.com/cpu/showdoc.html?i=1927&p=17

Notice how AMDs 1.6GHz Duron stomps all over Intels 2.6GHz Celeron.
1GHz slower clock, but 30% faster!

IMO, noone should ever buy a (P4-core)Celeron. For any reason.

If you're not impressed by benchmarks, I can offer you some personal
experience of subjective feel. I don't have any Celeron, but I have an
old 1.5GHz P4. Looking at the benchmarks and comparing with the 1.8GHz
P4, my 1.5 should be comparable to 2.2-2.6 GHz Celerons. I also happen
to have a 2.4GHz P4. I'm not really happy with any of my P4s, but let
me assure you, the 2.4 is a world apart from the 1.5.


ancra

 

[Maintane]

Actually, I did the build with the Celeron and I am very pleased with the
performance. I used the Intel 865GLC motherboard and a matched pair of
Kingston 256mb DDR 2100 to enable dual channel mem on the board and an
Enlight case. The board has onboard graphics, surround sound, 8 usb 2.0
ports, and 10/100 lan. I had a WD 7200 30g. It boots fast, loads programs
quickly, is very responsive in picture apps, and surfs and emails great and
the microATX form factor will fit her space perfectly.

For $325, I feel that I got a very nice, stable machine that my mom will be
pleased with. It runs circles around her AMD K6-500

Thanks for all the input.

Mike