Pentium Pro vs. Pentium in GAMES
J. Tige Richardson
Hi!
I posted a similar message over a week ago, and as so often happens in
newsgroups it took a detour and went completely off subject. I never did
get a satisfactory answer (from someone that has tried both systems) of
whether or not I should invest in a Pentium or Pentium Pro system for
games.
Here is my situation: I work in serious computer applications all day and
deal with lots of problems. As a result, as a stress reliever, I play
lots of games as a hobby.
I will have the new system (either Pentium 133/166/200 or Pentium Pro 200)
networked with my other system at home which is a P90. Both will run Win95
for the time being. I would like backwards compatibility with older 16-bit
games, but would also like new Win95 and DOS games to run very fast and
very well.
I would just like to know what kind of benefits/drawbacks I would get with
either system. Thanks very much for any help.
Tige
--
J. Tige Richardson
E-Mail: ti...@holly.colostate.edu
Fort Collins, CO 80525
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I am Pentium of Borg, precision is futile, you will
be approximated.......
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Jonathan Aitken
For the prices Ive seen in Australia at present, I'd get a P133/166 or
equivalent and upgrade later. What types of games do you plan to play? Do you
have to pay for the machine (dumb question I know but JIC)?
Are price differences any different in the US - ie Im assuming are Pros still a
lot more than Pentiums - is this true?
J. Aitken.
Paul Arnold
From what I have been able to find out about this subject, (I am facing the
same problem), I think that Pentium Pro 200 is the best choice. On the basis
of cost the PP-220 makes a lot of sense since the price differential between
the P-166 and P-200 is now less than $100 (for a 10% measured speed increase)
and then less than an additional $100 for the PP-200. The P-133 really does
not make any sense when speed is one of your factors deemed important.
The PP-200 will run all 16 bit games slower (probably about the speed of the
P-166) so this does not seem like too great a penality to pay for getting the
platform that will run tomorrows games at their best. I suspect that you will
have far more problems with getting old games to run because you don't have an
old soundblaster installed. I also believe that DOS and other 16 bit games
will tend to disappear over then next year or so due to some very significant
advantages for programmers to code in the new 32 bit world of Win '95. Among
these advantages are the multimedia interface built in Win '95 and the
elimination of the 64K max program segment size used in DOS/Win 3.1x.
One other item to consider is the MMX extensions coming in late '96 and '97.
I would like some additional comments from someone more familiar with the
details on this one. What I have read so far is that the MMX is probably over
hyped by Intel and in any event won't be ready for prime time until the end of
'97, i.e. don't buy the first version, at the earliest. The Pentiums will not
be upgradeable to MMX technology via overdrive. The P-200 will be the last
increase in Pentium speed because they have been maxed out in performance.
The P-200 has only 10% faster measured performance than the P-166 even though
the microprocessor speed was 20% greater. I don't know if the Pentium Pros
will be upgradeable. In any event we will be forced to the the Pentium Pro
platforms shortly since the P-200 is the end of the line.
Paul
Paul G. Arnold Software Engineering Institute Voice: (703) 908-8221
Carnegie Mellon University Fax: (703) 908-9317
4301 Wilson Blvd., Suite 902
Arlington, VA 22203-4191 E-mail: p...@sei.cmu.edu
Tim Johnson
From what I understand, the Pentium Pro 200 is not as efficient for running
anything 16 bit as the pentium, but the pro is faster because of outright
speed. For the highend gamer and bussiness user, with loads of 32 bit stuff,
I say get the pro.
Everyone else should stand fast, right now.
Also, your signature is interesting, but that was years ago.
mike
On Fri, 02 Aug 1996 13:24:40 -0700, Tim Johnson <taj...@voicenet.com>
wrote:
>> I will have the new system (either Pentium 133/166/200 or Pentium Pro 200)
>> networked with my other system at home which is a P90. Both will run Win95
>> for the time being. I would like backwards compatibility with older 16-bit
>> games, but would also like new Win95 and DOS games to run very fast and
>> very well.
>>
>> I would just like to know what kind of benefits/drawbacks I would get with
>> either system. Thanks very much for any help.
>>
>> Tige
>>
>> --
>> J. Tige Richardson
>> E-Mail: ti...@holly.colostate.edu
>> Fort Collins, CO 80525
>> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>> I am Pentium of Borg, precision is futile, you will
>> be approximated.......
>> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>
>From what I understand, the Pentium Pro 200 is not as efficient for running
>anything 16 bit as the pentium, but the pro is faster because of outright
>speed. For the highend gamer and bussiness user, with loads of 32 bit stuff,
>I say get the pro.
>Everyone else should stand fast, right now.
>Also, your signature is interesting, but that was years ago.
The way I thought it was, was that the Pentium Pro 200 is not as bad
as the pentiums at running old programs, its just that it runs them
worse than the new programs that will be out for the PPro. I heard
they run the old stuff similar to a P166.
Michael McCracken
mi...@gate.net
Lawrence Joseph Wobker
: networked with my other system at home which is a P90. Both will run Win95
^^^^^^^^^^^^^
THE PENTIUM (NOT THE PRO) 200 IS FASTER than the Pro 200 under Win 95,
it's been proven time and time again in benchmarks. The major
performance increase from the Pro does not occur until you move to a FULL
32-bit OS, which '95 is NOT. If you're considering upgrading to NT 4.0,
then you will want to get the Pro, but right now, the P-200 is the
fastest Win 95 machine available.
--
Lawrence J. Wobker NCSU Junior, Computer Science & MDS
Systems Administrator, Bell + Howell Mail Processing Systems
http://www4.ncsu.edu/~ljwobker/www/ <--> ljwo...@eos.ncsu.edu
Tempest
In <32026f80...@NEWS.GATE.Net> mi...@gate.net (mike) wrote:
:The way I thought it was, was that the Pentium Pro 200 is not as bad
:as the pentiums at running old programs, its just that it runs them
:worse than the new programs that will be out for the PPro. I heard
:they run the old stuff similar to a P166.
Almost all 16 bit programs are designed for 486 computers so even if PPro
does not run 16 bit codes as fast as a Pentium at equivalent clock speed,
you'll probably still need to run moslo to run these 16 bit games.
The Lord Leto II
I know this is off-topic, but I don't know where to put it and
probably neither does the original poster. And it's not a senseless
post, so...
>From what I have been able to find out about this subject, (I am facing the
>same problem), I think that Pentium Pro 200 is the best choice. On the basis
>of cost the PP-220 makes a lot of sense since the price differential between
>the P-166 and P-200 is now less than $100 (for a 10% measured speed increase)
>and then less than an additional $100 for the PP-200. The P-133 really does
>not make any sense when speed is one of your factors deemed important.
As far as I've seen, the PPro is a *lot* more expensive, not just
the chip, but the corresponding motherboard. But it's also a lot
faster. I don't think the slower at 16-bit is really anything
big. I think there's a 10-20% slowdown when comparing the PPro 200
to the P200.
>The PP-200 will run all 16 bit games slower (probably about the speed of the
>P-166) so this does not seem like too great a penality to pay for getting the
>platform that will run tomorrows games at their best. I suspect that you will
Aren't most games 32-bit, with the DOS/4GW extension?
>have far more problems with getting old games to run because you don't have an
>old soundblaster installed. I also believe that DOS and other 16 bit games
>will tend to disappear over then next year or so due to some very significant
>advantages for programmers to code in the new 32 bit world of Win '95. Among
Win 95 isn't totally 32-bit. Windows NT 4.0 is.
>these advantages are the multimedia interface built in Win '95 and the
>elimination of the 64K max program segment size used in DOS/Win 3.1x.
Isn't that 640K? You seem to be confused on your numbers.
>One other item to consider is the MMX extensions coming in late '96 and '97.
>I would like some additional comments from someone more familiar with the
>details on this one. What I have read so far is that the MMX is probably over
>hyped by Intel and in any event won't be ready for prime time until the end of
>'97, i.e. don't buy the first version, at the earliest. The Pentiums will not
>be upgradeable to MMX technology via overdrive. The P-200 will be the last
>increase in Pentium speed because they have been maxed out in performance.
>The P-200 has only 10% faster measured performance than the P-166 even though
>the microprocessor speed was 20% greater. I don't know if the Pentium Pros
>will be upgradeable. In any event we will be forced to the the Pentium Pro
>platforms shortly since the P-200 is the end of the line.
Is the P-200 the end of the line? I heard of them upping to
a 75Mhz bus speed (thus a 225 at triple-clock) but that may have
just been a rumour. Or maybe that was a clone chip. I dunno.
Choosing between the PPro and the MMX Pentium should prove a
difficult choice. I'd wait, at this point.
************ The Lord Leto II God Emperor of Arrakis *************
* You did one thing wrong * F--A--C--E * You woke up *
* It looked better before * F--G--Bb-D * More -- more! *
* When the headache's gone * E--G#-B--D# * The sun's not *
* Forgot to turn the alarm * Faith No * On -- on! *
* Don't look at me * More * I'm ugly in the morning *
Smoke Crack and Worship Satan
In article <4tt2tu$h...@news.sei.cmu.edu>, p...@sei.cmu.edu says...
>
>
> From what I have been able to find out about this subject, (I am facing
the
> same problem), I think that Pentium Pro 200 is the best choice. On the
basis
> of cost the PP-220 makes a lot of sense since the price differential
between
> the P-166 and P-200 is now less than $100 (for a 10% measured speed
increase)
> and then less than an additional $100 for the PP-200. The P-133 really
does
> not make any sense when speed is one of your factors deemed important.
>
The best choice is no choice at all. Now is a very bad time to buy. Why?
* The P5-200 is going to drop in price by over 1/2 in the next 6 months.
Currently it's way too expensive at $650+, in 6 months it will have MMX
and be around $300.
* A MMX Pentium is a much better Pentium, period. MMX Pentiums will have
increased L1 cache (from 16k to 32k) meaning that a P5-200 MMX will
perform around 10% faster than a normal P5-220 for everyday code. A level
1 cache increase has major performance repercussions. The speed increase
may even be faster than predicted since the bus speed is so limiting at a
3:1 bus speed ratio on the current P5-200. The L1 cache compensates for
this somewhat since it satisfies more memory requests without ever
hitting the memory bus, removing part of the bottleneck.
* The Pentium Pro will go through some major changes for the "lite"
version with MMX (Klamath). It may also have some silicon
modifications to make it run 16-bit code better than the current Pros.
That will be available in early '97 as well. It will also be much
cheaper.
* Intel is going to drop prices 15-20% sometime this month (August) so
that manufacturers will have plenty of stock for Christmas.
* If you recall the Pentium chipsets from Intel...
Mercury-- 1st chipset, sucked
Neptune-- 2nd chipset, okay
Triton-- 3rd chipset, finally realized full speed potential of Pentiums
So for the Pentium Pro we've had
Orion-- 1st chipset, sucked (buggy)
Natoma-- 2nd chipset, okay
??? -- 3rd chipset, probably much better than previous
I would wait for the magical third rev of the chipset on the Pros, since
history shows us that's about how long it takes for Intel to get the best
performing support chips out there. There are also some cool technologies
coming down the pike that Intel will probably only release for the Pros--
like AGP and I2O. So buying a PPro now means a new motherboard at some
point in '97 if you want to take advantage of those.
> One other item to consider is the MMX extensions coming in late '96 and
'97.
> I would like some additional comments from someone more familiar with
the
> details on this one. What I have read so far is that the MMX is
probably over
> hyped by Intel and in any event won't be ready for prime time until the
end of
> '97, i.e. don't buy the first version, at the earliest.
MMX is desirable for other reasons; a MMX chip will be at least 10%
faster than the same non-MMX chip because of the L1 cache increase. Also
the MMX stuff when properly utilized could be very cool.
> The Pentiums will not
> be upgradeable to MMX technology via overdrive.
False. Pentiums can be upgraded easily, either with a new VRM (voltage
regulation module-- the only thing that changes is the chip's expected
voltage, the pinouts are the same) on the motherboard or an Intel
Overdrive, which includes the VRM converter right on the chip.
> The P-200 will be the last
> increase in Pentium speed because they have been maxed out in
performance.
Probably true. Intel wants people to start buying Pros. It is a better
chip in general. But IMO Pentiums will be a better choice for most stuff
until mid-'97. That's when I have my PPro purchase scheduled, right after
the third rev of the PPro support chipsets are out with I20 and AGP.
> The P-200 has only 10% faster measured performance than the P-166 even
though
> the microprocessor speed was 20% greater.
I feel that the L1 cache increase on the P5-MMX will address part of this
bus speed:processor speed disparity. There are other silicon enhancements
as well.
> I don't know if the Pentium Pros
> will be upgradeable. In any event we will be forced to the the Pentium
Pro
> platforms shortly since the P-200 is the end of the line.
The current Pentium Pro chipsets do not understand pros of a higher speed
than 200Mhz. So your upgrade options are limited. And PPro motherboards
are *very* expensive-- $400+ to start. In my opinion the PPro
motherboards and chipsets out there are immature, unlike the Pentium
chipsets.
In summary...
If you want a PPro, feel free to buy now but you will need a new
motherboard sometime in '97. If you can afford to wait, I believe mid '97
is when you will see the first motherboards with the 3rd-rev chipset that
supports AGP, I20, etc. and that will be the time to buy. Plus the chips
will be cheaper, but that goes without saying.
if you want a P5, *definitely* wait for the MMX versions of the chips and
buy anytime after the price drops in August.
Peter
J. Tige Richardson wrote:
> [...]
> Here is my situation: I work in serious computer applications all day and
> deal with lots of problems. As a result, as a stress reliever, I play
> lots of games as a hobby.
I gave up trying to justify playing games a long time ago. Now I just
say "I play computer games." :-)
Peter
J. Tige Richardson
> * Intel is going to drop prices 15-20% sometime this month (August) so
> that manufacturers will have plenty of stock for Christmas.
> The current Pentium Pro chipsets do not understand pros of a higher speed
> than 200Mhz. So your upgrade options are limited. And PPro motherboards
> are *very* expensive-- $400+ to start. In my opinion the PPro
Just to draw some comparisons, I will be able to get the PPro200 w/
mainboard and Natoma 440FX chipset for about the same price as the P200
with mainboard in August. I cannot go into specifics at this point, but
that's the situation. So price is really not an issue for me.
Tige
Charles A Smith
There is a lot of misinformation being bandied about here (so what's new?).
If you are going to make "factual" comments about the PPro's performance,
make sure you are referring to the NEW chipset. Every benchmark I have
seen is based on the old chipset which had problems.
I have a Dell PPro and it is blazing fast in Win95. Dos games like
EF2000 are as smooth as silk in full detail.
As far as MMX goes... it stands for "Multimedia Extensions" and will be
advantageous to anyone using full screen video. As far as gaming goes,
the new graphics cards on the horizon will have a much greater impact
on gameplay, in my opinion. And they will plug quite nicely in my PPro,
thank you.
If you are going to make a claim here, get your facts straight. We all need
more light and less ... well, hot air.
Chuck Smith
cas...@ksu.ksu.edu
JEB
posts, the "factual" ones, that I don't even bother
to respond to them anymore. I just sit back with my PPro
and grin while images stream by on the screen fast as
you please.
JEB in Vegas
oz...@ix.netcom.com
Fergus Hammond
In article <4ts9mh$c...@lynx.aba.net.au>, ait...@ocean.com.au (Jonathan
Aitken) wrote:
> For the prices Ive seen in Australia at present, I'd get a P133/166 or
> equivalent and upgrade later. What types of games do you plan to play? Do you
> have to pay for the machine (dumb question I know but JIC)?
>
> Are price differences any different in the US - ie Im assuming are Pros
still a
> lot more than Pentiums - is this true?
[snip]
Nup. As an Australian living in the US (Seattle), one of things I love is
the low cost of computer hardware. A very decent Pentium Pro system can be
had for under $3000 US. I would certainly recommend anyone buying a hi-end
system go for the PPro; it's a much better buy. I sure know that our
software will run better on one.
fergus
--
Fergus Hammond Adobe Systems, Inc.
fham...@adobe.com http://www.aa.net/~fergus
Smoke Crack and Worship Satan
In article <4u2ah3$m...@abc.ksu.ksu.edu>, cas...@ksu.ksu.edu says...
> There is a lot of misinformation being bandied about here (so what's
new?).
> If you are going to make "factual" comments about the PPro's
performance,
> make sure you are referring to the NEW chipset. Every benchmark I have
> seen is based on the old chipset which had problems.
>
> I have a Dell PPro and it is blazing fast in Win95. Dos games like
> EF2000 are as smooth as silk in full detail.
>
Did you read what I wrote? I said nothing about the PPro's performance.
That has nothing at all to do with the article. Go read it.
> As far as MMX goes... it stands for "Multimedia Extensions" and will be
> advantageous to anyone using full screen video.
Actually I think Matrix Math eXtensions is the better term, but who
knows? Again, read the article I wrote and what I was saying was this...
MMX is not just the "pure" MMX extensions. A P5 labeled "MMX" has the
following:
* the MMX instructions
* a doubled 32k L1 cache (vs 16k on non-MMX P5s)
* "other" silicon enhancements (unspecified by Intel)
I have no idea what MMX will mean on the P6, but I am sure there will be
additional enhancements to the chip silicon itself, not just 50-odd new
instructions. After all, if they have to change the silicon designs,
they're going to make the most of that opportunity.
> As far as gaming goes,
> the new graphics cards on the horizon will have a much greater impact
> on gameplay, in my opinion. And they will plug quite nicely in my PPro,
> thank you.
>
Part of my original post was that the PPros paired with AGP graphics
technology which we will likely see in the 3rd rev of the PPro chipset
will *seriously* outperform PCI video solutions. The PCI bus is limited
to 132 MB/sec, which sounds like a lot until you start moving 640x480 x
24bpp x 30fps across the bus. That's the whole point of AGP-- a much
wider video path, while avoiding the incompatibilities (and unnecessary
expense for 98% of add-in cards) of a 66Mhz or 64bit PCI bus. This way,
there is a single AGP slot for the card that needs the bandwidth (video),
and PCI for everything else.
This is not to say that the PPro of today is a bad choice. Not at all. If
you need it now, get it now.
But like everything else in computers, timing is everything. The AGP /
I2O / 3rd generation PPro support chipset motherboards will likely be a
quantum leap in performance above current PPro motherboards. Plus they
will likely support processor speeds above 200Mhz in addition to these
technologies; current P6 motherboards do not.
Like I said, people who buy P6 machines now, just like people who bought
Neptune-based P5 machines, *will* be facing at *least* a motherboard
purchase in the next year.
> If you are going to make a claim here, get your facts straight. We all
need
> more light and less ... well, hot air.
>
I think you should re-read my original message, and stop taking it as a
personal affront to your purchase of a P6, which it is not. It is a
commentary on my perceptions of the proper place in the "bell curve" to
buy a P6 system and obtain best performance for your dollars and minimize
upgrade hassles.
> Chuck Smith
> cas...@ksu.ksu.edu
LEV
Charles A Smith wrote:
->
-> If you are going to make a claim here, get your facts straight.
-> We all need more light and less ... well, hot air.
->
One of my favourite game was Tristan Pinball. The gameplay was smooth
and I could control the ball very easy.
Yesterday I run it in Win 95 and I have quite surprised with the mad
ball. I had only one application - Tristan Pinball - but yet
Windows 95 have had some kind of mystery work.
Is there a way to get normal, smooth work of any game without
booting to DOS-mode? In other words, I want to have Pinball in
one window, CD player in second, Word in third, etc...
Or the games like Pinball are for DOS only?
Brian Rauchfuss - PCD
In article <4u2ah3$m...@abc.ksu.ksu.edu>,
Charles A Smith <cas...@ksu.ksu.edu> wrote:
>As far as MMX goes... it stands for "Multimedia Extensions" and will be
>advantageous to anyone using full screen video.
It also accelerates graphics, so most games should also see a large benefit.
(I don't speak for Intel, I just work here!)
Brian
Paul Arnold
In article <03AUG96.02...@ACADEMIC.NEMOSTATE.EDU>, The Lord Leto II <T9...@ACADEMIC.NEMOSTATE.EDU> writes:
snipped a bunch of stuff
|>
|> As far as I've seen, the PPro is a *lot* more expensive, not just
|> the chip, but the corresponding motherboard. But it's also a lot
|> faster. I don't think the slower at 16-bit is really anything
|> big. I think there's a 10-20% slowdown when comparing the PPro 200
|> to the P200.
The PPro 200 is actually $32 cheaper than a similiarly equiped P-200 from
Gateway 2000. You can check this out on their webpage at www.gw2k.com
|> >The PP-200 will run all 16 bit games slower (probably about the speed of the
|> >P-166) so this does not seem like too great a penality to pay for getting the
|> >platform that will run tomorrows games at their best. I suspect that you will
|>
|> Aren't most games 32-bit, with the DOS/4GW extension?
Good point. When I look at the old games that I have installed, a good number
are 32 bit and most of the rest I could probably easily do without.
|>
|> >have far more problems with getting old games to run because you don't have an
|> >old soundblaster installed. I also believe that DOS and other 16 bit games
|> >will tend to disappear over then next year or so due to some very significant
|> >advantages for programmers to code in the new 32 bit world of Win '95. Among
|>
|> Win 95 isn't totally 32-bit. Windows NT 4.0 is.
My understanding is that Win 95 only invokes 16 bit code to deal with old
programs that require this. So if one were running Win 95 on a PPro how much
of a performance hit would there be? In theory it should not be great when
one confines the software running to 32 bit apps. Theory and actual practice
may differ greatly, I don't know. Is there optimization in NT that would also
help to speed up apps?
|> >these advantages are the multimedia interface built in Win '95 and the
|> >elimination of the 64K max program segment size used in DOS/Win 3.1x.
|>
|> Isn't that 640K? You seem to be confused on your numbers.
No, 64K max program segment is right. I am refering to the segmentation that
all programs are subjected to by compilers to fit limitation of DOS/Win 3.1x.
This has nothing to do with the 640K max lower DOS addressable memory size.
This is probably not as big a benefit as I originally thought since the
compliers handle this seemlessly and the programmer does not have to deal with
this limitation today.
|> >One other item to consider is the MMX extensions coming in late '96 and '97.
|> >I would like some additional comments from someone more familiar with the
|> >details on this one. What I have read so far is that the MMX is probably over
|> >hyped by Intel and in any event won't be ready for prime time until the end of
|> >'97, i.e. don't buy the first version, at the earliest. The Pentiums will not
|> >be upgradeable to MMX technology via overdrive. The P-200 will be the last
|> >increase in Pentium speed because they have been maxed out in performance.
|> >The P-200 has only 10% faster measured performance than the P-166 even though
|> >the microprocessor speed was 20% greater. I don't know if the Pentium Pros
|> >will be upgradeable. In any event we will be forced to the the Pentium Pro
|> >platforms shortly since the P-200 is the end of the line.
|>
|> Is the P-200 the end of the line? I heard of them upping to
|> a 75Mhz bus speed (thus a 225 at triple-clock) but that may have
|> just been a rumour. Or maybe that was a clone chip. I dunno.
P-200 as the end of the line was from an article in PC Magazine when they
reviewed four of the first new P-200 in their "First Looks" article.
|> Choosing between the PPro and the MMX Pentium should prove a
|> difficult choice. I'd wait, at this point.
|>
|> ************ The Lord Leto II God Emperor of Arrakis *************
|> * You did one thing wrong * F--A--C--E * You woke up *
|> * It looked better before * F--G--Bb-D * More -- more! *
|> * When the headache's gone * E--G#-B--D# * The sun's not *
|> * Forgot to turn the alarm * Faith No * On -- on! *
|> * Don't look at me * More * I'm ugly in the morning *
Eric Pinnell
In <01bb8035$4b5b0960$5cc0...@tige.colostate.edu>, "J. Tige Richardson" <ti...@holly.colostate.edu> writes:
>Hi!
>
>I posted a similar message over a week ago, and as so often happens in
>newsgroups it took a detour and went completely off subject. I never did
>get a satisfactory answer (from someone that has tried both systems) of
>whether or not I should invest in a Pentium or Pentium Pro system for
>games.
>
>deal with lots of problems. As a result, as a stress reliever, I play
>lots of games as a hobby.
>
>games, but would also like new Win95 and DOS games to run very fast and
>very well.
>
>I would just like to know what kind of benefits/drawbacks I would get with
>either system. Thanks very much for any help.
>
>Tige
>
>--
>J. Tige Richardson
>E-Mail: ti...@holly.colostate.edu
>Fort Collins, CO 80525
>~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>I am Pentium of Borg, precision is futile, you will
>be approximated.......
>~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Tige,
Well, the answer depends on what type of application you are running. If the
game was a 32 bit DOS extended game, the odds are it would run faster on a
200MHz Pro than on a 200MHz Pentium.
However, given the large amount of 16 bit code in Windows95, then a game
run on that OS would probably run faster under the Pentium.
I bought myself a 166 Pentium in April. When the MMX compatible 200MHz
Pentium comes out at the end of the year, I'll swap the processor out. MMX will
help improve the performance of some types of games by quite a large margin.
Eric Pinnell
Patrick Riley
cas...@ksu.ksu.edu (Charles A Smith) wrote:
> As far as MMX goes... it stands for "Multimedia Extensions" and will be
>advantageous to anyone using full screen video. As far as gaming goes,
>the new graphics cards on the horizon will have a much greater impact
>on gameplay, in my opinion. And they will plug quite nicely in my PPro,
>thank you.
>If you are going to make a claim here, get your facts straight. We all need
>more light and less ... well, hot air.
Chuck maybe you should get your facts straight.
1) MMX does _not_ stand for "multimedia extensions"
2) It will be useful for much more than full screen video
Sheesh...
- Patrick
Kurt Schwind
> I posted a similar message over a week ago, and as so often happens in
> newsgroups it took a detour and went completely off subject. I never did
> get a satisfactory answer (from someone that has tried both systems) of
> whether or not I should invest in a Pentium or Pentium Pro system for
> games.
I've done some research into this myself as I'm in a similar
situation. I've opted for the P-200 w/32M RAM instead of the P-200 Pro.
The Pro doesn't handle 16bit as well as the Pentium. Since most of the
games are going to play over DOS (and don't play well under WIN95, OS2 or
WIN NT) I think that the P-200 is the better deal. Not to mention the
price savings and the lack of field testing on the Pro machines.
Hope this helps.
--
Kurt Schwind | Delta State University
DataBase Analyst/Systems Manager | http://www.deltast.edu
ksch...@dsu.deltast.edu | Vox Phone:601.846.4030
Dave Glue
Kurt Schwind <ksch...@dsu.seas.ucla.edu> wrote in article
<4u7t8h$g...@nntp2.backbone.olemiss.edu>...
> I've done some research into this myself as I'm in a similar
> situation. I've opted for the P-200 w/32M RAM instead of the P-200 Pro.
> The Pro doesn't handle 16bit as well as the Pentium. Since most of the
> games are going to play over DOS (and don't play well under WIN95, OS2 or
> WIN NT) I think that the P-200 is the better deal. Not to mention the
> price savings and the lack of field testing on the Pro machines.
> Hope this helps.
You haven't done much research.
Most DOS games are 32-bit, have been for years. The Pro-200 is the fastest
PC game machine out now, period. And the P-200 is an absolute rip-off,
you're paying an exorbitant amount for a 10% speed increase over a P166.
M.B.
On 6 Aug 1996 16:52:33 GMT, ksch...@dsu.seas.ucla.edu (Kurt Schwind)
wrote:
>J. Tige Richardson (ti...@holly.colostate.edu) wrote:
>> Hi!
>
>> I posted a similar message over a week ago, and as so often happens in
>> newsgroups it took a detour and went completely off subject. I never did
>> get a satisfactory answer (from someone that has tried both systems) of
>> whether or not I should invest in a Pentium or Pentium Pro system for
>> games.
>
> I've done some research into this myself as I'm in a similar
>situation. I've opted for the P-200 w/32M RAM instead of the P-200 Pro.
>The Pro doesn't handle 16bit as well as the Pentium. Since most of the
>games are going to play over DOS (and don't play well under WIN95, OS2 or
>WIN NT) I think that the P-200 is the better deal. Not to mention the
>price savings and the lack of field testing on the Pro machines.
> Hope this helps.
>
>--
>Kurt Schwind | Delta State University
>DataBase Analyst/Systems Manager | http://www.deltast.edu
>ksch...@dsu.deltast.edu | Vox Phone:601.846.4030
>
Well your not exactly correct, most DOS games are 32 bit. they
have been for a while now. As for this whole 16 bit thing with the
Pro, if you read any computer mags you will see that the new P5-200
barely edges the Pro-200 at 16 bit. But in 32 bit and FPU operations
the Pro is the pentium leader. Besides why would you spend so much on
a P5-200 when you can get the P6 for less.
JEB
Dave Glue wrote:
>
> Kurt Schwind <ksch...@dsu.seas.ucla.edu> wrote in article
> <4u7t8h$g...@nntp2.backbone.olemiss.edu>...
> > situation. I've opted for the P-200 w/32M RAM instead of the P-200 Pro.
> > The Pro doesn't handle 16bit as well as the Pentium. Since most of the
> > games are going to play over DOS (and don't play well under WIN95, OS2 or
> > WIN NT) I think that the P-200 is the better deal. Not to mention the
> > price savings and the lack of field testing on the Pro machines.
> > Hope this helps.
>
>
> Most DOS games are 32-bit, have been for years. The Pro-200 is the fastest
> PC game machine out now, period. And the P-200 is an absolute rip-off,
> you're paying an exorbitant amount for a 10% speed increase over a P166.
I've developed a rather strange, and selfish, attitude about
all these post about how the P6 "pro" 200 is a dog in dos.
Now-a-days I don't even respond to these post much. In fact
it's kinda like I get a sadistic enjoyment out of knowing
that I've got a Pro, it is a screamer, witness the various
"bench" test results:
In LONGBOW...the Pro is "off the scale"...1000 in all of the
tests and a total score of 1056...still can't figure out
what the extra "56" is for...hehe
In QUAKE...320x240...98.8 frames per second at the place
that everybody uses to test the TIMEREFRESH...in SVGA
34 frames per second in the same place.
In Gran Prix II, "GP2 LOG:ON" Processor score 379, no
P5 has reported in above 300, Video score 606, no P5
has reported in above 500!!!
In CBench...VGA...342.9 rating...205.7 frames per second.
(NO TYPO there)
In CBench...SVGA...77.8 rating...46.2 frames per second.
Monaco in GP2 at 23.6 frames per second...Processor
Occupancy is 130% in the toughest part of the course.
Most other parts it is below 100.
There is NOTHING published in the last year, for sure,
and I own almost everything that would be posted on
here, and elsewhere, will NOT run on a "Pro".
I've never seen anything run Win95 as fast and if
they want a real thrill...hehehe, run NT.
So, my strange attitude is that I enjoy having the
fastest "gun" in the west and kinda hope they all
get P5/200's. It's nice, after a year and a half
of suffering with a 486DX4 100 and reading all the
"Pentium" notes to be "on top" for a change. I like
it and don't mind if the crowd up "here" is sparse.
So I DO NOT recommend the "Pro"...hehehe
Selfish, I know, but when one tries to "tell 'em",
all we get is a bunch of out of date test results
that applied to the early "steppings" and is NO
longer valid at all.
Tell 'em to buy the P5 200...hehehe
JEB in Vegas
oz...@ix.netcom.com
Choy Pui Yin Irwin
JEB <oz...@ix.netcom.com> wrote:
>So, my strange attitude is that I enjoy having the
>fastest "gun" in the west and kinda hope they all
>get P5/200's. It's nice, after a year and a half
>of suffering with a 486DX4 100 and reading all the
>"Pentium" notes to be "on top" for a change. I like
>it and don't mind if the crowd up "here" is sparse.
>So I DO NOT recommend the "Pro"...hehehe
>Selfish, I know, but when one tries to "tell 'em",
>all we get is a bunch of out of date test results
>that applied to the early "steppings" and is NO
>longer valid at all.
>Tell 'em to buy the P5 200...hehehe
And next year everyone will buy P7 and recommend P6 to others.
I will definitely buy a P7 in 2 years' time.
Irwin
Michael McFarland
Hey JEB! Liked your comments. I'm in a similar situation that you were
in. I have a DX4-100 and am looking to upgrade and am considering
either a pent 200 or a pent pro 200. From the scores on your bench
marks the pent pro looks intriging. What video card are you using? Is
it one of the new 3D cards like Diamond and ATI have put out??
--
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| Information and Technology Resources |
| Technology Support Group |
--------------------------------------------------------------------
| Michael E McFarland Internet : michael....@csun.edu |
| B.S.E.E. Compuserve : 71763.3030 |
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| I want to die like my Grandfather, in his sleep. |
| Not like the other people in his car, screaming their heads off! |
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Kurt Schwind
Dave Glue (dav...@interlog.com) wrote:
> You haven't done much research.
> Most DOS games are 32-bit, have been for years. The Pro-200 is the fastest
> PC game machine out now, period. And the P-200 is an absolute rip-off,
> you're paying an exorbitant amount for a 10% speed increase over a P166.
Despite any 'subjective' tests you may have run, every major
benchmark run on DOS games shows that the P-200 and Pro 200 are about
the same. The Pro 200 isn't worth the difference in price if you want
to run DOS games.
JEB
Dave Glue wrote:
>
>
> Not Quake. Not F1GP2. Have you really looked into this at all? And what
> is the price premium for a Pro?
>
> A Pro user has been giving his benchmarks for DOS games. They are far
> beyond a P200, period.
I paid less for my PPro than most 166 packages out in
the national computer stores. I had mine built, which,
by the way, is what I HIGHLY recommend. I will never
buy another "name" brand computer after what I went
through with my NEC 9617 133. It suxs trying to get
things to work with these "proprietary" (sp?) deals.
I recommend that anyone interested find a "guru" in
his or her local area the build/assembles machines.
Sometimes these folks are in a store front, sometimes
out of their garages. But I would HIGHLY recommend
that you custom build any new machine. Get the
components that you want, EXACTLY, and have the
flexibility to add or change as you wish.
JEB in Vegas
Dave Glue
Kurt Schwind <ksch...@dsu.seas.ucla.edu> wrote in article
<4uamtb$o...@nntp2.backbone.olemiss.edu>...
> Dave Glue (dav...@interlog.com) wrote:
>
>
> > You haven't done much research.
>
> > Most DOS games are 32-bit, have been for years. The Pro-200 is the
fastest
> > PC game machine out now, period. And the P-200 is an absolute rip-off,
> > you're paying an exorbitant amount for a 10% speed increase over a
P166.
>
> Despite any 'subjective' tests you may have run, every major
> benchmark run on DOS games shows that the P-200 and Pro 200 are about
> the same. The Pro 200 isn't worth the difference in price if you want
> to run DOS games.
Not Quake. Not F1GP2. Have you really looked into this at all? And what
Bram Stolk
Hello gamer,
Kurt Schwind (ksch...@dsu.seas.ucla.edu) wrote:
: Despite any 'subjective' tests you may have run, every major
: benchmark run on DOS games shows that the P-200 and Pro 200 are about
: the same. The Pro 200 isn't worth the difference in price if you want
: to run DOS games.
Well, those 'major benchmarks' were not that major then!
If a game uses floating point (just about any polygon based game does)
then a PPRO will blow the socks off a Pentium.
Even when it's integer only, it will still outperform a Pentium considerably.
The only advantage that Pentium has over PPRO is running windows 3.11 apps.
Now, where's the gain in that?
older PPRO chipsets used to suffer from bad PCI performance.
The benchmarks you mentioned may have been influenced by that.
But remember: running games seldom requires a fast harddisk.
Furthermore, bad PCI performance has been fixed in the newer
chipsets.
If you want fast games... do not concentrate on the CPU too much.
THE bottleneck in hi-res games is the videoram.
If you play at 1024x768, then going from video DRAM to
video VRAM can tripple perfomances!
Because I am such I nice guy, I will let you all in on a secret:
VRAM is expensive, but there is a trick!
Nobody wants Vesa Local Bus anymore.
Buy a cheap VLB vga card with 4MB VRAM. (they exist!, Diamond e.g.)
Then transplant the VRAM onto a PCI VGA card that uses VRAM.
(Best deal would be if you could get a ramless PCI card).
Running settlers II in 1280x1024 will get you nowhere if you use DRAM.
VRAM will get you a _lot_ of smooth settlers on screen *GRIN*
Bram
--
o------------------------------------------------------------o
| Bram Stolk work: br...@gig.nl |
| Electro-GIG TEL: +31 (20) 5217 300 (main) |
| Herengracht 214 TEL: +31 (20) 5217 320 (direct) |
| 1016BS Amsterdam home: st...@sidonia.xs4all.nl |
| The Netherlands TEL: 020 668 5213 |
o------------------------------------------------------------o
John Esh
JEB <oz...@ix.netcom.com> wrote:
>Dave Glue wrote:
>>
>>
>> Not Quake. Not F1GP2. Have you really looked into this at all? And what
>> is the price premium for a Pro?
>>
>> A Pro user has been giving his benchmarks for DOS games. They are far
>> beyond a P200, period.
>I paid less for my PPro than most 166 packages out in
>the national computer stores. I had mine built, which,
>by the way, is what I HIGHLY recommend. I will never
>buy another "name" brand computer after what I went
>through with my NEC 9617 133. It suxs trying to get
>things to work with these "proprietary" (sp?) deals.
>I recommend that anyone interested find a "guru" in
>his or her local area the build/assembles machines.
>Sometimes these folks are in a store front, sometimes
>out of their garages. But I would HIGHLY recommend
>that you custom build any new machine. Get the
>components that you want, EXACTLY, and have the
>flexibility to add or change as you wish.
>JEB in Vegas
Actually, I was going to build my computer myself but I ended up
buying from Micron and ended up paying less cash for more system.
They're a first tier company and they're systems are just incredible.
It does'nt hurt to live in the town they're based out of either.....
John in Boise
Shannon Bradford
In article <4ucbe6$7...@nnrp1.news.primenet.com>,
>
>>I paid less for my PPro than most 166 packages out in
>>the national computer stores. I had mine built, which,
>>by the way, is what I HIGHLY recommend. I will never
>>buy another "name" brand computer after what I went
>>through with my NEC 9617 133. It suxs trying to get
>>things to work with these "proprietary" (sp?) deals.
>>I recommend that anyone interested find a "guru" in
>>his or her local area the build/assembles machines.
>>Sometimes these folks are in a store front, sometimes
>>out of their garages. But I would HIGHLY recommend
>>that you custom build any new machine. Get the
>>components that you want, EXACTLY, and have the
>>flexibility to add or change as you wish.
>
>buying from Micron and ended up paying less cash for more system.
>They're a first tier company and they're systems are just incredible.
>It does'nt hurt to live in the town they're based out of either.....
>
occasions and frankly, I'll probably always build my own in the future.
The only advantage to buying a pre-built is it saves time. If I build
my own computer I can re-use many of the parts from my old PC that are
still technologicly current. Additionally I can find much better prices
if I'm willing to be patient and buy on a component by component basis,
sometimes new, sometimes used. And I get the exact components that I
want.
Recently I spent slightly more then $2500 to get two P100 boxes. Note I
reused a lot of parts so the $2500 does NOT cover the entire price
of two systems. Still I think I did pretty well. Here's what I got
and what I paid. I should also mention that this was in early Feb.
of this year and prices were higher on a lot of items (particularly
ram) then.
Item Going Rate(2/1/96) Paid
P100 CPU $220 $150 used, bought two
8Mb EDO SIMMs $200 $172 new, bought 4 SIMMs
STB Powergraph
64 2Mb video $160 $90 used
Western Digital
1.6gig EIDE $325 $265 new, bought two
Tower Case $50 - $450 $95 new
Adaptec 2940UW
SCSI Kit $320 $180 new
MAG DX17
17" monitor $599 $500 new
3COM 3C590
networking card $150 $75 new, bought two
Asus P55TP4N
motherboard $99 $70 new, bought two
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Totals ~$3562 $2673 = Savings of ~$889
I already had the following and reused them:
Nanao T2-17 monitor
USR V.Everything external modem
Tallgrass SCSI tape drive
Matrox Millennium 4Mb video card
Two 1.44Mb floppy drives
Toshiba SCSI 4X CD-ROM drive
GUS 1Mb Soundcard
I had a few cheap miscellaneous items left to get, but the
point of all this is by reusing parts I had and carefully
adding others, I was able to setup my own two node network
for about the price of one new PC and I got P100s, 16Mb RAM,
17" monitors, 1.6gig fast EIDE drives and tower cases.
Shannon
Gregory T Cato
Excerpts from netnews.comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.rpg: 7-Aug-96 Re: Pentium
Pro vs. Pentium.. by Kurt Sch...@dsu.seas.uc
> Despite any 'subjective' tests you may have run, every major
> benchmark run on DOS games shows that the P-200 and Pro 200 are about
> the same. The Pro 200 isn't worth the difference in price if you want
> to run DOS games.
Ok, for 16 bit games, they are about the same. For 32, the Pro blows the
p5 out of the water. And last time I checked, the Pro was cheaper than
the p5.
Greg
MN Paul
Windows 95 and its apps run on a 200 MHz pentium pro about as fast as
they would on a 133 MHz Pentium. IN GENERAL.
Pro users have a big advantage, though. When Windows 95 (or whatever
the name will be then) becomes pure 32-bit operating system, the pros
will be flying much faster than pentiums of similar clock speeds. Those
of us with regular old pentium 200 MHz machines will be left in the dust
or will be spending $$ to upgrade.
JEB
John Esh wrote:
>
>
>
> Actually, I was going to build my computer myself but I ended up
> buying from Micron and ended up paying less cash for more system.
> They're a first tier company and they're systems are just incredible.
> It does'nt hurt to live in the town they're based out of either.....
>
I have a very good friend who has a Micron and I will
tell you I'm VERY impressed with it. His is a 133 and it
totally smokes my NEC 133, in my view, and it is a great
platform overall. It reeks of quality components and if
I could have afforded one...they are NOT cheap, I probably
would have one now. In my case it worked out ok cuz I
ended up with a nice machine.
I do NOT think that you can go wrong with MICRON.
Plus, I was totally impressed when they sent my
friend a "refund" cuz the price dropped within
60 days of his purchase. A REAL CLASS company.
Enjoy
JEB in Vegas
Timothy Gaastra
>
> >these advantages are the multimedia interface built in Win '95 and the
> >elimination of the 64K max program segment size used in DOS/Win 3.1x.
>
> Isn't that 640K? You seem to be confused on your numbers.
No he isn't. He's talking about segmenting, which is what the x86's used to
access a large
section of memory in the past with 16 bits than normally would have been
possible.
That's also what DOS 4GW is for, to make a flat memory model for memory
access and allow
one to access memory in a non-segmented fashion. Its also about the only
thing 32 bit about
DOS 4GW. (Sorry if I'm oversimplifying things too much to those in the
know)
Looking at the MMX IS additions (which are I hope, actual internal data bus
changes and not just
microcode, I haven't looked carefully at it yet), it mainly seems to be
adding the ability to do 64 bit
operations, which will allow among other things "unrolling" of interior
loops for a near doubling of performance of these loops. For graphic
redraws this could be significant.
The Lord Leto II
In article <4uamtb$o...@nntp2.backbone.olemiss.edu> ksch...@dsu.seas.ucla.edu (Kurt Schwind) writes:
>Dave Glue (dav...@interlog.com) wrote:
>
>
>> You haven't done much research.
>
>> Most DOS games are 32-bit, have been for years. The Pro-200 is the fastest
>> PC game machine out now, period. And the P-200 is an absolute rip-off,
>> you're paying an exorbitant amount for a 10% speed increase over a P166.
>
>benchmark run on DOS games shows that the P-200 and Pro 200 are about
>the same. The Pro 200 isn't worth the difference in price if you want
>to run DOS games.
That's absolutely not true. "Every major benchmark" -- I think the
Quake README.TXT says something to the contrary.
A PPro200 smokes the P200.
Whether or not it's worth the price difference is an entirely
different matter.
JEB
disagree with the first statement.
In our house we have a P6/200 on one table and a P5/133 on
the other table, same room.
There is NO comparison between the two as far as running
Windows 95, or anything else for that matter, specifically.
The PPro runs ALL things dramatically faster...with a capital
"D".
I can assure the 133 is no competition at all in the speed
department.
JEB in Vegas
oz...@ix.netcom.com
JEB
The Lord Leto II wrote:
>
>
>
> That's absolutely not true. "Every major benchmark" -- I think the
> Quake README.TXT says something to the contrary.
>
> A PPro200 smokes the P200.
> Whether or not it's worth the price difference is an entirely
> different matter.
>
> ************ The Lord Leto II God Emperor of Arrakis *************
I find it very interesting, this debate regarding the PPro.
Someone once said that it takes years to build a good reputation,
and only a few minutes to ruin one. In this case it would appear
that the early PPro's DID have some PCI problems and WERE a bit
sluggish in DOS apps. Now that the later "steppings" are out, and
the MB's are correct, or at least improved, the "reputation"
persists without regard to the facts at all.
I also think that there is a bit of a factor that the P6 "pro" is
TOO close to the Pentiums (P5's). By that I mean that folks just
got rid of their 486's awhile back...in the last year or so, and
here comes the P6 TOO damned soon. We had a couple of years to
catch our breath and enjoy our smashing "486/33's", WOW, what
a machine it was...remember?? Now, the P5 folks, and I would
mention that I am one too (got my 133 just in May), are faced
with this "new" machine...it has a "higher" number...it has
an intimadating clock speed...and is generally reputed to be
a "business machine", so there is a great deal of resistence
to this "new" THING.
Too close, came on too fast...to many folks just dumped a
couple to threesome grand in their P5's and the software
has just caught up in the last 6 to 9 months with the P5's
and it is all happening too fast. I can EASILY understand
the "holy shit, NOT AGAIN, and NOT THIS SOON" factor when
it comes to upgrades. I have had an interesting experience
with this...kinda accelerated...because I went from a 486
DX4 100, IN MAY OF THIS YEAR...2 short months ago, to a
P5/133...GOSH, what a nice machine...to a P6 in mid June.
Kept the P5/133 (got two "bad boyz" and we HAD TO HAVE
2 machines...C&C, Warcraft II...etc) BUT to tell the
truth I NEVER run the 133...Yuk...what a S L O W machine.
Really, DREADFULLY slow in comparison.
The REAL problem is the human brain. Fast is fast, and
faster is FASTER. I now find that I have to "wait" on
some things to happen on the P6. I have to laugh at
myself, cuz it is LIGHTENING QUICK, but still, the damned
human brain (yes, I do have one...hehehe) just get's used
to things too damned quick. I've already started the plan
to get the NEXT step for the P6 and am seriously considering
the "dual" processor thing...already got a price, cuz...
FASTER is BETTER too...
In any case...I do feel good about one thing. I sincerly
believe, as you mentioned, that the BEST days for the P6
are definately TO COME...
It is REFRESHING to have a machine that has NOT yet reached
it's potential, as there is not much out there gamingwise, YET,
to really push this thing, and WOW, I can hardly wait to get
to the "need for speed" factor.
Just my view...nice to have a "fast gun", especially out here
in the "west"...hehehehe
JEB in Vegas
oz...@ix.netcom.com
Kevin Kramer
Peter wrote:
>
> I gave up trying to justify playing games a long time ago. Now I just
> say "I play computer games." :-)
Me too, I used to try to justify my $2500 computer by listing
off all that it can do. But I gave up justifying it, I have a
computer so I can play on it!
About the only non-play things I do (I consider the internet to
be playing) are Quicken (which I love) and updating my resume'.
All the rest of the time I am doing nothing but killing brain
cells and frying my retina's, and loving every minute of it!
Kevin
J. Tige Richardson
> Not Quake. Not F1GP2. Have you really looked into this at all? And
what
> is the price premium for a Pro?
I can get a PPro 200 and 440FX motherboard for around $800!
Tige
Michael Gerard
The Lord Leto II <T9...@ACADEMIC.NEMOSTATE.EDU> wrote:
>In article <4uamtb$o...@nntp2.backbone.olemiss.edu> ksch...@dsu.seas.ucla.edu (Kurt Schwind) writes:
>>Dave Glue (dav...@interlog.com) wrote:
>>
>>
>>> You haven't done much research.
>>
>>> Most DOS games are 32-bit, have been for years. The Pro-200 is the fastest
>>> PC game machine out now, period. And the P-200 is an absolute rip-off,
>>> you're paying an exorbitant amount for a 10% speed increase over a P166.
>>
>> Despite any 'subjective' tests you may have run, every major
>>benchmark run on DOS games shows that the P-200 and Pro 200 are about
>>the same. The Pro 200 isn't worth the difference in price if you want
>>to run DOS games.
>That's absolutely not true. "Every major benchmark" -- I think the
>Quake README.TXT says something to the contrary.
>A PPro200 smokes the P200.
>Whether or not it's worth the price difference is an entirely
>different matter.
Ahhhhhh, here's the deal: if you see "DOS4GW" at the startup of your game, and
your game is the ONLY thing running on your system at the time, and the game is a
compute-performance hungry title (re: Quake), then a Pro will smoke a flat
Pentium, at the same clock rate. Once you start adding 16-bit driver TSRs
(sound, cdrom, network), they'll start to bottleneck the Pro chip, but those
bottlenecks, at least in a game like Quake, you hit much later than the single
performance bottleneck of trying to render polygons onto a 305k surface at
20-30FPS. Without magic hardware to do it for you (3d cards) or new extensions
to the chipset (MMX Pentiums), a Pro is going to be faster at that stuff than a
same-clock pentium.
On the other hand, I'd warrant Civ2 would run almost as good on a P100 as a
PPro200. If you're not doing massive amounts of math, why pay the premium?
mig
QSI
JEB
Scott Caddaye wrote:
>
> JEB wrote:
> >
> >
> > Just my view...nice to have a "fast gun", especially out here
> > in the "west"...hehehehe
> >
> > JEB in Vegas
> > oz...@ix.netcom.com
>
> What are you doing over here?
> Get back to rec.autos.simulators immediately young man! :))
I don't know what happened, Scott, I hit the "kerb" and
then I was thrown off the track and ended up here....
It was all a blurr...hehehe
JEB in Vegas (G)
MacCorMac
JEB wrote:
>
> Scott Caddaye wrote:
snip
> > JEB,
> > What are you doing over here?
> > Get back to rec.autos.simulators immediately young man! :))
>
> I don't know what happened, Scott, I hit the "kerb" and
> then I was thrown off the track and ended up here....
> It was all a blurr...hehehe
>
> JEB in Vegas (G)
JEB, you auto be ashamed of yourself!
MacCorMac (rend)
Scott Caddaye
JEB wrote:
>
>
> Just my view...nice to have a "fast gun", especially out here
> in the "west"...hehehehe
>
> JEB in Vegas
> oz...@ix.netcom.com
Dave Glue
MN Paul <pa...@pclink.com> wrote in article <320AA6...@pclink.com>...
> Windows 95 and its apps run on a 200 MHz pentium pro about as fast as
> they would on a 133 MHz Pentium. IN GENERAL.
Source. Benchmarks. Anything, please. The only ones I have seen indicate
this is far from the truth, in fact a Pro200 using Win95 32-bit apps was
faster than a P200.
Rick Huber
Choy Pui Yin Irwin wrote:
>
> >Tell 'em to buy the P5 200...hehehe
>
> And next year everyone will buy P7 and recommend P6 to others.
>
> I will definitely buy a P7 in 2 years' time.
>
> Irwin
Don't count on this. I belong to the local IEEE, and we had a
person from Intel come speak at one of our meetings about the
Pro and Intel's plans for the future. He indicated that the P7
will never hit the market, and the P8 will be the next after
the Pro. His reasoning for this was in several parts:
1) The cost of designing and building the factories that make the
processors was getting VERY expensive. Hundreds of millions of
dollars per factory!
2) Intel is trying to move from the .25 micron tecnology to a
.18 micron technology, or less! (This is 'wire' width connecting
each transistor in the processor). To create a faster/better
processor this is very nessessary or the CPU size and heat
managment become a problem. This jump in technology was still in
the works when the spokesperson from Intel was at our meeting.
3) Intel is doing joint work with HP. The idea here is to merge
the CISC and the RISC architectures into one. The P7 was to be a
stepping stone in this direction, but was not (at the time) slated
to be released to the public. The idea was to release a second
generation of the merged chip that was by that time well tested
and confirmed as a viable product for the PC market.
4) It was perceived that when the Pro hit the markets, at the time
the Pro had not been released yet, it could easily provide the
performance and results that the business and personal PC world
was screaming for. NT was suppose to have hit the market at the
same time that a machine of the Pro's calibur was to be released.
The Pentium (P5) was a let down to Microsoft. It was also perceived
at the time that with multiple processor Motherboards for the Pro
family, there would be no problem with speed in the PC for the next
couple years. Thus giving Intel time to design and perfect their
upcomming processors.
This was the story as I heard it about a year ago. Whether this
stance by Intel has changed or I misinterpreted what the spokesperson
was saying, I have no information on. Until such a time that the P7
is actually released or I get information to the contrary, I will
continue to go by what I was told. By the way, the spokesperson
from Intel never gave a definate time slot on the year of release for
the P8 or anything else. He did however say that Intel wanted to
break the trend of ever-increasing speeds at which processors/computers
are outdated. As was noted in a couple posts, the Pro hit the market
right on the tail of the P5, yet it took much longer for the P5 to hit
after the 486 was initially released.
Hope this was useful in some way...
Rick H.
Whew...sorry I was so long winded! :)
Brad McQuaid
MN Paul (pa...@pclink.com) wrote:
: Windows 95 and its apps run on a 200 MHz pentium pro about as fast as
: they would on a 133 MHz Pentium. IN GENERAL.
This is sooooooo much crap. I have both a ppro 200 and a p133,
and running both win95 and dos games (32 bit dos games, like
quake, etc), the ppro rocks all over the p133. Big time.
Like over twice the frame rate.
-Brad
Smoke Crack and Worship Satan
In article <4ueuid$p...@newsfeed.intelenet.net>, m...@quicksilver.com (Michael
Gerard) wrote:
>
> On the other hand, I'd warrant Civ2 would run almost as good on a P100 as a
> PPro200. If you're not doing massive amounts of math, why pay the premium?
>
That's the thing. There really isn't much of a premium any more, amazingly
enough. For example, go to www.dell.com, and visit the "build your own system"
area.
I built two *identical* systems-- one with a P5-166 (512k external L2 cache) and
one with a P6-200. Guess what the price difference was?
One Hundred and Fifty Dollars.
That's right, folks, the current price difference between a P5-166 system and a
P6-200 system is $150! Sheesh. It just doesn't make sense to buy Pentiums any
more when you can get something much better for an insignificant additional
cost.
--------
8/9/96 quote from www.dell.com
XPS Pro 200Mhz mini-tower chassis
32MB EDO RAM
Spacesaver 104 Win95 keyboard
Ultrascan 15TX Trinitron Color Monitor, 13.7 viewable
#9 2MB EDO ViRGE 3D Video Card
3.2GB EIDE hard drive
1.44mb floppy
WIndows NT 3.51
Microsoft Mouse
Soundblaster 16
Altec Lansing ACS5 speakers
MS Office Pro 7.0
1 year onsite, 2nd and 3rd parts only
$2546 without shipping.
$2405 for the P5-166, 512k cache version
$1872 premium for Mac equivalent at www.powercc.com
Jonathan Aitken
Which is great unless you already have the pentium 100, and dont have any
programs to upgrade for yet - you decide on the software you want to run, then
you upgrade - I get the impression that many people talking about buying Pro's
are doing this in reverse - future proofing seems to be a bit pointless at
present doesnt it?
I still think that I'd rather keep any low end pentium I had and upgrade when
its really worthwhile - leading is bleeding. BTW, Dell is not particularly cheap
in Oz whatever you buy, especially compared to a clone - is it any different in
America?
For me, some of the frame rates quoted sound irrelevant - after 30 its fairly
pointless.
If anyone replies to this could they either post privately or to the newsgroup
and not both at the same time. I shant cry if nobody does.
Im feeling much better now....
Dave Glue
Rick Huber <rhu...@pacific.sdsu.edu> wrote in article
<320C3B...@pacific.sdsu.edu>...
>
> 2) Intel is trying to move from the .25 micron tecnology to a
> .18 micron technology, or less!
"From"? Intel has no processors on .28 technology, let alone .25. Are you
sure this guy was from Intel? :)
Terry Thiel
> Windows 95 and its apps run on a 200 MHz pentium pro about as fast as
> they would on a 133 MHz Pentium. IN GENERAL.
>
> Pro users have a big advantage, though. When Windows 95 (or whatever
> the name will be then) becomes pure 32-bit operating system, the pros
> will be flying much faster than pentiums of similar clock speeds. Those
> of us with regular old pentium 200 MHz machines will be left in the dust
> or will be spending $$ to upgrade.
I've always seen it described as being as fast as a 166mhz Pentium in general.
Jan Löbzien
bmcq...@cts.com (Brad McQuaid) wrote:
>MN Paul (pa...@pclink.com) wrote:
>: Windows 95 and its apps run on a 200 MHz pentium pro about as fast as
>: they would on a 133 MHz Pentium. IN GENERAL.
>This is sooooooo much crap. I have both a ppro 200 and a p133,
>and running both win95 and dos games (32 bit dos games, like
>quake, etc), the ppro rocks all over the p133. Big time.
>Like over twice the frame rate.
>-Brad
Hi Brad,
do you have the opportunity to run F1GP2 from MicroProse on the
PPro200 and then,please,post or email me the estimated framerate from
the graphics-menue for svga with ALL options on?
Thanks in advance,
Jan
MacCorMac
JEB wrote:
snip
> "auto" be ashamed....hehehe
>
> Mac, that was the posting equivilent (sp?) of
> CHALK screeeeeeeeching on a BlackBoard....
>
> GROAN........OUCH....HEHEHEHhehehehehe
>
> "auto"....ROTFLMAO...
>
> Pretty good......(BAD)
>
> JEB in Vegas
> oz...@ix.netcom.com
Why thanks JEB, being compared to "CHALK screeeeeeeeching on a
BlackBoard...." is the highest compliment a punner can get :)
I'd also like to thank all those posting to this thread. I'm trying to
decide whether to get a P5 or PPro, and you've all offered a lot of good
info here.
Looks like the PRo is the way to go, especially since the price spread is
approx $100 and dropping (for my Gateway configuration, anyway).
MacCorMac (rend)
Ian
br...@gig.nl (Bram Stolk) wrote:
>Hello gamer,
>Kurt Schwind (ksch...@dsu.seas.ucla.edu) wrote:
>: Despite any 'subjective' tests you may have run, every major
>: benchmark run on DOS games shows that the P-200 and Pro 200 are about
>: the same. The Pro 200 isn't worth the difference in price if you want
>: to run DOS games.
>Well, those 'major benchmarks' were not that major then!
>If a game uses floating point (just about any polygon based game does)
>then a PPRO will blow the socks off a Pentium.
Actually, they don't. For example, Quake uses HEAVY floating point, yet PPro
200s don't do much better than Pentium 200s. They do tend to do somewhat
better, but the Quake Framerate page shows the differences as very small. Of
course, from most places a P200 chip is actually just as or MORE expensive
than a PPro 200, so you might as well get the Pro even though performance
probably won't improve much.
>If you want fast games... do not concentrate on the CPU too much.
>THE bottleneck in hi-res games is the videoram.
>If you play at 1024x768, then going from video DRAM to
>video VRAM can tripple perfomances!
Or better yet, get an ET6000 based card with MDRAM (fastest DOS video on the
planet). They cost around 200 dollars, and blow away EVERYTHING ever created
as far as DOS performance goes (they even outperform the Millennium, though
not by a huge amount).
Then, some time later this year or next year, get an Orchid Righteous 3D to
keep it company. No matter what chip you are using, your video will kick ass.
JEB
MacCorMac wrote:
>
> JEB wrote:
> >
> > Scott Caddaye wrote:
>
> snip
>
> > > What are you doing over here?
> > > Get back to rec.autos.simulators immediately young man! :))
> >
> > then I was thrown off the track and ended up here....
> > It was all a blurr...hehehe
> >
> > JEB in Vegas (G)
>
> JEB, you auto be ashamed of yourself!
>
> MacCorMac (rend)
"auto" be ashamed....hehehe
Rico Laguna
nstn...@fox.nstn.ca (Ian) wrote:
>br...@gig.nl (Bram Stolk) wrote:
>>Hello gamer,
>>Kurt Schwind (ksch...@dsu.seas.ucla.edu) wrote:
Actually....the Hercules Stringray 64 was faster in DOS than the
Millenium. At this is supposedly the FASTEST DOS card using the
ARK2000 chipset
Smoke Crack and Worship Satan
In article <4ujosp$h...@news.nstn.ca>, nstn...@fox.nstn.ca (Ian) wrote:
> br...@gig.nl (Bram Stolk) wrote:
>
> >Hello gamer,
>
>
> >Kurt Schwind (ksch...@dsu.seas.ucla.edu) wrote:
>
> >: Despite any 'subjective' tests you may have run, every major
> >: benchmark run on DOS games shows that the P-200 and Pro 200 are about
> >: the same. The Pro 200 isn't worth the difference in price if you want
> >: to run DOS games.
>
> >Well, those 'major benchmarks' were not that major then!
>
> >If a game uses floating point (just about any polygon based game does)
> >then a PPRO will blow the socks off a Pentium.
>
> Actually, they don't. For example, Quake uses HEAVY floating point, yet PPro
> 200s don't do much better than Pentium 200s. They do tend to do somewhat
> better, but the Quake Framerate page shows the differences as very small.
Not true at all! Where are you getting this from?
Go to http://www.cam.org/~agena/quake.html for the quake frame rate list.
Here is the only result from a P5-200 on that page. Hopefully it's
representative of other P5-200s, they are in very short supply.
320x200 320x400 640x350 640x480 800x600
34.12 22.29 17.68 14.24 10.26
Now compare with the P6-200 results (one of many):
320x200 320x400 640x350 640x480 800x600
46.32 31.14 25.28 N/A 15.13
Here is the percentage difference:
35% 39% 42% 47%
The P6-200 is, on average, 40% faster than the P5-200 in Quake. To put this in
perspective, it's like going from a P5-90 to a P5-133. Is that a "small"
difference to you?
> course, from most places a P200 chip is actually just as or MORE expensive
> than a PPro 200, so you might as well get the Pro even though performance
> probably won't improve much.
>
Exactly. For the $150 premium, it's a no-brainer. And it is *much* faster under
Windows NT-- like twice as fast as a P5-166 according to Infoworld's sysmark 32.
>
> Or better yet, get an ET6000 based card with MDRAM (fastest DOS video on the
> planet). They cost around 200 dollars, and blow away EVERYTHING ever created
> as far as DOS performance goes (they even outperform the Millennium, though
> not by a huge amount).
>
Yeah but they suck in a GUI like Win95. Get an all-around performer like the 3D
ViRGE chipset boards-- stealth 3D, etc.
> Then, some time later this year or next year, get an Orchid Righteous 3D to
> keep it company. No matter what chip you are using, your video will kick ass.
>
Definitely agree on the 3dfx!
MacCorMac
Lord Gek wrote:
snip
>I've heard that there is going to be a universal drop in Intelchip
>prices sometime in August. Has it happened yet?
Hi Lord Gek
The price for my configured Gateway PPro dropped from $3429 (USD) to
$2944 about 10 days ago. I don't know if this is the price drop you
refer to. Their P5-200 dropped from $3019 to $2874, and their P5-166
dropped from $2919 to $2639 (all the same configurations except 256K
cache on the PPRo vs 512K on the P5's).
I believe Gateway (and others) still has the "if the price drops
within 30 days of purchase we refund the difference policy", so if that
wasn't the price drop you refer too...
>Another factor to consider...the infamous MMX chipsets which, from what
>I hear, will initially only be available for P5 boards with
>the P6 equivalents coming quite sometime later.
I've heard that, and also heard there won't be a delay for the MMX
PPro, can someone clear this up for us?
>Being in the same situation as you do you think this MMX deal is big
>enough factor to be considered (it seems the Epic folk doing Unreal
>think it is)?
That's a tough one.
(To further complicate matters, I've heard that a third generation
chipset for the PPRo will be out in several months [unless I've
misunderstood], and that would be nice to wait for also.)
Someone suggested that it's better to not buy the first generation of
a technology (like MMX), wait for the inevitable improvements. So I'm
thinking: buy the PPRo now, wait for the second or third generation
version of MMX (and for faster PPro clock speeds's), then do a processor
(motherboard too?) upgrade.
If I could wait 6-9 months I would, but my 3 1/2+ year old 486-66v
really needs upgrading now. I guess the real question is "Can we wait
until after Christmas for a new system?"
MacCorMac (rend)
Peter Collins
>> You haven't done much research.
>
>> Most DOS games are 32-bit, have been for years. The Pro-200 is the fastest
>> PC game machine out now, period. And the P-200 is an absolute rip-off,
>> you're paying an exorbitant amount for a 10% speed increase over a P166.
>
>benchmark run on DOS games shows that the P-200 and Pro 200 are about
>the same. The Pro 200 isn't worth the difference in price if you want
>to run DOS games.
which major benchmarks? do they include the doom timedemo or quake
timerefresh?
where are the results of these tests?
+----------------------------------------------------------------------+
| Peter Collins email: coll...@ee.cit.ac.nz |
| call my raytracing home page at: http://www.ee.cit.ac.nz/~collinpe |
+----------------------------------------------------------------------+
Lord Gek
In article <320D6F...@iastste.edu>, jbb...@iastste.edu says...
>I'd also like to thank all those posting to this thread. I'm trying to
>decide whether to get a P5 or PPro, and you've all offered a lot of good
>info here.
>
>Looks like the PRo is the way to go, especially since the price spread is
>approx $100 and dropping (for my Gateway configuration, anyway).
I've heard that there is going to be a universal drop in Intel chip prices sometime in
August. Has it happened yet? Another factor to consider...the infamous MMX
chipsets which, from what I hear, will initially only be available for P5 boards with
the P6 equivalents coming quite sometime later. Being in the same situation as you
do you think this MMX deal is big enough factor to be considered (it seems the
Epic folk doing Unreal think it is)?
Whatcha folk think?
Tim "Lord Gek" Jordan
Brad McQuaid
: >then a PPRO will blow the socks off a Pentium.
: Actually, they don't. For example, Quake uses HEAVY floating point, yet PPro
: 200s don't do much better than Pentium 200s. They do tend to do somewhat
: better, but the Quake Framerate page shows the differences as very small.
I don't know on what planet this was, but here on earth the ppro 200
gets over twice the frame rate on quake vs. a p133. Now, I haven't
tested a p200, but given only 66 more mhz, I sincerely doubt the
p200 gets over twice the frame rate on quake vs a p133. Quake
is a 32bit game, and a ppro 200 runs 32 bit apps waaaaaaaay faster
than a p200.
I ran quake on both a pentium-133 and a pentium pro 200, same
video card, in vid_mode 12 (640x480) and got over TWICE the frame
rate.
Please note that with a ppro, you need to run a program called
fastvid in your autoexec.bat file in order to turn on fast
video ram read/writes. (I imagine this will be fixed once Windows 95
detects a ppro -- it thinks it's a pentium now). Not running this program
may be why some tests show dos games not quite as awesome as one would expect
on a ppro. Before running fastvid.exe I get around 24 MB/s
video read/writes, whereas after I get over 80 MB/s.
-Brad
Kevin Bozman
:
:
: >Kurt Schwind (ksch...@dsu.seas.ucla.edu) wrote:
:
: >: Despite any 'subjective' tests you may have run, every major
: >: benchmark run on DOS games shows that the P-200 and Pro 200 are about
: >: the same. The Pro 200 isn't worth the difference in price if you want
: >: to run DOS games.
: >Well, those 'major benchmarks' were not that major then!
:
: >then a PPRO will blow the socks off a Pentium.
:
: Actually, they don't. For example, Quake uses HEAVY floating point, yet PPro
: 200s don't do much better than Pentium 200s. They do tend to do somewhat
: course, from most places a P200 chip is actually just as or MORE expensive
: than a PPro 200, so you might as well get the Pro even though performance
: probably won't improve much.
I thought Quake's problem with the ppro was video writes, so
people should use "fastvid" (according to id) to correct this.
But I seem to recall the quake benchmark page myself, and most
were using fastvid, werent they?
Chris
:
: >If you want fast games... do not concentrate on the CPU too much.
: >THE bottleneck in hi-res games is the videoram.
: >If you play at 1024x768, then going from video DRAM to
: >video VRAM can tripple perfomances!
:
: Or better yet, get an ET6000 based card with MDRAM (fastest DOS video on the
: planet). They cost around 200 dollars, and blow away EVERYTHING ever created
: as far as DOS performance goes (they even outperform the Millennium, though
: not by a huge amount).
:
: Then, some time later this year or next year, get an Orchid Righteous 3D to
:
:
Chris Mangiarelli
On Sat, 10 Aug 1996, Rick Huber wrote:
->2) Intel is trying to move from the .25 micron tecnology to a
->.18 micron technology, or less! (This is 'wire' width connecting
->each transistor in the processor). To create a faster/better
->processor this is very nessessary or the CPU size and heat
->managment become a problem. This jump in technology was still in
->the works when the spokesperson from Intel was at our meeting.
On 10 Aug 1996, Dave Glue wrote:
->> 2) Intel is trying to move from the .25 micron tecnology to a
->> .18 micron technology, or less!
->"From"? Intel has no processors on .28 technology, let alone .25. Are you
->sure this guy was from Intel? :)
Last I read, Intel operates on a .30 micron silicon based medium.
.30 Micron is not small enough for the increased demand on processor's.
AMD has been operating on .25 micron for years now, and my guess is that
they will be ever increasing their technology in this area. AMD has
always been further advanced than Intel in the silicon department.
Unfortunately for AMD, they have yet to provide an alternative to Intel's
Pentium and Pro. Their K5 has not yet been fully developed and they have
yet to offer higher speeds in these processor's. AMD has the technology,
but Intel has the processing design.
->3) Intel is doing joint work with HP. The idea here is to merge
->the CISC and the RISC architectures into one. The P7 was to be a
->stepping stone in this direction, but was not (at the time) slated
->to be released to the public. The idea was to release a second
->generation of the merged chip that was by that time well tested
->and confirmed as a viable product for the PC market.
Umm, AMD has already developed an CISC and RISC merged processor, it's
called the K5. It operates basically on a RISC core with a translation of
CISC to RISC instructions from program call execution.
->4) It was perceived that when the Pro hit the markets, at the time
->the Pro had not been released yet, it could easily provide the
->performance and results that the business and personal PC world
->was screaming for. NT was suppose to have hit the market at the
->same time that a machine of the Pro's calibur was to be released.
->The Pentium (P5) was a let down to Microsoft. It was also perceived
->at the time that with multiple processor Motherboards for the Pro
->family, there would be no problem with speed in the PC for the next
->couple years. Thus giving Intel time to design and perfect their
->upcomming processors.
Well, if AMD was able to develop their K5 faster and perfect it sooner,
the k5 would have blown away the p5 and p6 simply because of it's risc
architecture and quad pipeline. But they weren't, so Intel still has the
handle on advanced processors.
->Hope this was useful in some way...
->Rick H.
Like the other guy mentioned, intel has been behind in silicon technology
for quite some time. They have a fairly good design team, but their
silicon etching and manufacturing needs to be improved. AMD is quite the
opposite, they have superior manufacturing capabilities, but their design
team is too slow to keep up with intel's time frame for developing new
processors.
***---***---***---***---***---***---***---***---***---***---***---***
Christopher A. Mangiarelli * Email : c...@wpi.edu
Electrical & Computer Engineering * http://modoc.wpi.edu/cam/
WPI College Computer Center - PC Network Support Supervisor
***---***---***---***---***---***---***---***---***---***---***---***
"We Watch The Children Pray...Save Us God Today...Come Whatever May!"
M Childe
It was kinda getting dull to read your posts about Pentium Pro
vs Pentium stuff, but it'd be cool if you'd transfer your discussion
to email mode or in a hardware newsgroup. No offence
intended, tho'.
Thanks
Rico Laguna
cnei...@catya.demon.co.uk (M Childe) wrote:
>It was kinda getting dull to read your posts about Pentium Pro
>vs Pentium stuff, but it'd be cool if you'd transfer your discussion
>to email mode or in a hardware newsgroup. No offence
>intended, tho'.
Actually, Jerky, I found your post rather dull...Im very intersted in
these threads since it will impact just about everything we discuss on
these newsgroups....btw no offence, either
just skip over this thread...its very easy
Kenneth Lamb
M Childe (cnei...@catya.demon.co.uk) wrote:
: It was kinda getting dull to read your posts about Pentium Pro
: vs Pentium stuff, but it'd be cool if you'd transfer your discussion
: to email mode or in a hardware newsgroup. No offence
: intended, tho'.
I disagree. I have been reading this thread in
comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.sports and I am glad that it was here, otherwise, I
would have missed it.
Here's my situation:
I can no longer hold on to my 486 dx4-100. It is time to upgrade.
After reading all the info in this thread, I have decided that
the Pentium Pro is the way to go. I heard a few people mention
benchmarks that might be a negative for the PPro, but I don't think I
read a single post from someone who has actually compared the two and
thought the Pentium 200 to be a better buy.
Now, what I need to know is, what do I need to look for in a
motherboard for the PPro?
What is the best chipset? How much cache do I need for 32 MB of
RAM (or is the on-chip cache all you need)? What features should I be
looking for? Who is a well-known maker? What should I be paying for one
of these?
I would appreaciate any help you guys could provide. Send
replies via post or e-mail.
Thanks.
--
--Ken
**********************************************************
* Ken Lamb *
* kl...@netcom.com <--Preferred e-mail address *
* kwl...@ccgate.hac.com <--Daytime e-mail address *
* kl...@cs.ucr.edu <--Old e-mail address *
**********************************************************
* *
* ___&___ *
* / \ "DOH! or donut. There is no try." *
* | | *
* ^^ (o) (o) *
* C ,---_ ) *
* | |,___| *
* | \__/ *
* /_______\ *
* /_______/ \ *
* *
**********************************************************
Hom...@heedila.com
>On Sat, 10 Aug 1996, Rick Huber wrote:
>->2) Intel is trying to move from the .25 micron tecnology to a
>->.18 micron technology, or less! (This is 'wire' width connecting
>->each transistor in the processor). To create a faster/better
>->processor this is very nessessary or the CPU size and heat
>->managment become a problem. This jump in technology was still in
>->the works when the spokesperson from Intel was at our meeting.
>On 10 Aug 1996, Dave Glue wrote:
>->> 2) Intel is trying to move from the .25 micron tecnology to a
>->> .18 micron technology, or less!
>->"From"? Intel has no processors on .28 technology, let alone .25. Are you
>->sure this guy was from Intel? :)
>Last I read, Intel operates on a .30 micron silicon based medium.
>.30 Micron is not small enough for the increased demand on processor's.
>AMD has been operating on .25 micron for years now, and my guess is that
>they will be ever increasing their technology in this area. AMD has
>always been further advanced than Intel in the silicon department.
>Unfortunately for AMD, they have yet to provide an alternative to Intel's
>Pentium and Pro. Their K5 has not yet been fully developed and they have
>yet to offer higher speeds in these processor's. AMD has the technology,
>but Intel has the processing design.
>-
>Like the other guy mentioned, intel has been behind in silicon technology
>for quite some time. They have a fairly good design team, but their
>silicon etching and manufacturing needs to be improved. AMD is quite the
>opposite, they have superior manufacturing capabilities, but their design
>team is too slow to keep up with intel's time frame for developing new
>processors.
Texas Instuments has developed finest silicon technology at .18
micron. I don't know if they plan on using this tech in a line of
chips or sell the tech to a major player like Intel, Cyrix, AMD...
Of course they all seem content with todays technology and
buffering(16k->32k) there current chips to squeeze more money out of
us than getting around to developing a chip that can handle real time,
hi res, Realistic, smoothassshit VR on your desktop at a consumer
price. Ahh...the day is coming <G> 10-20 years hmmm...at this rate
dunno.
Wilson Lee
I've heard rumors that there would be an MMX upgrade that would fit
over
the non-MMX P5 CPU. Any truth to that rumor?
Wilson
In <4umbaj$l...@news0-alterdial.uu.net> lor...@best.com (Lord Gek)
writes:
Markus W.J. Islinger
Kenneth Lamb wrote:
>
> M Childe (cnei...@catya.demon.co.uk) wrote:
> : It was kinda getting dull to read your posts about Pentium Pro
> : vs Pentium stuff, but it'd be cool if you'd transfer your discussion
> : to email mode or in a hardware newsgroup. No offence
> : intended, tho'.
>
> I disagree. I have been reading this thread in
> comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.sports and I am glad that it was here, otherwise, I
> would have missed it.
>
> Here's my situation:
>
> I can no longer hold on to my 486 dx4-100. It is time to upgrade.
> After reading all the info in this thread, I have decided that
> the Pentium Pro is the way to go. I heard a few people mention
> benchmarks that might be a negative for the PPro, but I don't think I
> read a single post from someone who has actually compared the two and
> thought the Pentium 200 to be a better buy.
> Now, what I need to know is, what do I need to look for in a
> motherboard for the PPro?
I agree. I also feel I should upgrade to a PPro instead of a Pentium.
The trouble is though to find the proper motherboard. AFAIK there is no
PPro motherboard yet that can compete with the Pentium motherboards in
PCI performance.
A recent review (8/96 issue of c't, a German magazine) showed, that the
best PPro boards were only able to transfer about 28 MB/s to a
ET6000 graphics card whereas a good Pentium board can reach up to 84 MB/s!
So I guess I should wait until there is a chipset which is optimised for
PCI performance or maybe until AGP appears (sometime next year, hopefully?).
Markus
--
"You may say I'm a dreamer but I'm not the only one" John Lennon
Markus Islinger CERN - European Laboratory for Particle Physics
Markus....@cern.ch Geneva, Switzerland
Ricardo Lopez
On Tue, 13 Aug 1996 04:31:41 GMT, Kenneth Lamb <kl...@netcom.com> wrote:
: M Childe (cnei...@catya.demon.co.uk) wrote:
: : It was kinda getting dull to read your posts about Pentium Pro
: : vs Pentium stuff, but it'd be cool if you'd transfer your discussion
: : to email mode or in a hardware newsgroup. No offence
: : intended, tho'.
:
: I disagree. I have been reading this thread in
: comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.sports and I am glad that it was here, otherwise, I
: would have missed it.
I personally don't have an opinion on whether or not this thread belongs
here, but if you start following the hardware groups (motherboards, etc.)
you will get a much better idea of whether or not to go with the
ppro.
Just my .02. Those groups helps me immensely when I upgraded my
motherboard/video/soundcard not too long ago.
--
|---------------------------------------------------------------------|
|HOMEPAGE: --> http://www.ifp.uiuc.edu/~rlopez |
|University of Illinois Beckman Institute|
|---------------------------------------------------------------------|
Rico Laguna
Perhaps
"Markus W.J. Islinger" <isli...@sunrans.cern.ch> wrote:
>Kenneth Lamb wrote:
>>
>> M Childe (cnei...@catya.demon.co.uk) wrote:
>> : It was kinda getting dull to read your posts about Pentium Pro
>> : vs Pentium stuff, but it'd be cool if you'd transfer your discussion
>> : to email mode or in a hardware newsgroup. No offence
>> : intended, tho'.
>>
>> I disagree. I have been reading this thread in
>> comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.sports and I am glad that it was here, otherwise, I
>> would have missed it.
>>
buck...@best.com
>I paid less for my PPro than most 166 packages out in
>the national computer stores. I had mine built, which,
>by the way, is what I HIGHLY recommend.
AGREED WHOLE HEARTEDLY!
I will never
>buy another "name" brand computer after what I went
>through with my NEC 9617 133. It suxs trying to get
>things to work with these "proprietary" (sp?) deals.
>I recommend that anyone interested find a "guru" in
>his or her local area the build/assembles machines.
>Sometimes these folks are in a store front, sometimes
>out of their garages. But I would HIGHLY recommend
>that you custom build any new machine. Get the
>components that you want, EXACTLY, and have the
>flexibility to add or change as you wish.
Man..couldn't have said it better myself!!! I look at the prices of
full package computes, and then compare what it would cost me to build
my own from pieces. Well, the story goes, about 6 years ago, to 3
years ago it used to be cheaper to build your own system than buy a
whole complete one. Then, the tides turned. It started getting cheaper
to buy a complete system, with software installed, than to piece one
together. Now, the tides have turned again! With memory and hard
drives being so cheap these days, you can't beat it. While most
complete systems have not reflected the price drop in memory and hard
drives/mass storage, buying pieces and building it yourself, or have
someone do it for you is much cheaper. For instance, an average price
of a p5-133, 16MB ram, 1MB SVGA card, 1.6GB HD, mid-tower case,
keyboard, mouse, 15" SVGA monitor will cost around $2000, maybe a
little more or less depending on where you shop. Note however that
that entire system may only have 1 or 2 "decent" quality parts, the
rest being cheap parts to make a complete system. Oh..I left out the
soundcard and modem. Sorry. So, I just recently bought my new p5-100
system in pieces. I bought a ASUS p5t motherboard, which supports up
to a p5-200 with Socket 7, has Intel's 430HX chipset, PnP, 256MB RAM,
1MB cache, 3 ISA 3 PCI, onboard flppy/harddrive/printer I/O, and more
for $180. I bought the p5-100 chip for $120. I bought 2 16MB EDO ram
chips for $110 each, total $220. I bought a 15" SVGA monitor for $300,
1280x1024 NI .28, I got the full-tower for $55, got the 1.2GB hd for
$190, got the MS keyboard for $55, got the 1MB PCI video card for $55.
Got the SB 16 PnP for $80. Got the USR WinModem ( 28.8 upgradable to
33.6 via software download patch ) for $145. So total is $1400. With
all that I got top of the line parts, not cheap crap. ASUS is one of
the best mother/boards you can buy, and let me tell you a little
storry. This is no lie. I bought a cheap $150 mother/board that fit up
to a p5-133, without the HX chipset, and I bought a p5-133 chip. The
p5-133 chip ran about a 26 on Norton, as well as comparable on other
tests. I was pissed when I heard my buddies p120 was running faster.
So, I took it back and said to hell with it. I had a p75 from a friend
for free, so I figured I would use that to get by and spend the extra
dough on good parts. I spent $30 more and got the ASUS, and bought a
few other stuff ( SCSI STUFF ). In total I saved $250 for the p5-133
chip, which I spent on the SCSI stuff. I spent $30 more for a
name-brand top of the line mother/board. I kid you not when I tell you
the p5-75 on the ASUS mother/board pulled in at 22.5 on the NORTON
test. There average P90 test showed 20.7. My p75 on this mother/board
was pulling 22.5, 2 points faster!. And only 4 points slower than a
p133 on a crap mother/board, that cost only $30 less than the top of
the line.
Well, what I am getting at is what the other guy said. You can have
a system built for much less, and at the same time get a much better
top of the line system. For me, I don't need a name brand monitor. Any
SVGA 14" or 15" monitor will do. Monitors have never really dropped in
price, so those aren't very cost effective to compare. But the
majority of other components are. I would get the SoundBlaster 16 over
cheap $40 generic soundcards because you are at least guaranteed game
and multimedia compatibility with the SoundBlaster. Other cards are
always seeming to have problems. The modem, well, USR is the best,
hands down! Hayes and Motorolla are great, but they are not as good as
USR. So get yourself a WinModem. After all, unless you play networking
DOS games, the WinModem has a free downloadable patch that puts it up
to a 33.6 modem, and it is only $145, if not less by now. I bought
mine 3 months ago. Also, p5-133 chips were about $250 or so last I
checked. I bought that one for $307, minus the amount I saved on a
return, so it only cost me $250. But they should be right around that
price now. I know p75 are like $90 now, and p100 aren't much farther
behind. Anyways..if you live in the San Francisco Bay Area, and need a
system built, I am happy to build one for a mere $100 or so. You can
come with me to get all the parts, you keep all the receipts, and I
will build it there with you and show you how some of it is done.
Email me if you are interested.
buck...@best.com
Gregory T Cato <ca...@andrew.cmu.edu> wrote:
>Excerpts from netnews.comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.rpg: 7-Aug-96 Re: Pentium
>Pro vs. Pentium.. by Kurt Sch...@dsu.seas.uc
>> Despite any 'subjective' tests you may have run, every major
>> benchmark run on DOS games shows that the P-200 and Pro 200 are about
>> the same. The Pro 200 isn't worth the difference in price if you want
>> to run DOS games.
>Ok, for 16 bit games, they are about the same. For 32, the Pro blows the
>p5 out of the water. And last time I checked, the Pro was cheaper than
>the p5.
Not exactly. The Pro mother/board and chip are about $300 more than a
p166. Personally, the p200 is a waste. You get on average 5% increase
in performance. From what I have seen on a few friends ppros and
p5-166 and 200 machines, the ppro is about the same on 16-bit games as
a p200, but on win95 and NT stuff..it smokes them all to hell. What
will really set them apart is when winNt 4.0 comes out and is able to
play win95 games and apps. Then, you can run winNT 4.0 on a dual or
quad PPro mother/board system. Get yourself 4 PPro 200 chips running
with winNT 4.0 and you are looking at damn near SGI power for much
much less!
>Greg
buck...@best.com
Man..I can really appreciate what you just said. I went from a 386 25,
to a 486 33, to a 486 66, to a dx5-133, to a p5-75, to a p5-133, to a
p5-100 ( got the p5-100 chip for $25 from a friend ). I am presently
staying at the p5-100, cause I am now getting married in a year and
have to save $10,000 for that, which is impossible. If I could do it
all over, I would buy a dual-ppro 200 system with winNT. I don't play
DOS games too often, and as fast as a PPro 200 is, I am sure it will
play DOS games much faster than my current p5-100, so I wouldn't
complain there.
But what really struck me funny is when you said you want faster now.
I find myself always ALWAYS wanting more speed. Sure, ATF ( game ),
WC II, and the likes all play pretty damn smoothly now, with fast
smooth hi-res graphics and sound. But, as a programmer, I want much
more compiling speed. I want my 500,000 lines of code compiled in 5
seconds, not 35 minutes! I want full screen full-motion 1600x1200 in
24-bit color games with full surround sound, thumping bass, and a ppro
200 under winNT ( 2 p200's ) will do that for me! My p5-100 will cry
to me instead. :) I did all that computer transition inside of 1
year. So you can imagine going from a 386 25 a year ago, to what I
have now, a p5-100 is a VERY big jump for me. I can actually render a
3d image in LightWave or TrueSpace 3D in a few seconds now, and it
looks good in 24-bit color. Before, I had to use 8-bit color, and it
took a few minutes! However, I am sure LightWave or 3D Studio would
absolutley FLY using a dual or even quad ppro 200 system with winNT
4.0! Hell, being that ToyStory was done on SGI computers ( well, what
ever they were..can't remember ), having a quad pro200 would be pretty
damn close to one of theres! Even so, I don't have 2 years to spend
rendeirng a 1 hour animated film! ;) Plus, I am no artist. But you get
my drift!
Dan Mize
I LIVE IN VA BEACH AREA WANT A PARTNER TO PLAY MODEM GAMES...
DOOM2 , WARCRAFT2 OR WHATEVER ELSE...
DAN
Brad McQuaid
Markus W.J. Islinger (isli...@sunrans.cern.ch) wrote:
: I agree. I also feel I should upgrade to a PPro instead of a Pentium.
: The trouble is though to find the proper motherboard. AFAIK there is no
: PPro motherboard yet that can compete with the Pentium motherboards in
: PCI performance.
: A recent review (8/96 issue of c't, a German magazine) showed, that the
: best PPro boards were only able to transfer about 28 MB/s to a
: ET6000 graphics card whereas a good Pentium board can reach up to 84 MB/s!
: So I guess I should wait until there is a chipset which is optimised for
: PCI performance or maybe until AGP appears (sometime next year, hopefully?).
Yout gotta run fastvid. Without fastvid my ppro 200 does about 24 mb/s
to my matrox mellenium. With fastvid, I am getting around 82-84 mb/s.
Apparently, just as good as the best pentium boards, according to you.
So couple comperable video read/writes, a long with integer and fp
performance that smokes a pentium, and very obviously ppro is the
way to go.
-Brad
Kin Chu
In article <4uhgvu$g...@optional.cts.com>,
Brad McQuaid <bmcq...@cts.com> wrote:
>MN Paul (pa...@pclink.com) wrote:
>: Windows 95 and its apps run on a 200 MHz pentium pro about as fast as
>: they would on a 133 MHz Pentium. IN GENERAL.
>
I bet you are comparing the 150 mhz pentium pro to a pentium 133. With
the slow memory or pci bus that 150 mhz pentium pro has! Its performance
under Win95 is about the same as 133 pentium. However, due to the
incrediable clock speed of a 200 mhz pentium pro, it can blow past a pentium
166, too! The fact is the ZD CPUMARK16 gave me the idea that 200 ppro
is still great under Dos and Win95 with a price that's a little bit more
than a really expensive pentium 200!
Lord Gek
>Yout gotta run fastvid. Without fastvid my ppro 200 does about 24 mb/s
>to my matrox mellenium. With fastvid, I am getting around 82-84 mb/s.
>Apparently, just as good as the best pentium boards, according to you.
>So couple comperable video read/writes, a long with integer and fp
>performance that smokes a pentium, and very obviously ppro is the
>way to go.
>
>-Brad
Pardon my ignorance, Brad, but what is fastvid? A commercial software
product, a setting in the PPRO 200 CMOS or what?
Thanks in advance,
Tim "Lord Gek" Jordan
Dennis joris
Hi,
What's all this talk about MMX Pentium Pro's being faster??
I tought that the MMX part of the processor were extra
instructions for the CPU. Now how can a program that doesn't
use those instructions be faster? (exept for the increase in
1st level cache).
-Dennis.
-------------------------------------------------------------
E-mail: g...@iaehv.nl
home: http://www.iaehv.nl/users/gto
-------------------------------------------------------------
Peter Christopher Evans
Excerpts from netnews.comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.strategic: 14-Aug-96 Re:
Pentium Pro vs. Pentium.. by Brad McQ...@cts.com
> to my matrox mellenium. With fastvid, I am getting around 82-84 mb/s.
> Apparently, just as good as the best pentium boards, according to you.
> So couple comperable video read/writes, a long with integer and fp
> performance that smokes a pentium, and very obviously ppro is the
> way to go.
Thanks,
Pete
J. Tige Richardson
> I agree. I also feel I should upgrade to a PPro instead of a Pentium.
> The trouble is though to find the proper motherboard. AFAIK there is no
> PPro motherboard yet that can compete with the Pentium motherboards in
> PCI performance.
> A recent review (8/96 issue of c't, a German magazine) showed, that the
> best PPro boards were only able to transfer about 28 MB/s to a
> ET6000 graphics card whereas a good Pentium board can reach up to 84
MB/s!
> So I guess I should wait until there is a chipset which is optimised for
> PCI performance or maybe until AGP appears (sometime next year,
hopefully?).
In response to your concern over the PCI bus: If you run a program called
FASTVID you can overcome any performance problems on the Pentium Pro.
Tige
Brad McQuaid
Lord Gek (lor...@best.com) wrote:
: >Yout gotta run fastvid. Without fastvid my ppro 200 does about 24 mb/s
: >to my matrox mellenium. With fastvid, I am getting around 82-84 mb/s.
: >Apparently, just as good as the best pentium boards, according to you.
: >So couple comperable video read/writes, a long with integer and fp
: >performance that smokes a pentium, and very obviously ppro is the
: >way to go.
: >-Brad
: Pardon my ignorance, Brad, but what is fastvid? A commercial software
: product, a setting in the PPRO 200 CMOS or what?
Fastvid is a free distrbutable program by John Hinkley. It turns
on write posting, banked VGA write combining, SVGA linear frame
buffer write combining, etc. on the ppro motherboard.
Not being a video guru, I cannot explain this in laymans terms :),
but the end result is a change from 24mb/s video read/writes to
about 84mb/s.
You just put it in your autoexec.bat file and go from there. Helps
both dos games and win95 games.
Please email the author for more info: John Hinkley
72466...@compuserve.com
-Brad
Smoke Crack and Worship Satan
In article <4m4a5ha00...@andrew.cmu.edu>, Peter Christopher Evans
<pe...@andrew.cmu.edu> wrote:
Here is the info from Quake's TECHINFO.TXT file. I know this is required on
older (Orion motherboard) P6 machines, but does it apply to newer (Natoma
motherboard) machines as well? Any P6 owners care to comment?
Pentium Pro Performance
-----------------------
The Pentium Pro is a very fast Quake platform, but has one weak spot;
it is
by default very slow on writes to video memory. This means that in
default
hardware configurations, you are usually much better off setting
vid_nopageflip to 1 if you use VESA modes, so drawing is done to
system
memory instead of to video memory. Remember that you must set the
mode
after setting vid_nopageflip to 1 in order to get vid_nopageflip to
take
effect. (vid_nopageflip can sometimes be faster on a Pentium, too,
but
not by nearly as much in general, and it's often slower.)
The Pentium Pro has some special features that are not turned on by
default,
but which can help Quake performance a LOT. These features can be
enabled
by John Hinkley's program FASTVID, which can be obtained from
ftp://members.aol.com/JHinkley/fastvid.zip. Performance in 640x480
mode on a Pentium Pro/150 nearly doubled after FASTVID was run; Quake
was very playable (and looked great!) at this resolution.
There's the usual caution with FASTVID: It could conceivably make
your
system run goofily, or who knows what. FASTVID is not a product of
id Software, and id makes no guarantees regarding FASTVID. In other
words,
use FASTVID at your own risk.
> Excerpts from netnews.comp.sys.ibm.pc.games.strategic: 14-Aug-96 Re:
> Pentium Pro vs. Pentium.. by Brad McQ...@cts.com
> > Yout gotta run fastvid. Without fastvid my ppro 200 does about 24 mb/s
> > to my matrox mellenium. With fastvid, I am getting around 82-84 mb/s.
> > Apparently, just as good as the best pentium boards, according to you.
> > So couple comperable video read/writes, a long with integer and fp
> > performance that smokes a pentium, and very obviously ppro is the
> > way to go.
Jason Spangler
buck...@best.com (buck...@best.com) wrote:
: absolutley FLY using a dual or even quad ppro 200 system with winNT
: 4.0! Hell, being that ToyStory was done on SGI computers ( well, what
: ever they were..can't remember ), having a quad pro200 would be pretty
: damn close to one of theres! Even so, I don't have 2 years to spend
: rendeirng a 1 hour animated film! ;) Plus, I am no artist. But you get
: my drift!
I have a vague memory of reading an article saying that Toy Story was
rendered using a network of Sun systems and a rendering system that
distributed the work between the systems.
--
______________________________________________________________________
Jason Spangler http://purl.oclc.org/NET/JasonSpangler/Home
Awaiting Ultima Online... jas...@usemail.com
Jacob Daniel Walter
buck...@best.com (buck...@best.com) wrote:
: >I paid less for my PPro than most 166 packages out in
: >by the way, is what I HIGHLY recommend.
: AGREED WHOLE HEARTEDLY!
: I will never
: >buy another "name" brand computer after what I went
: >through with my NEC 9617 133. It suxs trying to get
: >things to work with these "proprietary" (sp?) deals.
: >I recommend that anyone interested find a "guru" in
: >his or her local area the build/assembles machines.
: >Sometimes these folks are in a store front, sometimes
: >out of their garages. But I would HIGHLY recommend
: >that you custom build any new machine. Get the
: >components that you want, EXACTLY, and have the
: >flexibility to add or change as you wish.
-cut-
: behind. Anyways..if you live in the San Francisco Bay Area, and need a
: system built, I am happy to build one for a mere $100 or so. You can
: come with me to get all the parts, you keep all the receipts, and I
: will build it there with you and show you how some of it is done.
: Email me if you are interested.
OK, no offense to you buckweet, but I think I need to add a footnote
here. Make sure you know EXACTLY what you are doing if you opt for this
option. Otherwise you could get screwed in a big way. I bought my
computer a couple of years ago and had it custom built. Well, it was my
first one, and I had no idea what I was doing. It turned out that I
believed the guy who sold it to me when he said I really didn't need a
better motherboard than was put into it. Since then, I have had problems
the biggest of which is that my soundcard (an SB16 or an SB32, which I
was able to return) does not work with my motherboard. So, as they say
'Buyer beware'. 'nuff said. Again, no offense buckweet.
Jake
--
******************************************************************************
"If Jesus came back to earth today and found out that Pat Robertson was
his spokesman, 42% of all americans believe we'd all be in big trouble"
-TV Nation Poll
******************************************************************************
Jake Walter: ja...@gwis2.circ.gwu.edu
******************************************************************************
THIS SPACE FOR RENT (just as long as the ad does not include the words
make, money, or fast).
J.A.Jones
Dennis joris <g...@IAEhv.nl> wrote in article <4ut7up$6...@news.IAEhv.nl>...
__
J.A.Jones
rlj...@sprynet.com
Michael Lewchuk
I've spent a bit of time browsing Intel's web site. There are a few things
to watch for over the next year or so:
* 512k cache Pentium Pros - double the L2 cache for faster performance
* The next Pentium Pro chipset
* AGP graphics bus (your peripherals will still be PCI or ISA).
* And the well advertised MMX instruction set.
By the time MMX comes out, and down to a reasonable price level, you may find
yourself getting a better CPU and motherboard in addition to MMX.
From what I read, I expect all of them to be in full production by Christmas 97.
"That's almost a year and a half from now!" you say. Well, yes, but that's
volume production. I think they're planning to push Pentiums out the door
by Christmas 97, but that's just speculation. Anyways, look for all these
things appearing in systems over 1997, with the exception of 512k cache, which
should appear in systems some time this year. Personally I'll be waiting until
next year to buy, because frankly I'm still satisfied with this old 486 with
the old 15" monitor (which has the display area of today's 14" monitors), the
9-pin dot matrix printer, and the 2xCD. :)
Btw, with all the talk about which monitor to buy, I find it very interesting
that Pentium Pros are pushing graphics to its limits. With the new graphics
bus it may be that even 1024x768 SVGA can be done so quickly that we'll move to
a new graphics standard, perhaps 2048x1536.
Btw, anyone know where I can find a FAQ/walkthru for the missions in Mech2?
Michael Lewchuk
lew...@cs.UAlberta.CA
Dave Glue
Michael Lewchuk <lew...@cs.ualberta.ca> wrote in article
<4v34cf$8...@scapa.cs.ualberta.ca>...
>
> I've spent a bit of time browsing Intel's web site. There are a few things
> to watch for over the next year or so:
> * 512k cache Pentium Pros - double the L2 cache for faster performance
Irrelevant to 95% of users. It provides a very minimal benefit for a much
larger cost, it's purpose is for heavy multiprocessing systems (4+ chips) where
the cache's can become cramped. Regardless, Intel is moving towards Pro's with
an external cache.
> * The next Pentium Pro chipset
Yeah, one where we didn't need a third party hack that only works under DOS to
get Pentium PCI speeds would be nice. I guess third time's a charm for Intel.
> * AGP graphics bus (your peripherals will still be PCI or ISA).
This indeed looks interesting.
> * And the well advertised MMX instruction set.
> By the time MMX comes out, and down to a reasonable price level,
MMX CPU's add virtually nothing to the cost. The first ones I think will be on
a .28 process, and early price's I've heard indicate they will be substantially
cheaper than today's Pentiums (regular Pentiums of course will drop down in
price). MMX Pentiums will _not_ be high-level items.
> From what I read, I expect all of them to be in full production by Christmas
97.
512k Pro's already exist now, you don't find them in systems because they
simply add little benefit to single/dual processing machines. MMX chips are
ready now, but Intel is waiting to satisfy complaints from OEM's that it has
too many CPU variants in the channels- they will be released first quarter '97.
You'll have to wait until the end of '97 for AGP, probably mid '97 for the
next Pro chipset, although it might accompany the Klamath (early '97 as well).
> Btw, with all the talk about which monitor to buy, I find it very interesting
> that Pentium Pros are pushing graphics to its limits. With the new graphics
> bus it may be that even 1024x768 SVGA can be done so quickly that we'll move
to
> a new graphics standard, perhaps 2048x1536.
Sure, when some new monitor technology is invented. Monitor prices have
remained at virtually a standstill, a 17" monitor is by far the most expensive
component on most systems.
Brad McQuaid
Dave Glue (dav...@interlog.com) wrote:
: > * The next Pentium Pro chipset
: Yeah, one where we didn't need a third party hack that only works under DOS to
: get Pentium PCI speeds would be nice. I guess third time's a charm for Intel.
if the third party hack you refer to is fasvid, it works under dos and
windows 95. It very much accelerates win95 games.
-Brad
Iikka Paavolainen
Brad McQuaid <bmcq...@cts.com> wrote in article
<4v589o$b...@optional.cts.com>...
Where could I obtain this hack?
Your Name
In article <320C3B...@pacific.sdsu.edu>, rhu...@pacific.sdsu.edu says...
<snip>
>3) Intel is doing joint work with HP. The idea here is to merge
>the CISC and the RISC architectures into one. The P7 was to be a
>stepping stone in this direction, but was not (at the time) slated
>to be released to the public. The idea was to release a second
>generation of the merged chip that was by that time well tested
>and confirmed as a viable product for the PC market.
>Hope this was useful in some way...
<snip>
>Rick H.
I am not sure what you mean when you say that HP and Intel want to
merge CISC and RISC technologies into the P7. CISC, Complex Instruction
Set Computers, typically have fewer registers and more machine level
instructions whereas RISC, Reduced Instruction Set Computers, typically
have more registers and fewer, simpler instructions.
I have heard that the Pentium is a kind of hybrid. It is actually a RISC
based architecture, but it has a component that allows CISC instructions
to be translated into RISC ones.
This is all what I heard in a class, and could be wrong.
Regards,
Dan Cieslak
Chris Mangiarelli
On 23 Aug 1996, Your Name wrote:
->>Rick H.
->I have heard that the Pentium is a kind of hybrid. It is actually a RISC
->based architecture, but it has a component that allows CISC instructions
->to be translated into RISC ones.
->This is all what I heard in a class, and could be wrong.
->Regards,
->Dan Cieslak
To my knowledge, the Pentium does not have this ability. AMD was first to
introduce this concept into their K5, a RISC core, with a CISC conversion
routine on top of the core. Unfortunately for AMD, the K5 is behind in
production.
Then again, I've kept up on the K5 progress, I'm not as interested in the
P5 as it's design is inferior in nature to the K5.
***---***---***---***---***---***---***---***---***---***---***---***
Christopher A. Mangiarelli * Email : c...@wpi.edu
Electrical & Computer Engineering * http://modoc.wpi.edu/cam/
WPI College Computer Center - PC Network Support Supervisor
***---***---***---***---***---***---***---***---***---***---***---***
"We Watch The Children Pray...Save Us God Today...Come Whatever May!"
Ahmad Bahbahani
On 20 Aug 1996 21:58:38 GMT, "Iikka Paavolainen" <ipaa...@cc.hut.fi>
wrote:
>
>Brad McQuaid <bmcq...@cts.com> wrote in article
><4v589o$b...@optional.cts.com>...
>> Dave Glue (dav...@interlog.com) wrote:
>> : > * The next Pentium Pro chipset
>>
>> : Yeah, one where we didn't need a third party hack that only works under
>DOS to
>> if the third party hack you refer to is fasvid, it works under dos and
>> windows 95. It very much accelerates win95 games.
>
>Where could I obtain this hack?
>
What hack are you guys talking about??
BosHab
c...@concentric.net
Does fastvid make permanent changes, or do you need to run it each
time?
cmg
Mark Green <Ma...@antelope.demon.co.uk> wrote:
> Firstly, stuff that is written for the PPro (and I bet there'll be some
>soon) won't need it.
> FASTVID is a little patch, available from members.aol.com, which flicks
>on a few bits on the PPro to get it to use interface acceleration stuff that's
>turned off by default. (Contrary to the above, it's not really a hack; it's
>just a bit of processor configuration.) Yes, it helps a lot. Double speed
>for Quake.
>Mg
>--
JEB
c...@concentric.net wrote:
>
> Does fastvid make permanent changes, or do you need to run it each
> time?
>
> cmg
>
>
machine for that session. If you don't reboot or otherwise switch, it
would persist. If, like myself, you switch from DOS to Win95 a lot,
and do a lot of rebooting then you will need to "throw the switches"
again.
I use FASTVID as an "on demand" type switcher. I do NOT use it in
some cases, for example, I run WARCRAFT II from DOS and do NOT
envoke FASTVID when running that game. It doesn't need it, so it
is not necessary to "throw the switches". In a case like QUAKE, or
some "frame rate" heavy game/sim, I load FASTVID as part of the
"autoexec" for that "boot", or I just include it in the 'bat' file
that loads the game/sim.
It is simply a switch that turns or, or off for that matter, the
settings "in" or "on" the chip, or CPU, or whatever makes the
PPro work.
It DOES have a dramatic effect on the machine, however, it makes
an already very fast machine, somewhat unbelievably fast in some
cases/uses.
Hope this explains some of the mystery about FASTVID.
BTW, it is one of the most useful and transparent utilities
that I've ever encountered. It doesn't seem to "reside"
anywhere, it just throws the switches, apparently, and that's
it.
For PPro owners it is "hardware" more than "software". I have
a copy of it "vaulted" and also store it in more than one location
on each of my drives...I don't want to be without my FASTVID..hehehehe
JEB
PS: Thanks to Mr. Hinkley for writing this fine tool, BTW.
Mark Green
michael legner
I will most certainly go for the P6 200, buying a Pentium (P5)
is a more mediocre solution (not to mention the "almost-stupid"
choice of a P5-200).
In Sweden computer prices are HIGH in comparison with the USA,
but still, the difference between P5 and P6 is small (even when
comparing m/b prices). I think I would feel less ripped off
if I bought a P6 instead of a P5.
Since I am going to play AH64D Longbow I was happy to read
how well your P6 scores on that one (you did mean this Longbow,
didn't you?)
Michael
PS. Thanks for the "real-world" numbers! DS
JEB (oz...@ix.netcom.com) wrote:
> Dave Glue wrote:
> >
> > Kurt Schwind <ksch...@dsu.seas.ucla.edu> wrote in article
> > <4u7t8h$g...@nntp2.backbone.olemiss.edu>...
> > > I've done some research into this myself as I'm in a similar
> > > situation. I've opted for the P-200 w/32M RAM instead of the P-200 Pro.
> > > The Pro doesn't handle 16bit as well as the Pentium. Since most of the
> > > games are going to play over DOS (and don't play well under WIN95, OS2 or
> > > WIN NT) I think that the P-200 is the better deal. Not to mention the
> > > price savings and the lack of field testing on the Pro machines.
> > > Hope this helps.
> >
> > You haven't done much research.
> >
> > Most DOS games are 32-bit, have been for years. The Pro-200 is the fastest
> > PC game machine out now, period. And the P-200 is an absolute rip-off,
> > you're paying an exorbitant amount for a 10% speed increase over a P166.
> I've developed a rather strange, and selfish, attitude about
> all these post about how the P6 "pro" 200 is a dog in dos.
> Now-a-days I don't even respond to these post much. In fact
> it's kinda like I get a sadistic enjoyment out of knowing
> that I've got a Pro, it is a screamer, witness the various
> "bench" test results:
> In LONGBOW...the Pro is "off the scale"...1000 in all of the
> tests and a total score of 1056...still can't figure out
> what the extra "56" is for...hehe
> In QUAKE...320x240...98.8 frames per second at the place
> that everybody uses to test the TIMEREFRESH...in SVGA
> 34 frames per second in the same place.
> In Gran Prix II, "GP2 LOG:ON" Processor score 379, no
> P5 has reported in above 300, Video score 606, no P5
> has reported in above 500!!!
> In CBench...VGA...342.9 rating...205.7 frames per second.
> (NO TYPO there)
> In CBench...SVGA...77.8 rating...46.2 frames per second.
> Monaco in GP2 at 23.6 frames per second...Processor
> Occupancy is 130% in the toughest part of the course.
> Most other parts it is below 100.
> There is NOTHING published in the last year, for sure,
> and I own almost everything that would be posted on
> here, and elsewhere, will NOT run on a "Pro".
> I've never seen anything run Win95 as fast and if
> they want a real thrill...hehehe, run NT.
> So, my strange attitude is that I enjoy having the
> fastest "gun" in the west and kinda hope they all
> get P5/200's. It's nice, after a year and a half
> of suffering with a 486DX4 100 and reading all the
> "Pentium" notes to be "on top" for a change. I like
> it and don't mind if the crowd up "here" is sparse.
> So I DO NOT recommend the "Pro"...hehehe
> Selfish, I know, but when one tries to "tell 'em",
> all we get is a bunch of out of date test results
> that applied to the early "steppings" and is NO
> longer valid at all.
> Tell 'em to buy the P5 200...hehehe
> JEB in Vegas
> oz...@ix.netcom.com
--
Michael Legner Tel: +46 13 18 55 64
Saab Military Aircraft Fax: +46 13 18 41 22
S-581 88 Linkoping, Sweden mi...@weald.air.saab.se
michael legner
No, it's like DOSKEY or any other program: the changes are lost
as power is lost. I guess a m/b with softpower would keep the
settings though (but then again you aren't rebooting that
computer, only putting it to sleep).
Btw, has anyone had the opportunity to try this "softpower" thing
in real life? Does it work well?
Michael
c...@concentric.net wrote:
> Does fastvid make permanent changes, or do you need to run it each
> time?
> cmg
...
The Lord Leto II
In article <32239460...@196.1.69.107> sa...@ncc.moc.kw (Ahmad Bahbahani) writes:
>On 20 Aug 1996 21:58:38 GMT, "Iikka Paavolainen" <ipaa...@cc.hut.fi>
>wrote:
>
>>
>>Brad McQuaid <bmcq...@cts.com> wrote in article
>><4v589o$b...@optional.cts.com>...
>>> Dave Glue (dav...@interlog.com) wrote:
>>> : > * The next Pentium Pro chipset
>>>
>>> : Yeah, one where we didn't need a third party hack that only works under
>>DOS to
>>> if the third party hack you refer to is fasvid, it works under dos and
>>> windows 95. It very much accelerates win95 games.
>>
>>Where could I obtain this hack?
>>
>
>What hack are you guys talking about??
FASTVID is a program for pentium pro's that speeds up the interface
to the video subsystem. Sorry, I don't know much more.
************ The Lord Leto II God Emperor of Arrakis *************
* You did one thing wrong * F--A--C--E * You woke up *
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