What's better: P4 3.0 on i865, or P4 2.8 on i875?

[Tim Borek]

I'm having a new Pentium 4-based NLE computer built. Would an 875 system with P4 2.8 GHz be any faster than an 865 system with P4 3.0 GHz? (Both CPUs feature Hyper Threading and 800 MHz frontside bus.) I'm thinking the lack of Performance Acceleration Technology (PAT) on the 865 motherboard offsets the slightly faster CPU so that one system wouldn't be noticeably faster than the other. Seems like six of one and a half-dozen of the other to me. Right?

I can get the 3.0 GHz P4 with 865-based motherboard for $55 less than the 2.8 P4 with 875-based motherboard. I know the 875 chipset is the latest and greatest, but is it really worth the extra $125 over an 865-based board?

[Tom DelRosario]

http://anandtech.com/chipsets/showdoc.html?i=1823

Above is a comparison between 875 and 865 chipsets. The 865 is about 2-5% slower. Since the CPU is about 7% faster, I'd say go for the 3.0GHz/865 over the 2.8GHz/875, especially since it is cheaper.

EDITed to make the link clickable.

[John Hartney]

I'm suprised there's such a large price disparity on the quote. There's only about a $20 differance in the boards and a $34 diff in the chips...

I like the 875 chipset and the p4 3.0 for price performance...

[Mike Rehmus]

There are some other pluses with the 875 chip having to do with next gen processors and some of the motherboard services IIRC. For example, on the Asus P4C800-E deluxe board, the Intel LAN can run at 1 Ghz and not interfere with editing. At least that's what I read somewhere in the literature.

Might want to read the info on the Intel site.

What is the quoted diff? $55 or $125?

[Glenn Chan]

1- You can enable PAT on non-Intel 865PE boards.
2- For Vegas, there is no measureable difference between PAT on and off. Memory timings also make no difference (PAT is kinda like a memory timing, where it lowers memory latency by a cycle or so).

2- You can overclock very mildly (10%-20%) and get "free" performance. I recommend you grab some artic silver 5 for ~$10 if you plan on doing this. It's takes extra time to stress test your system so the small performance bump may not be worth the time.

[Edward Natale]

I just recently (this weekend actually) upgraded my after effects system to a p4 2.8 ghz with 1 gig of memory. I ended up going with the 865pe chipset and I'm happy.

Also, make sure you get the processor with 1MB of cache vs 512kb. Supposedly it makes a difference. Also make sure your motherboard supports dual channel DDR. Supposedly that makes a difference as well.

She renders super fast now, although the system was upgraded from a lowly 600 mhz celeron, so anything seems fast to me.

And just in case you just have to know the inner most details of my life, I bought a p4 2.8ghz with 1 MB cache 800mhz bus, an MSI Mobo that supports dual channel DDR and serial ATA etc, 1 gb pc3200 kingston memory, and a new mid tower case for only $550 after tax and second day air shipping from newegg.com.

Eddie

[Tim Borek]

<<<-- Originally posted by John Hartney : I'm suprised there's such a large price disparity on the quote. There's only about a $20 differance in the boards and a $34 diff in the chips...

I like the 875 chipset and the p4 3.0 for price performance... -->>>

My shop charges $109 for the MSI 865-based motherboard, and $225 for the ASUS P4C800-E deluxe.

Both prices are high compared to NewEgg.com, etc., but labor is included. When working 40 hours a week at my day job and shooting three weddings per month in May and June, there's barely time for editing, so building and troubleshooting a new PC is out of the question right now.

[Tim Borek]

<<<-- Originally posted by Glenn Chan : 1- You can enable PAT on non-Intel 865PE boards.
2- For Vegas, there is no measureable difference between PAT on and off. Memory timings also make no difference (PAT is kinda like a memory timing, where it lowers memory latency by a cycle or so).

2- You can overclock very mildly (10%-20%) and get "free" performance. I recommend you grab some artic silver 5 for ~$10 if you plan on doing this. It's takes extra time to stress test your system so the small performance bump may not be worth the time. -->>>

Don't you mean 875 boards? I'm not aware of 865 boards that have PAT. Is this different from the Intel Application Accelerator?

[George Ellis]

PAT theoretically will give you 7%, but in reality, there are many 865 boards that keep up with 875 boards. I would go with a faster Prescott as NLEs have a direct benefit from the new processor (and are about the only thing that does clock for clock with the Northwood.)

PAT cannot be user enabled on an 865. That takes the board mfgr and Intel has tried to close that loophole. I think MSI had PAT enabled on one of their 865 mobos.

As for overclocking, I still have not seen a definitive guide to this, but MPEG encoding may suffer OOS problems because of mixed clock timings. I would not build a NLE machine with overclocking as a requirement.

Me, after ASUS came out with the PC-DL 875 based dual-Xeon, I am a ASUS fan. That board is about $210 at Newegg and supports 4 SATA, 2 Xeons to 3.2, and has ATA-100 and ATA-133 connections. Sweet - Duuuuddddeeee. But, I am waiting for Nacoma for the next system ;)

BTW, there are some special deals at Dell in the Small Business section. I would not buy an extra drive from them ($400 for a 250!), but their 3.06 4600 can be had at a song.

[Edward Natale]

<<<-- Originally posted by Tim Birej : When working 40 hours a week at my day job and shooting three weddings per month in May and June, there's barely time for editing, so building and troubleshooting a new PC is out of the question right now. -->>>

I hear that! I'll never forget the day that i first realized my hobby had become work.

Good luck with the new system.

Eddie

[Glenn Chan]

PAT theoretically will give you 7%, but in reality, there are many 865 boards that keep up with 875 boards.

Well the 7% figure is meaningless when you don't mention what the 7% applies to. For Vegas Vegas, I've tried PAT versus no PAT. PAT makes no measurable difference (assuming my Asus P4P800 865PE chipset motherboard can really enable PAT).

2- All the motherboard manufacturers cheat. I'm sure they all perform the same. A lot of the review sample motherboards are:
A- overclocked slightly. MSI boards have DOT, or dynamic overclocking technology which is even more of a cheat.
B- have special features to lower memory timings. If you don't know how to lower em yourself and test with memtest86, then you may consider this a feature and not a cheat. Memory timings happen to do nothing for Vegas, but do make a difference for other tasks.
When the motherboards have the same chipset, they are going to perform equal. However, the other parts of the motherboard are not the same and affect performance. These are the hard drive controllers, RAID controllers (BIG difference here), on-board sound, etc.

Many of the non-Intel 865PE can have PAT enabled. Well at least it used to be, I don't know if it's still happening. Intel took out PAT from the 865 chipsets but the manufacturers figured out how to enable PAT anyways.

I would go with a faster Prescott as NLEs have a direct benefit from the new processor (and are about the only thing that does clock for clock with the Northwood.)

I would go with the Canterwood processors instead of the Prescotts. Canterwoods are cheaper, faster in most benchmarks (same clock speed), and run much cooler (good for overclocking and quietness). The Prescott has a bigger cache (good), longer execution pipeline (bad), and the SSE3 instruction set (good if your software supports it; SSE3 is very useful for video).

As for overclocking, I still have not seen a definitive guide to this, but MPEG encoding may suffer OOS problems because of mixed clock timings. I would not build a NLE machine with overclocking as a requirement.

I've never heard of that. Many people overclock fine with no problems. Of the failures I've heard of, most people damaged their CPU during installation (indirectly caused by OCing since people are more likely to swap CPUs). That's very difficult now that AMD and Intel have metal shields over their latest processors. Personally my overclocking experience didn't go so well since my computer reboots and BSODs randomly. No idea why. I've run prime95 (does lots of calculations and checks against known results to test stability) but it doesn't get errors.

BTW, there are some special deals at Dell in the Small Business section. I would not buy an extra drive from them ($400 for a 250!), but their 3.06 4600 can be had at a song.

I agree (I calculated that the computer was cheaper than just the parts+software for a DIY system), but then you still gotta put in your own parts and it's half the effort of building a computer. Although building a computer isn't hard... you just have to read the manuals.

(Tim Brej)

Don't you mean 875 boards? I'm not aware of 865 boards that have PAT. Is this different from the Intel Application Accelerator?

MSI, Asus, and Abit boards are some boards that can enable PAT. IAA is for SATA-connected hard drives or something, the 865 boards have it too. I'm not too sure what IAA does and I can't take advantage of it.