Pentium 2 versus Celeron

[Guest]

Hello,
I was looking around my MB site and ABIT said that the BH6 now supports Celeron 700 with new bios. My question is how much am I going to gain if I upgrade from a Pentium II 400 (100mhz bus) to a Celeron 700 (66mhz bus)? I was reading several articles on bus speed and wondering if it may not be any better.

 

[FatBurger]

It would be the same, at best. I think you'd see less performance. If you're looking to upgrade, the best bet is to get a motherboard and CPU combo. There's lots of them out, and you can check <A HREF="http://www.pricewatch.com" target="_new">PriceWatch</A> for good prices on them.
Duron is better than Celeron, but budget processors give you budget performance. I'd recommend getting something like a 1 gig Tbird and a good motherboard, but I have no idea how much you're willing to spend.

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[Crashman]

I wouldn't bother with the celeron, PIII's are cheap. The PIII 700 can be easily clocked to 933 with a system that supports 133FSB, and the PIII 750 is cheaper than the 700 (but can't always make the 133FSB setting). Both of these are running under $100. I tested a Celeron 850 against a PIII 700, the Celeron lost. Then when I overclocked the PIII 700, the Celeron lost by much more.
I think that if your going to spend more than $50 on a CPU you might as well get a PIII for $90-$100.

Cast not thine pearls before the swine

 

[Guest]

I agree with both of you that, a tbird 1gig and pIII 700 clocked at 133 is better, but now we are are talking $250-300 if I get chip, and new mb and PC133 RAM. The Celeron 700 is only $50 plus slotkey, because I can use my MB and RAM. I wish there was a site that gave me all of benchmarks for P2, p3, and p4, celeron together. Intel seems to have lost all of the P2 benchmarks mysteriously. I searched their site and couldn't find them. And to be honest, I am very conservative when I am dealing with CPU's - not an overclocker. Maybe against the philosophy of this website...

 

[dhlucke]

I would advise against a P2-400. First of all it doesn't even meet the minimum requirements of some software NOW, let alone in the future. Second of all it is a 3.5 year old processor, so you are basically buying a used car at a huge markup. It's wasted money considering that you could save up just a bit more money and get either a P3 or a AMD system with new memory and a new motherboard.

I wouldn't bother with a celeron either. I couldn't imagine UPGRADING to a celeron with a 66 mhz bus.

If you're on a budget go see if you can get a good deal for a motherboard, memory, and cpu. If you were already considering putting a P2 in your machine then I don't think you are after a performance machine. On pricewatch I see motherboard combos relatively cheap. You should be able to come way under the $250-$300 mark. Maybe crashman has some good suggestions on which lowend motherboards will work fine with a P3.

I would consider a Duron processor if I were you. Go check pricewatch and get a $90 combo, stick 128 MB of PC133 for $20, and buy a new power supply if you need it for $40. I don't know if you can get a better deal than that. The performance difference will be huge too.

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[Crashman]

Oh ye of little understanding-if you don't want to overclock, the PIII750 is the same price as the PIII700, goes faster, is harder to overclock, but, like you said, you don't like overclocking.
YOu don't need a new motherboard-the Celeron 700 is a Copermine CPU at 10.5x66.6. The PIII 750 is a Coppermine CPU at 7.5x100. You have already established that your motherboard accepts Coppermines by stating that it could use a Celeron 700. You have already established that it can accept mutlpliers up to 10.5x fro the same reason. You have already established that your RAM is at least PC100 by stating that you are already running a 400. So by getting a PIII 750, you only replace the processor, and if it's an FC-PGAput it on a slotket (which you planned to do anyway), and get a new CPU cooler (which you planned to do anyway.

So the diference between using a PIII 750 or a Celeron 700 has nothing to do with your motherboard, it is simply a matter of choice and about $20.



Cast not thine pearls before the swine

 

[bungee]

Don't buy the Celeron 700. I had a PII300 and replaced the chip for a Celeron 500. Both were at bus of 66 mhz and I saw no real difference between both and I have been a bit disapointed with that. In your case, if you low your bus from 100 to 66, it would maybe even decrease performance. However, if you can put your 66 up to 83, maybe you will increase performance.

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