what`s all this fuss about?

[gaviota]

I agree with everyone who thinks that there is no significant difference in performance between the latest and older CPUs for mainstream appplications and normal users. But then some of us in this forum are not normal users - we are ENTHUSIASTS.
Being an enthusiast in many ways is like having an addiction. A car enthusiast will want to have a 400 horsepower car that runs 200 miles per hour, even if speed limits and traffic will never let him reach even half that speed. And he will spend tons of money in modifications to make his car even faster. For me this doesn't make any sense, because all I need is a reliable car to take me from point A to point B...not worth making any fuzz about a car.
Its exactly the same case for us computer enthusiasts. I upgraded my PC in June this year with the latest components available, and I will probably upgrade it again in June next year...I know it doesn't make sense to many, but as I said, its like having an addiction. And that's why we make all the fuss.

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[jskubick]

I can't even BEGIN to conceive how somebody could say that they honestly don't perceive any difference between a 700-1.2GHz PC and a 2+ GHz one -- even if it IS just for "things like productivity apps and web surfing".

No, a faster CPU won't make the binary data collectively comprising a web page transfer over the network any faster, but it sure as hell makes a difference in the post-load, pre-display offscreen composition time.

Maybe normal, unsophisticated users DO have different perceptions -- or more likely, lower expectations -- but my stress and frustration level go through the STRATOSPHERE whenever I'm forced to use a PC slower than 1.8GHz or so. When I click the taskbar icon to launch a new instance of Internet Explorer, I want it loaded NOW. Not 1 or 2 seconds from now. NOW!!!

Likewise, with respect to word processing, doesn't it drive normal people NUTS to grab the scrollbar and NOT have the window's contents INSTANTLY follow their every gesture? "inertia" is bad enough, but even THAT isn't as bad as having to stop scrolling for a moment to wait for Windows to catch its breath and finish redrawing the window being scrolled.

Personally, I think AMD and Intel should send road tours across America to grab people off the street and pay them to use a system with the fastest available CPU for a half hour just to show them HOW GOOD a computer can be. Or better yet, a system running Windows XP with TWO of the fastest available CPUs, just to eliminate every last thread-starvation related hiccup. I guarantee that they'll NEVER be happy using their old, creaky 700MHz system again. Things they never really thought about or noticed before will leap out at them and become increasingly annoying. Mission accomplished ;-)

Actually, I have a second theory as to why "normal" people don't think speed is important. Consumer-grade computers built by compaies like Compaq and HP use the slowest, cheapest components the manufacturers can get away with -- because manufacturers know that "normal" people are stupid, and don't understand anything besides CPU speed. It's absolutely sinful how willing normal companies are to use components that are just a LITTLE cheaper, but carry a HUGE performance penalty relative to the cost savings.

I mean, for god's sake, selling a 2.4GHz system with a 5400RPM hard drive, 128megs of CL-3 PC-133 SDRAM, on-board UMA video, and a HSP winmodem should be a criminal offense. Such a system, when compared to a 14 month old 1.6GHz system owned by an enthusiast friend, WON'T seem to be much faster. Of course, the friend's nominally slower system probably has 512 megs of DDR, a 7200RPM hard drive, and a GeForce-family video card, and its owner would sooner slash his wrists than touch a HSP winmodem. Compare the crippled 2.4GHz Compaq or HP system against one with a 7200RPM hard drive, 512 megs of DDR, and a Radeon 9700, and I guarantee the GOOD 2.4GHz system will totally SPANK both the HP/Compaq 2.4GHz system and the year-old 1.6GHz system.

 

[OLDSKOOL]

Well said that man!

 

[eden]

That is pretty much what I was trying to say.
However you might be putting it a bit too extreme, though your ideology is true and I agree.
Let us not forget how much HDD fragmentation, RPM speed and capacity filling can affect that. Fresh systems with 500MHZ and 5400RPM drives could load IE faster than messy ones at 2.4GHZ! I can speak that from experience on a 350MMX P2 system I had.
However under normal user-care circumstances, after many speed grades, you can notice a slight performance increase. WinXP is especially sensitive to that.

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I guess I just see the world from a fisheye. -Eden<P ID="edit"><FONT SIZE=-1><EM>Edited by Eden on 10/26/02 08:33 PM.</EM></FONT></P>

 

[gaviota]

That's exactly my point jskubick...for us enthusiasts that difference of a few seconds is more than enough to make us want to upgrade our PCs. We notice it and we consider it important.
But to many people, "a few seconds" are not important in a computer, just as its not important to me to spend more money in a car that reaches 60 miles per hour "a few seconds" faster. But a car enthusiast will surely notice the difference and will spend his money on the faster car.

__________________________________________________
It's not important to know all the answers, as long as you know how to contact someone who does.

 

[LancerEvolution7]

Oh god no! One second off my life waiting for IE to load is going to kill me...
Is it really worth spending another $500-$1000 every year just because IE can load a fraction of a second faster. I mean to enthusastics that may be needed, but to the common person who uses it basically to surf the internet, type and check email, anything above a pentium can do fine.

"If you sign up for AOL now, we'll give you 1024 hours of slow service and disconnects free of charge"

 

[eden]

That wasn't the point, it was to prove that CPU CAN affect general usage. I personally cannot stand computers which take over 5 seconds to open My Computer or IE, nor do I like it when MS WORD plays with me and takes more than 3 seconds when it usually takes 1.

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I guess I just see the world from a fisheye. -Eden