A Basic Question on CPU Speeds and Performance

[Subarctic]

Hi Guys

I have very little knowledge about CPU's and how they perform, i have a couple of basic questions about how two chips compare to each other very basic question but you have to promise not to laugh when i ask it.

The two chips are a Pentium 4 2.6 and an AMD Athlon 64 bit 3700+

The questions are

1) Which of these two chips is fastest?

2) Which is better for playing games?

3) Are there any major advantages/disadvantages to either of the two?

4) if im building a pc for playing games on which should i buy?

Once again thank you in advance for removing my ignorance of all things PC related

 

[Amp34]

Is the pentium chip a pentium D 805 or a standard P4? If it is the standard P4 the 3700 will be a far better chip for pretty much everything. It will also run a little cooler than the P4 which means less noise.

If its the pentium D then its a little less clear cut, if your into overclocking then the D may be a better bet as it will be cheaper and is dual core. Although i dont quite know how the benchmarks differ.

 

[Subarctic]

Thanks for the reply, the Pentium 4 is a standard Pentium 4 2.6 Hyper Thread chip.

Does that make any difference or is the 3700+ still the better chip?

For example when i look at the specs for some of the games i want to play it says for example Pentium 4 2.1 or AMD equivilent requried, but i dont understand what the AMD 64 3700+ means when compared to a Pentium.

Can you give me further help please.....sorry for my stupidity.

 

[hp7909]

Thanks for the reply, the Pentium 4 is a standard Pentium 4 2.6 Hyper Thread chip.

Does that make any difference or is the 3700+ still the better chip?

For example when i look at the specs for some of the games i want to play it says for example Pentium 4 2.1 or AMD equivilent requried, but i dont understand what the AMD 64 3700+ means when compared to a Pentium.

Can you give me further help please.....sorry for my stupidity.

Processor labelling was sort of turned upside down by AMD a few years ago. So the 3700+ you are looking at runs at 2200Mhz, but according to AMD other factors make it out to be the equivalent of a 3.7GHz CPU hence 3700+. Intel have also recently dropped naming their processors in terms of MHz's because it doesn’t really matter anymore (hence why Amp34 asked you if it’s an Intel Pentium D 805 which runs @ 2.66GHz but is Dual Core)

If you want to compare the processors & others, see http://www23.tomshardware.com/cpu.html. But the AMD 3700+ is definitely better/more modern/etc than the P4 2.6.

 

[Subarctic]

Thank you very much indeed guys.

That website really sorted my head out, good to see the information in a graphical format as its the only way i would understand it.

I see what you mean about the 3700+ being the better of the two chips.

Cheers