To: Joe NYC who wrote (73974 ) 3/7/2002 11:51:57 PM From: milo_morai Read Replies (2) | Respond to Joe. <font color=blue>Ace's</font> comments here are really interestingAlso interesting, but less surprising, is the fact that the Northwood can lower the impact of the memory system thanks to its larger cache. PC800 RDRAM is 8% (Serious Sam) to 12% (Max Payne) faster than the i845/Willamette system, but Northwood lowers that advantage to 3-5%. That is only a temporary reprieve, as the recent reports at Tom's Hardware indicate that as clockspeeds get higher, the memory subsystem gets more and more important. Now let us look at the Northwood at 3 GHz with the same memory subsystem. Cache misses still happen 4% of the time, but filling the cache takes 50% longer as the CPU is now 50% faster and the memory subsystem is still running at the same speed (for example i845D chipset with PC2100). As the CPU has to wait longer for the requested data, the effect of the larger cache is negated. aceshardware.com Conclusion Pentium 4 Willamette cut a rather foolish figure and was beaten in almost every benchmark. This humiliation wouldn't have taken place if the Willamette had access to a PC1066 DRDRAM platform. Our benchmarks strongly point out that the Pentium 4 performs competitively in modern game engines and many workstation applications when paired with this technology. Apart from databases and 2D graphics, the performance of the turbo-charged PC1066 Willamette is extremely good. aceshardware.com
