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Pastimes : Dream Machine ( Build your own PC ) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Andja Miskin who wrote (2813)	10/9/1998 8:01:00 AM
From: Dave Hanson	Respond to of 14778

Good question, Andja. Sean may be better on this, as he has more experience with dual CPU machines. Key issue is how well the app you're using to display (I gather from your followup post to me that this is RealTick III) would dish out its tasks to the two CPUs. My not so expert preliminary take is that you'd be better off with the one fast PII CPU. The step up from P150 to PII > 350, which has the 100 mhz bus, faster memory, fewer bottlenecks, etc., will be _massive._ Especially assuming that your current P5 MB isn't caching more than 64 megs of that RAM--very likely, unless you have the intel HX chipset with the proper TAG ram and other settings (unlikely, and don't worry if this is jibberish) or you happened to grab one of the "Super 7" p5 class boards. (In fact, if this is true the move from 64 to 128 megs almost surely is slowing your machine down significantly, since NT loads from the top portition of memory, which is uncached.) Moreover, you're dealing with a non-MMX CPU, running on a 60 mhz bus, with older memory archetecture. If you still have bottlenecks after this upgrade, they'll likely have much less to do with CPU cycles than other things. Also, dual CPU setups reduce your options, increase your expense, and increase heat. FWIW, you might consider going with one 350 PII over a 450 ($300 difference says pricewatch this AM) and spend some or all of that on more RAM, especially if you are upgrading soon. That extra $ would take you almost from 128 to 384 megs right there. Then if CPUs were a bottleneck soon (unlikely, IMHO), you could always pick up the faster CPU in 6 months for less than the 350 costs today. Hope this provides some food for thought. Dave