When working on a computer, all of what you are doing is processed by the CPU (central processing unit), the brain of the computer if you will. Like brains, computers aren’t all of equal power. Some are the equivalent to a rat brain, and some to Einstein. The trick is to find that sweat spot between value and performance, that’s when you’ve found the perfect processor for you! But, before you decide how much power you want to jam in that little chip, you’re going to want to decide on the type. This my friend, is where we enter a feud that has lasted longer than life itself (well, at least for people that are younger than it!), the Intel versus AMD feud.

From the early 80's when the company Intel was founded, (by the way, Intel isn’t derived from the word intelligence, it’s a mix between the words integrated electronics) Intel has taken off and dominated the home computer market. It also took over the laptop processor market, and just recently with the introduction of there first 64 bit processor, very might well take over the server and workstation market (previously occupied by Sun’s UltraSparc and Compaq’s Alpha). But, all along the road to fame Intel has run into some competition. In the beginning, from IBM (the creator of the desktop), then Cyrix (which is almost totally wiped out), and most recently AMD. You might think that AMD will have the same fate as the rest, but the fact is that AMD is putting up a huge fight and is actually taking away Intel’s market share in almost all markets.

Now that I’ve given Intel’s background, AMD deserves some of the spotlight. AMD (Advanced Micro Devices) doesn’t have such a long and prestigious history, but has done some pretty amazing things. No one knew about AMD before they introduced there first hit product, the AMD K6-2. It was designed to compete against the Pentium Pro, Pentium II, and earlier Pentium III’s. They then introduced the AMD K6-III, which wasn’t as popular and didn’t stick around long due to the introduction of the AMD Athlon and Duron processors. The Duron was designed to compete against the Celeron, it was designed as a consumer budget model. The Athlon was more advanced and was designed to compete against the Pentium III. They then redid the Athlon and came out with a Socket model (uses a small chip with pins on the bottom compared to the slot which was about the size of a graphing calculator and went in thin side down). This was designed to compete against the later Pentium III models and the Pentium 4.

Now that you know some background information on the two companies, it’s time to start the debate between the Intel processors and the AMD processors. The first fight is between the two consumer budget chips from both models, the Celeron from Intel and the Duron from AMD. The next fight is the desktop round between the Pentium III and Pentium 4 from Intel and the Athlon from AMD. The next is the high-end workstation and server markets, in which the Itanium from Intel and the SMP version of the Athlon from AMD. The last battle is for the notebook market. This includes the Pentium III with SpeedStep technology from Intel and the Athlon 4 from AMD.

Round One, Consumer Budget Processors

This fight is between the two entry level processors, Intel’s Celeron and AMD’s Duron. Both of the processors don’t perform as well as there desktop counterparts, especially the Celeron. The Celeron is about 200 megahertz slower than the Duron or AMD equivalent, although the technical clock speed may be the same. In this one, the Duron wins hands down. It’s cheaper, faster, and fits in the Athlon socket, so if you built a system designed for a Duron you could easily upgrade to an Athlon, no converters or change of motherboard required!

Round Two, Desktop Processors

This is really where Intel and AMD fight because here energy is not an issue and the speeds aren’t limited by cooling or space. The Intel Pentium III processor goes from 400 megahertz to 1 gigahertz. It performs similar to the Pentium 4, but is cheaper (although not as cheap as the high end Athlon’s). The Athlon is meant to compete on all fronts. It goes from 550 megahertz to 1.67 gigahertz (and climbing). It usually performs at about the same speed as an Intel processor 400 megahertz ahead (for example, a 1.4 GH-z Athlon will beet out a 1.8 GH-z Pentium 4). They are also really cheap, with the 1.4 GH-z processor going for $100. The last processor is the Pentium 4. This is aimed at the higher level consumer, but when sold with a desktop isn’t much more expensive. Overall, I’d say go for the Athlon because it’s cheaper, faster, and doesn’t use Rambus RAM (the P4 only uses Rambus RAM, the Athlon can use SDRAM or DDR RAM) unless you’re a gamer, then I’d say go for an Intel Pentium 4 based system at 1.5 GH-z.

Round Three, High-end Workstations and Servers

For a market where neither Intel nor AMD has ever been too successful, there is an awful lot of competition. AMD competes with it’s SMP based systems (Symmetrical Multi-Processor, more than one processor) and Intel competes with its 64 bit Itanium processor. The first half of the fight is centered around high-end workstations. These are usually involved with CAD and CAM programs which just suck up megahertz like there’s no tomorrow. On this front, the SMP Athlon systems win out. They are much cheaper than the Itanium chips and don’t need a 64 bit operating system to perform to their full potential. The server market is different. It doesn’t really have much activity directly onto it, but much serve up a lot of information to a large number of clients. This fight is won by the Intel Itanium. People are willing to pay more for speed when dealing with web servers, and the operating system really isn’t that important because only the clients are going to interact with it and they won’t need to navigate around the OS and there aren’t any compatibility issues like there are with programs like AutoCAD.

Round Four, Mobile Processors

In one corner, weighing in at up to 1.1 Gigahertz, the Intel Pentium III with SpeedStep. In the other corner, the latest mobile processor from AMD, weighing in at up to 1 Gigahertz, the AMD Athlon 4! Alright, first things first, what sets these chips apart from there desktop counterparts. The SpeedStep technology that Intel talks about in the naming scheme is why it’s a mobile processor. SpeedStep enabled chips are designed to save power by running at one speed when plugged in and another when relying on battery power. For example, in my Dell Inspiron 8000 with an Intel Pentium III 900 MH-z SpeedStep enabled processor runs at 900 megahertz when plugged in and 750 when relying on batter power. This can be disabled though, at the BIOS screen. The Athlon 4 (note that the 4 is just meant to compete with the Pentium 4, it’s basically the same as the normal Athlon) is just basically an energy saver. At the end of the match, I’d have to say that the AMD Athlon 4 processor would win because it doesn’t slow down the processor and is much cheaper (as are most AMD products).

All of this having been said, there are other choices out there. The main alternative is the Motorola PowerPC G4 or G3 that is in all Apple computers. I didn’t go into this here, because if you want a PowerPC system then you really only have two choices, iMac or G4 desktop. In the server/high-end workstation market there is the Alpha by Compaq (a 64 bit processor, although Compaq’s given up on this in favor of the Itanium) or the UltraSparc by Sun Microsystems. Also, in the notebook field there is the Transmeta Crusoe which consumes very little power. I just wanted to point this out before the Apple, Alpha, UltraSparc, and Transmeta fans start sending me hate mail!

Labels: AMD, INTEL