Much More Speed Increase Than I Expected! Get A P3!

Recently I gave into the “pressure” and purchased a new Intel Pentium III processor. For over a year my main system was running on a P2-350, and truthfully I thought that the speed was incredibly fast and that I did not need an upgrade. However, when I built a second computer last week I decided to go with a P3 even though I highly considered saving the money and buying another P2.

I am very glad that I decided to go with the P3 550. This processor wasn’t excessively expensive since it has been out for a while now (6 Months?), so I did not feel like I was throwing away my money.

Let me tell you... right away I noticed a considerable speed increase over the P2-350 that I replaced. Programs and windows popped up extraordinarily faster than before. Full-screen DVD playback was now smooth-as-can-be! Everything that I thought was extremely fast before was now blazing!

So, even though I now have a processor that was released about 6 months ago, I still feel that I have a top-of-the-line machine. The only thing the P2-350 was lacking was flawless full-screen DVD playback, which the P3-550 took care of nicely.

My Suggestions

INTEL? Even though many people are turning to the AMD Athlon processor, I decided to stick with the Intel. The main reason is because my motherboards both support any and all Slot-1 (Pentium 2 & 3) chips, so interchanging them for whatever reason is a breeze.

CACHE? There are now a couple of different versions of the older P3 chips. There is the basic model with 512K Level-1 cache (which I purchased), and the “e”, or “coppermine” version that has 256K of super-fast cache (They call it active transfer cache.). The prices for each of these seem to be equivalent, but personally I believe that more is better.

OEM? Make sure you purchase the “retail” version of the chips. This version comes with the fan/heatsink already attached to the chip, and also with a 3-year warranty from Intel. The “OEM” versions that are cheaper do not come with the fan/heatsink (you have to purchase one), and usually only a few week warranty. No matter how you look at it, the retail version (in a sealed Intel box) is the safest way to go. Also, with the retail version you get a nifty little “Intel Inside” sticker that you can put on your computer.

BUS SPEED? The speed of the P3 processors depend on the “front side bus” (fsb), which is simply 100MHz or 133MHz. (The P3-533 is 133MHz while the P3-550 is 100MHz). The faster the fsb the faster your computer works. However, odds are that your computer is not ready for 133. My computer, for instance, WILL support the 133 speed, but all of my memory (RAM) is only PC-100 and NOT the PC-133 which the 133MHz fsb requires. So, if you’re not sure what speed your RAM is, it is safer to go with the 100MHz models of processors.

Summary

To sum everything up, I recommend that you upgrade your P2 to a P3 if it is financially possible. Faster is better!!! How’s that for a summary? – I like it! At the time of this review, Intel has released the P3-800 processor. The price for chat chip is far out of my price range, so I did not even consider buying a newly-release chip like that, nor have I ever.

When shopping to upgrade your CPU, keep in mind the topics that I have covered in this review. An informed consumer is a smart consumer!