AMD Releases Sempron Earlier Than Expected

I_am_Rambi writes "AMD has released the Sempron today, a release date that moved up from Aug 17th. Because of this move, some of the reviews that are out, will be continued later on. Some sites already have reviews including Toms Hardware, Anandtech, and Tech Report. The Sempron, AMDs budget processor, is staged against the Intel Celeron." Jason Jacobs writes with a review on Techware Labs, and Hack Jandy adds a link to a review at HotHardware, writing "it appears as though the Socket A based Sempron performs abysmally while dollar for dollar the Socket 754 version levels every Intel CPU."

Comments

Re:Sempron

[garcia]

"It is what IT is." ;)

By "performs abysmally"

[eddy]

By "it appears as though the Socket A based Sempron performs abysmally" they probably mean that these $30-40 budget processors are only ~5-8 times faster than as say a "K6-2 400" or equalient "Pentium 2" -- processors which did provide and still provide all the performance you need on a non-gaming/non-dev desktop machine.

"Bah, these $30 chips don't run Doom 3 at Max Extreme Settings. We're so disappointed. They are useless!"

Re:By "performs abysmally"

[cortana]

What are you, some kind of communist?

CONSUME!

Re:By "performs abysmally"

[mirko]

It just looks like the Celeron still gains when it comes to encoding videop streams...
So I would not say that the Sempron always wins.

Re:By "performs abysmally"

[Anonymous Coward]

Socket-A Semprons "performs abysmally" compared to the CURRENT AMD budget offering.

Reason for this is misleading numbering sceheme. For example 1.8GHz 2200+ AthlonXP is available at $49, 1.75GHz Sempron is called 2500+ as it's much more epensive.

Re:By "performs abysmally"

[Short Circuit]

I was a little disappointed by the HotHardware review...they're stacking AMD's value processor line against older versions of Intel's performance line. That makes sense until you try to compare things that depend on, e.g. processor caches.

Re:By "performs abysmally"

[Anonymous Coward]

The "CURRENT AMD budget offering" is the 1.6 and 1.8GHz Duron.

Re:By "performs abysmally"

[sharkey]

Keep reading. Tom's hardware probably states your point across pages 43-51 of their review, sandwiched between the ads and [NEXT PAGE]

Re:By "performs abysmally"

[mog007]

I don't understand what AMD is thinking with this. As far as prices go, an Athlon XP is a socket a and it competes with Celeron. It's also so fast that it can challenge the Pentium 4 line. I'm all for progress, but this seems to be the opposite.

Re:By "performs abysmally"

[gl4ss]

it's all about marketing, nothing else.

if you actually bothered to read up a bit.. the first semprons provided are just athlon xp's rebranded and flagged with a performance number that's higher so it can be compared to celerons mhz rating.

this no doubt is because people are just buying by the number on the cpu, a normal consumer doesn't really know anything but the 2.8ghz number on the celly.

Re:By "performs abysmally"

[ncc74656]

It just looks like the Celeron still gains when it comes to encoding videop streams...

If you're doing any substantial amount of video encoding, you'd have to be insane to do that with any kind of "budget" processor. You want as fast a processor as you can get.

Re:By "performs abysmally"

[mat.h]

OBEY. CONSUME. MARRY AND REPRODUCE. STAY ASLEEP.

Now, please take off your magic sunglasses or things are going to get real nasty.

Re:By "performs abysmally"

[Visaris]

..the first semprons provided are just athlon xp's rebranded..

That is close to being correct, but not quite. The Semprons do support the NX-bit and other features that are not in a regular XP. The Sempron is not just a rebranding.

Re:By "performs abysmally"

[cfuse]

What are you, some kind of communist?

Or, as one of my angry co-workers called me: "Fucking Terrorist!"

Finally a CPU I would buy

[Amiga Lover]

It's been increasingly apparent that I wouldn't buy most CPUs today until they hit a minimum performance level. Until that "minimum" is something that's capable of running almost any app I throw at it.

While that's a moving target and always will be, at the moment what I'm running on it really begs for a CPU like these. And with them as a new low-end, I'm really set for an upgrade.

The last time I felt so excited by a speed upgrade was when I bought my first PPC Amiga. Good to see the IT world can keep on delivering.

Re:Finally a CPU I would buy

[Solder Fumes]

I'm not sure if it's the wording, but does anyone else completely fail to understand what this post means?

Re:Finally a CPU I would buy

[devphaeton]

I think it's a mal-formed Amiga-stroking Tirade.

We get those every now and again, but they are getting squeezed out by the Apple and Gentoo Tirades.

keke!

Disclaimer: Aug 17th is my birthday

Re:Finally a CPU I would buy

[arose]

True, the upgrade from my K6-2 500MHz to a "low end" Athlon XP 2500+ did give a nice (~8x) speed boost...

Re:Finally a CPU I would buy

[drinkypoo]

There is no point to buying any semporn processor when you can get an Athlon XP 2500+ for the same amount of money or less. The Athlon XP is the budget processor of today, and the Athlon 64 and Opteron lines are the top-end stuff. Well, except when they get schooled in benchmarks by the latest P4, but Hammer is due for a speed bump anyway, and I'm not talking about the kind that jars your colon loose at the grocery store.

Re:Finally a CPU I would buy

[Anonymous Coward]

There's at least one good reason: Sempron fits in Socket 754. If you've just got enough money to buy a fancy 754 motherboard, but you can't afford to put an actual Athlon 64 chip in there, it can make a good bridge solution until CPU prices fall, especially if the 754 Sempron is 64-bit (I haven't checked yet). That's what I did with my Duron; I just upgraded it to an Athlon later, when prices were good enough. Of course, this doesn't work when the platform is changing every 6 months (*cough* Intel *cough*). And higher quality motherboards generally last longer.

Re:Finally a CPU I would buy

[mjj12]

Yes, well what AMD is doing here is that they are tweaking with their lower to middle end Athlon XPs a little, giving them a bigger number, and phasing out the Athlon XPs. (I suspect that the prices will drop fast enough that that we won't genuinely be paying more for a Sempron than equivalent Athlon). It sounds also that the faster Barton core Athlon XPs are going to be phased out by the end of the year, so that those of us who have been buying them will have to migrate to Socket 754 based motherboards with either Athlon 64s or Semprons derived from them. (Apparently the die size for Barton based CPUs is too large for AMD to be all that keen on using it for Semprons).

Which is kind of a shame. There are a huge number of Socket A motherboards out there, and I like being able to build fairly powerful computers using them. For now there is less choice for Socket 754, and the motherboards are generally more expensive.

Re:Finally a CPU I would buy

[drinkypoo]

On the other hand, after they drop the Athlon XP line, there will be a short period where the prices go down, after which they will probably go up sharply due to scarcity, so there will be a nice window in there where it's cheap to put in a nice fast XP :)

Personally, I'm looking forward to going to a hammer core, even if it's a socket 754 sempron, although I want the x86-64.

Re:Finally a CPU I would buy

[mjj12]

Well, my own desktop machine is at present merely running a 1.0GHz Athlon, and with 512Mb of RAM and a big (160Gb) hard drive the machine still works fine for a non-gamer like me. That said, I probably will put in a new motherboard sometime in the next year, and I will likely go for an socket 754 Athlon 64.

That's for me, though. I also from time to time build PCs for other people, and if someone who doesn't know a great deal about these things asks me to "Build me a nice new computer", I will at present probably build them an Athlon XP 3000 machine. If someone on a budget asks me to build me a cheap but decent computer, I will probably use about an XP 2400. For that low end machine, these new Semprons will be just fine. Losing the Barton core CPUs for the "nice" computer is a nuisance.

Sempron Fi

[grunt107]

'...AMD has elected to stick with its "fake subatomic particle" naming scheme rather than veer into Intel's "fake member of the periodic table of elements" naming scheme. Sempron is largely a branding exercise, so the name is important. The Sempron name is intended to evoke phrases like "semper fidelis" and other such tokens of solidity and steadfastness. Roughly translated from a mix of Latin and leet-speak, though, Sempron means "always pornographic," and I fear the little CPU will never fully escape that connotation of its recently fabricated moniker. '

"Always faithful to porn"!!! That's my kinda CPU (Completely Pornographic Unit)

Re:Sempron Fi

[garcia]

Sempron is largely a branding exercise, so the name is important. The Sempron name is intended to evoke phrases like "semper fidelis" and other such tokens of solidity and steadfastness.

It's meant to seperate the processor from the Athlon series which has confused most people. The article states that most people probably don't know (or care to know) that there is a huge difference between the AthlonXP and the Athlon64.

Re:Sempron Fi

[dilger]

I couldn't agree more. Most CPU names (and I indict Intel and Transmeta too---"Efficeon," bleah) are silly.

cbd.

Re:Sempron Fi

[macmastery]

Who's got a boil on their Semprini? /PYTHON

Re:Sempron Fi

[tepples]

It's meant to seperate the processor from the Athlon series which has confused most people.

And "Duron" won't work why? Or did the paint company sue?

Re:Sempron Fi

[ceeam]

When was the last time that a new processor name did not raise a wave of giggles on /. and other places? BUT! When the dust settles it seems like people at marketing dep's are not _that_ idiotic (and that's scary ;)
Anyone still finds names like Celeron or Athlon really silly?

Re:Sempron Fi

[shawn(at)fsu]

Wait a minute you mean that their is a difference between the two!?!?! That lying SOB.

Re:Sempron Fi

[grunt107]

Celeron still makes me hanker for a Bloody Mary (titter)

Re:Sempron Fi

[swordboy]

Like "Celeron" which was derived from the Latin word, "celer" that means "fast" or "swift". This should be obvious from the association with "celery", the fastest of all vegetables.

Re:Sempron Fi

[JAgostoni]

Problem is that you can't trademark the names that make sense. That is why Intel switched from 486 to Pentium. Now the competition could not call their's "Pentium" compatible because it's trademarked.

Given that, there is a serious problem for companies finding trademarkable names anymore. That is why there getting more and more ridiculous.

I think, however, they should use more superlatives: The Spectaculon, or Superfastium. Probably already taken though...

Re:Sempron Fi

[jacksonj04]

I always thought they named the processors by throwing together random letters and adding a latin prefix. Can't we give them all numbers (286/386/486-esque?)

Re:Sempron Fi

[dilger]

Yes! Or the Megasuperblisteringium, or the Optimizitrollion. Hell, if the names are gonna be silly, they might as well be REALLY silly. None of this wimpy silliness.

cbd.

Re:Sempron Fi

[JAgostoni]

Perhaps they should make it easier on the end-user:

Fasterthenthelastium

Re:Sempron Fi

[cheekyboy]

why can't slash do +6 ++ funnies.

ARM has it right, ARM7, 9, 14 34 87 123

I long live for the day when PPC/INTEL are pin compatible. ie instead of 3000 pins in 2009, why not less at say 100 pins with more serial XML IO.

I mean who needs more than 16 pins really now.

GND,RX,TX,SYNC,+2V is enough really for any speed.

Re:Sempron Fi

[Anonymous Coward]

PowerPC G3, G4, G5. Not particularly silly.

Re:Sempron Fi

[poot_rootbeer]

The Sempron name is intended to evoke phrases like "semper fidelis" and other such tokens of solidity and steadfastness. ...Semprini?

Re:Sempron Fi

[rpdillon]

I still have trouble believing that AMD fell into the same trap Intel fell into with Pentium. IMHO, Pentium M should have never been so named: it was new technology and it should have been marketed as such. AMD did the same thing with AthlonXP and Athlon64...a shame, because people *don't* understand the difference at a basic consumer level. I understand that name-brand does have value, but you still want to give the public a good idea (via your naming scheme) when one product breaks away from the others on a technology/performance level. JM2C...

Re:Sempron Fi

[rpdillon]

Umm, just because the competition has a trademark doesn't mean I can't say my processor is compatible with it, even in my advertising. People use trademarked names of their competitors in their advertisments all the time.

As I recall, Cyrix was onto the 586/686 naming scheme and Intel switched to Pentium to distinguish their product.

Re:Sempron Fi

[Trumpetgod2k1]

Following on the grand-parent's insight, this must be a combination of Latin (fast) and 1337 (porn). Thus, Celeron is the fastest porn delivery system known to man.

Nerd: This program downloads porn from the internet one million times faster than any other program!
Marge: Who needs that much porn?
Homer: **drool** one million times!!! **drool**

Re:Sempron Fi

[Anonymous Coward]

Frankly they should never have switched away from the number scheme. It was obvious to anyone that a 486-25 was better than a 386-33, even though the clock speed was lower...

Re:Sempron Fi

[corngrower]

I thought that 'celer' was just a misspelling of 'cellar'. You know - to invoke thoughts that the performance of this chip is in the cellar, below everything else.

Re:Sempron Fi

[soulsteal]

Pentium M is not a new technology. It's the previous core (P6) with better SIMD bolted on and ramped up clock speeds. It's drastically different from the P4 (Netburst) core but it's not new by any stretch of the imagination.

The whole Athlon/AthlonXP/Athlon64 should be self-explanatory to anyone who's willing to investigate, but most people aren't.

So it goes.

Re:Sempron Fi

[TheLink]

Why not just Athlon XP -> Duron XP
Rather than
Athlon XP -> Sempron

Removing 64 bit functionality when it's possible to have it sucks. Removing cache is more likely to improve yield than removing 64 bit stuff.

So what if HP said they'd put AMD CPUs in if they make em 32 bit only. HP wants Itanium...

Wonder if they'd make it possible for the 64 bitness to be turned back on by a BIOS update or CPU "fix".

Annoyed

[artlu]

I am really annoyed that Intel and AMD market these low end procs. Usually for $10 more you can get a similar speed older processor that performs better. Most consumers do not know the difference and they buy junk HP desktops that I used to have to fix every other week.

GroupShares Inc.

Re:Annoyed

[lachlan76]

But the newer processors are still mass-produced, and I'm fairly sure that you can get a couple of thousand 2.4GHz Celerons/Semprons (equiv clock speed) much more easily than an equivalent speed older processor. When Dell/HP/Compaq want a processor line, that will carry much more weight than individual people. But this doesn't really affect me since I use my computer for games/devel, so I need at least a moderately fast machine.

Re:Annoyed

[DAldredge]

Well, rather the promoting a site that can be used to run pump and dump scams, why don't you setup a business and charge people to repair their systems?

Re:Annoyed

[nelsonal]

Actually most of the Sempron line is just a renamed older Athlon for cheap systems. One is a non 64bit socket 754 CPU.

Re:Annoyed

[MrNemesis]

I can understand your frustration re: the socket A model: Athlon XP's are currently cheap as chips (ha ha) and very good performers for the price, whereas the socket A Sempron is a bit of a disappointment.

But the real meat of the Sempron line is getting a dirt cheap socket 754 CPU out there, to help speed up the transition to the new desktop socket. The 754 Semprons are very good performers for the price (since the Sempron is, IIRC, a redesign of the A64 core you'd expect it to work better on a socket 754 board) *and* come in much cheaper than the current breed of A64's.

Good news for the OEM's (cheap chips to flog to other people with more money than sense) and good for us, cos it'll mean cheaper A64 motherboards :)

Re:Annoyed

[evilviper]

Usually for $10 more you can get a similar speed older processor that performs better.

That's only true on the high-end of the "value" lines... (ie. the newest ones).

You can find Durons much cheaper than equivalent XPs, and you can find Celerons FAR, FAR cheaper than equivalent P4s.

In addition, the funniest thing about the "value" processors is that they are newer than the more expensive product lines, so they are typically better designed, more reliable, use and output less heat as well.

Low end market

[steelerguy]

Looks like AMD can really give Intel a beat down on the low end market now.

Will this finally force Dell to start selling AMD chips in their machines? I can't imagine they would be able to ignore the price and performance advantage.

Re:Low end market

[Anonymous Coward]

Dell has never been about anything but maximizing margins. They might not actually have to use semprons; they might just threaten to use them to extract greater discounts from Intel. They don't care what's in their boxes.

Dell doesn't give a damn about your computing experience because practically anything will run a home computer well enough for aunt Tillie. They just want your check to clear so Apu can begin giving you Dell's award winning customer service.

Re:Low end market

[Original Buddha]

Why start now? It's been well documented that 1.6 Durons are better performers than Celerons for half the price.

http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.asp x? i=1927

Re:Low end market

[Anonymous Coward]

Dell has been making overtures that indicate it would like to sell AMD, but is currently locked into a deal with Intel that prohibits such an arangement.

Re:Low end market

[carnivore302]

Performance advantage is not an issue here. These are low budget items and having more performance doesn't matter, a lower price does. As someone correctly pointed out, it's often better to buy an older high-end processor than a newer low-end. For Dell, as a seller, this is different, they can't sell pcs with dated processors, it doesn't fit their image.


Click on the Amazing Waves Link!

Re:Low end market

[JediLuke]

Yeah its called their OEM agreement...and much like MS with most companies, Intel pulls the same crap. "Oh you want these reference designs? Oh well you're going to have to stop selling AMDs"

Re:Low end market

[sigaar]

If Dell had put AMD chips in their notebooks, I would have bought a Dell notebook a long time ago.

I don't see why a manufacturer like Dell should stick to only one CPU. If they offer their customers the choice, they would have many more customers

Re:Low end market

[indigeek]

The problem with Dell is not really with chips but the subsystems. Dell has a really good supply-chain which allows them to produce machines faster than anyone else.
It is much easier to work with a few trusted,tested suppliers than to deal with 20-30 companies which make motherboards, RAM ,fans cases etc. With Intel, they can buy the chips, sometimes mobo etc. from Intel and the other parts from some other traditional vendors.
Moving to AMD willl mean signing up a lot of supplier agreements, redesigning their factory layout (the process for building a computer is almost like a car-chassis moving around collecting peripherals) etc. etc.
This is one reason they never have the latest-hottest stuff with them. It is cheaper to mass produce a lot of not-so-cutting edge stuff than to make some of lotsa-premium-but-consumers-are-wary stuff .In addition, It seems it is also more profitable for Dell. Quite unlike the old world Sony who used to thrive on the 6 month margin before the generic-product manufacturers kicked in. To each his own I suppose.

Re:Low end market

[servognome]

The question is would the margins they get justify all the new cost associated with having different systems.
These processors are low margin to begin with, and to add them to the product line up means hiring alot of new people, since now they have to handle managing purchasing and inventories of new motherboards and new CPUs. They also probably have to invest in alot of new testing equipment, training, and assembly lines, and tech support staff.
For do-it-yourself people its no problem switching back and forth. For a big OEM it can get quite expensive.

Re:Low end market

[dabneyd]

Unless Intel falls dismally behind AMD in power and price, Dell will not stop selling Intel. A friend at Dell tells me that AMD is at Dell HQ in Round Rock, TX, for a weekly meeting. As far as I know, this has been going on for at least 2 years, and Dell still has not changed their minds. Apparently Dell gets Intel's newest stuff before everyone else, and Michael Dell likes it that way.

Re:Low end market

[Xilman]

I don't see why a manufacturer like Dell should stick to only one CPU. If they offer their customers the choice, they would have many more customers

You are probably right.

However, would they have sufficiently more customers to cover the cost of having to stock a greater range of parts? Such considerations are extremely important when working at the insanely low profit margins where Dell and the like make their living.

In the UK we have a saying: pile it high and sell it cheap. That's exactly what Dell is doing.

Paul

Re:Low end market

[Anonymous Coward]

so Apu can begin giving you Dell's award winning customer service.

Blargh, don't remind me...
After talking on the dell hotline once I'm never gonna buy anything from them. EVER. Simply because I feel for these poor polish bastards who are enslaved in dells "european customer support"-callcenter, working their asses off for $8 per hour and being steadily pissed on by their supervisors...

Yea, call me communist or whatever but I will not give that company my money.

Re:Low end market

[sigaar]

Well, considering how many Athlons and Durons have been sold in recent years, I wouldn't think Dell would have a problem selling AMD based machines. Conpaq seem so sell enough to sustain their AMD lines.

I think a lot of people would be happy to pay Celeron prices to get a Duron based notebook, even if the Duron is actually cheaper per CPU. Same goes for the Sempron. It's a matter of choice, really.

I also don't why training shoud be an issue. Anyone who can assemble a PC/server in a professional way, already has the skill to do exactly the same thing with an AMD instead of an Intel. The work/care/know-how is no different.

Someone else in this discussion mentioned that Dell probably has some sort of deal with Intel that forbids them to use competing products (does that remind us of anyone?) - that's most likely the reason for not using AMD.

Beats the Celeron...

[xot]

The Sempron beats the celeron in almost all the benchmarks, so if its priced cheaper than the Celeron or even 5% more I see no reason why anyone should buy a Celeron!
I am a recent AMD convert with a brand new Athlon 2800+ Mobile version.It really does beat Intel hands down.

Re:Beats the Celeron...

[secondsun]

There never was a reason to buy a celeron. By the time intel got around to PUTTING A CACHE in it the Athlon was out, at the same price point, and beating the living dogshit out of it.

Re:Beats the Celeron...

[Anita Coney]

There was "never" a time to buy a celeron. Sorry, there was once such a time. The celeron 300A. It was so cheap it was practically free and could be easily clocked to 450MHz and higher. But, other than that one chip, you're right.

Re:Beats the Celeron...

[Halthar]

Thanks, I was just going to post a reply about the 300A. The only Celeron I ever purchased. My 300A running at just over 500 is still running to this day, very reliably I might add.

Re:Beats the Celeron...

[pi42]

And also, don't forget the line of S370 PPGA Celerons that were out while the Athlon was still $230+ -- the ones that could beat an equally clocked original (Slot 1) Pentium III clock-for-clock.

Re:Beats the Celeron...

[Dman33]

Boy, I loved my 300A. Should have kept it and framed the little sucker. Great chip for the cost.

Re:Beats the Celeron...

[ameoba]

Don't forget the 600MHz parts... they were newly upgraded to the Coppermine core (more cache) and consistantly OCed to 900MHz (66Mhz FSB to 100MHz).

Re:Beats the Celeron...

[Cerberus7]

Ah, the 300A... The only time I ever wished I'd bought into the "slot 1" platform instead of sticking with Socket 7 was when I saw what people were doing with that CPU. Those slots still sucked, though.

Re:Beats the Celeron...

[jayteedee]

Agree on the Celeron 300A. I still have one too. Nice to overclock the memory bus to 100Mhz. But, have to add, the "other" time to buy a Celeron was in the laptop market since AMD was absent from that arena for so many years, and then came with power sucking devices initially. The Celeron's would run quite cool and sip power miserly and be a good $100 -$200 cheaper than the Pentium alternative.

Re:Beats the Celeron...

[BestNicksRTaken]

Ouch, you got the 2800+M - that's the 72w one that doesn't overclock at all well, basically identical to the regular Barton. You should have saved some money and got the 45w 2600+ and OC'd it to 2.5GHz, or the 35w 2400+ @ 2.4GHz...

Re:Beats the Celeron...

[Fweeky]

Don't forget the BP6 too. A pair of 500MHz Celerons made for a nice little machine that still fit well inside most budgets.

Re:Beats the Celeron...

[Corporate Gadfly]

Re:Beats the Celeron... (Score:5, Informative)
by Anita Coney (648748) Alter Relationship on Wednesday July 28, @10:16AM (#9821386)
There was "never" a time to buy a celeron. Sorry, there was once such a time. The celeron 300A. It was so cheap it was practically free and could be easily clocked to 450MHz and higher. But, other than that one chip, you're right.

I have a BP6 motherboard with dual-celeron 300As overclocked to 500. It still runs faithfully after about 5 years of usage.

Re:Beats the Celeron...

[Anonymous Coward]

No, the first coppermine celerons were pretty sweet too. I've still got a system with a celeron 566@850, which just happens to be the exact same overclock ratio as the 300A going to 450. I got it for $60 when top of the line was around 1.1GHz.

Thanks for sharing your ignorance. Next time try to stay away from ridiculous absolutes like that.

Re:Beats the Celeron...

[dew-genen-ny]

Ahh my faithful bp6

proll my favorite computer of all time. little bastard just doesnt know when to give up :)

Re:Beats the Celeron...

[Anonymous Coward]

wow...bitter much?

BTW, it was not the post you replied to making the absolute statement...he was just illustrating that there was in fact an exception to it.

So you have another exception, BFD.

IT on slashdot?

[Anonymous Coward]

Come on slashdot, "IT" is PHB-speak, not geek-speak!

Re:IT on slashdot?

[poison1701]

This is Slashdot's poor attempt to seem like a legitimate news source. Problem is, with a color scheme like this, nobody is being fooled.

Re:IT on slashdot?

[drinkypoo]

I am a geek, not a PHB, and I refer to myself as an IT professional. It (IT) is an appealing term because the alternative is to be part of information services which implies that you do something, and I'd rather get paid to sit around and slashdot :)

AMD vs Intel

[myte]

I am so happy that AMD is really giving Intel a run for their money. I remember when they had so many problems with their first few processors. Now that their processors are strong and stable they have a lot of 'followers'. Their processors are a great value and definately worth every penny.

I love rooting for the underdog and watching them really become a force in the market. Kudos to AMD and good luck in the future.

Re:AMD vs Intel

[southpolesammy]

When were the processors the problem? I have a venerable AMD 386-40MHz system collecting dust in my basement that ran solidly for about 8 years before it failed to keep up with my computing needs. I'll bet that if I powered that system back up that it would still be running (although the clock battery has probably died by now).

Re:AMD vs Intel

[JCholewa]

> I am so happy that AMD is really giving Intel a run for their money. I remember when they had so
> many problems with their first few processors. Now that their processors are strong and stable they
> have a lot of 'followers'. Their processors are a great value and definately worth every penny.

Um. The first AMD processors were made in the early 1970s. The first AMD x86 (PC) processors were made around the time that IBM adopted the 8086 processor (the late 1970s, I think).

And, bah, AMD's processor designs (that is, after they stopped being a foundry for Intel's designs) have been stable since the K6. Their processors have been "strong" (that is, if by strong you mean having fast floating-point performance) for several years, starting with the introduction of the K7 (Athlon). They tend to have fewer catastrophic bugs than Intel processors. Any real stability problems have been caused by poor support by chipset manufacturers, and there were always stable options, if you were willing to avoid crappy motherboard manufacturers.

--
-JC
http://www.jc-news.com/coding/freedom/

Sempron ???

[Potatomasher]

Is it just me or are the processor names getting lamer and lamer.
What would you call your new processor if you were coming out with your own micro ??

Re:Sempron ???

[cowscows]

BFP 9000

Re:Sempron ???

[no reason to be here]

I'd call my new processor an Imtell Pantiom Quattro, and install it in my genuine Sorny laptop, and then stream MP3s from it to my Magnetbox stereo.

Imtell Pantium: now with 5% more pant.

Re:Sempron ???

[Raagshinnah]

What would you call your new processor if you were coming out with your own micro ??

Cowboy Neal

Re:Sempron ???

[maximilln]

Is it just me or are the processor names getting lamer and lamer

Since the government controls >50% of the GDP all systems are, naturally, going to mimic the trends being set by the government.

This is a natural counterpart of things like "War against Terror" and "Office of Homeland Security".

Everything in life is becoming lamer and lamer...

Re:Sempron ???

[VDM]

As far as I know, you can also stream NB3s.

Re:Sempron ???

[Short Circuit]

Selenium. Or Lithium. There's a bunch of cool names in the periodic table.

Quick take on major differences

[IronChefMorimoto]

The Semprons are available in Socket A (AthlonXP) and Socket 754 flavors.

Anandtech - http://www.anandtech.com (better article)
Tomshardware - http://www.tomshardware.com

Big differences are...

ATHLONXP vs. SEMPRON (SOCKET A) -- can't really tell upon first glance. The Sempron is available in the same speeds as the AthlonXP and based on the Thoroughbred B core (I'm running a Barton and a Thoroughbred B pair of cores in mine and Allison's desktops). The Sempron tops out at a slower over speed vs. the AthlonXP lineup. How confusing is that? The FSB, right now, tops out at 333Mhz, so it might be a little odd to pair a Sempron Socket A up with DDR400 (PC3200) memory.

ATHLON64 (SOCKET 754) vs. SEMPRON (SOCKET 754) -- same issue -- they both look the same and have the same speed numbering. However, the original 754 was a Clawhammer (1MB L2 cache), followed by Newcastle (512KB L2 cache). Now, the Sempron has a 256KB L2 cache and NO x86-64 instructions. You can run matching memory FSB speeds of 400MHz with the 754 variant of the Sempron.

The Anandtech article noted that the AthlonXP is the better performance value now, until it's phased out. After that, the Sempron 754 is a good entry-level processor vs. a slightly slower full Athlon64.

Ugh -- talk about confusing. No more so, I guess, than Intel having 2.8GHz P4 Prescotts and 2.8GHz Celeron Ds.

IronChefMorimoto

Re:Quick take on major differences

[lachlan76]

But isn't AMD planning to phase out Socket-754 to replace it with Socket-939? Or were they going to use 754 for Athlon XP and 939 for desktop 64-Bit, and leave 940 for the Opterons? If anyone could confirm this, I'd greatly appreciate it.

Re:Quick take on major differences

[rokzy]

yes, 939 will replace 754 and 940 but in the short term chips will be released with versions for both.

the new 939 has less cache but ends up being just as fast because of how it's handled.

the 939 also allows use of non-ECC RAM that the 940 required.

Re:Quick take on major differences

[Anonymous Coward]

> No more so, I guess, than Intel having 2.8Ghz P4 Prescotts and 2.8Ghz Celeron Ds.

Intel is calling them 340, 520, 730 etc. these days.

Re:Quick take on major differences

[Illissius]

Here's how it is:
Socket A: Athlon XPs and Semprons which are the same thing except with a different name.
Socket 754: Athlon 64 "value socket". It'll have A64s up to the 3700+, as well as some Semprons, which are A64s minus the 64-bit capability and half the cache (the latter of which has only a minor effect on performance).
Socket 939: Mainstream desktop socket. It'll have Athlon 64s for a while to come (4000+ and up). Dunno whether it'll have Semprons.
Socket 940: Highend socket. This is exclusively Opteron territory and will stay that way for the foreseeable future.

As for technical differences between the A64 sockets, s754 has single channel memory while the other two have dual channel (which make them slightly faster, roughly the performance equivalent of 100MHz), and socket 940 requires ECC/Registered memory which is slower by roughly the same amount.

Re:Quick take on major differences

[MindStalker]

So the biggest question of course, will the SEMPRON work on all socket 754 boards, or do some of those boards expect a x86-64 processor??

Re:Quick take on major differences

[Anonymous Coward]

I guess it's just a man's point of view. ie yesterday; i show one black tank top and one purple sleeveless v neck to a guy and answer is "they are the same" One has 2mm straps and other has 6cm? "Oh except from that they are same" One is black adnd the other is purple? "and except from that they look the same to me" One is v neck and the other has nothing at all!! "a minor difference, they're similar" One is transparent and other is thick "Oh that is almost no difference, you both wear them right? They are both cloth?" Actually one is paper based... And so on and on... Comparison? Similarities between processors? Sure that article is from a man's point of view!!

Re:Quick take on major differences

[lachlan76]

I knew this, but what I meant was in the long term will AMD do to Socket 754 what Intel did to 423?

Re:Quick take on major differences

[Illissius]

Probably. There's not supposed to be anything new after the 3700+, which is already out. Maybe some Semprons, but that's about.
(Again, this is what's *supposed* to happen, AMD may change its mind and frequently does.)

My processor would be named...

[boelthorn]

80747 - would be nice to have processor as reliable as the other thing this name implies. *g* But to be serious: Giving processors numbers instead of names, let's the consumer focus on specs and not on pointless debates about the name per se.

Fixed Toms Hardware link

[maroberts]

AMD's Sempron

Compete with Celeron?

[goldspider]

Isn't that what the Duron was supposed to do?

Re:Compete with Celeron?

[the real darkskye]

Yes, but apart from the newer durons, most (all?) Durons ran at a FSB of 100Mhz, with the later running at 133.
The Sempron moves away from that old slow FSB and allows easier integration with DDR and newer motherboards.

In short, AMD isn't just phasing out the Duron, they are phasing out SDRAM and sub 333FSB requirements for motherboards.

Re:Compete with Celeron?

[Anonymous Coward]

They also made some FSB 333 (=166x2) Durons. There didn't seem to be a great supply, but they were dirt cheap and I believe pretty powerful. If you want a value chip right now finding one of these is likely to be your best deal.

Sockets?

[Anonymous Coward]

Can someone explain the difference between socket A and socket 754?

Re:Sockets?

[scharkalvin]

Socket 754 is an ATHLON-64 socket. The Sempron is NOT a 64 bit cpu, it is a 32 bit cpu using the 'hammer' bus. So it is sorta a cut down Athlon-64 rather than a cut down Athlon.

Put it another way, buy an Athlon64 MB and put an Athlon 32 cpu in it. WHY?

Re:Sockets?

[jCaT]

Put it another way, buy an Athlon64 MB and put an Athlon 32 cpu in it. WHY?

Sounds like a good upgrade path to me- Buy a socket754 mobo and a sempron, and later on down the road you can upgrade the memory and CPU and double your performance when you can afford it.

Re:Sockets?

[AbRASiON]

If I recall AMD is moving to Socket 939 for ALL their CPU's in the near future - this is a temporary chip, much like the initial nasty P4 chips (the one before the northwood, willamette perhaps?)

So while it SEEEMS like a good upgrade path - I (beleive) it's actually nasty :(

Re:Sockets?

[DreadCthulhu]

Well, you could thow in a $120 Sempron now, and then a year or so in the future go with a Athlon64 3700, which is a pretty big speed boost, and that chip is already out.

Re:Sockets?

[Anne Thwacks]

One is expensive, the other is VERY expensive, now if only I could remember which is which!

Re:Sockets?

[AbRASiON]

It just doesn't seem like a cost effective upgrade to buy a 3100 Semp now and then buy the 3700 later (is it even Socket 754 or will it be in a year's time??)

It'll be 30% quicker. (give or take a few % of course)

I normally prefer at LEAST 50% before I consider a CPU upgrade otherwise the money could be better spent somewhere else.

If you ask me the CPU manufacturers are shitting themselves - because I've had a 3ghz P4 for (I beleive) a year now and nothing is SIGNIFICANTLY faster than my box (or at least worth justifying the cost for)

Re:Sockets?

[Fweeky]

The 3700 is S754; the 3800 is S939. In a year's time I'd be more interested in a dual core chip than the top+end of line processor for my crummy cheapo transitional socket.

Re:Sockets?

[forkazoo]

That's just what I was thinking. I sell computers, and most of our new builds are 32 bit athlons. I always mention that the 64 bit revolution is imminent, but with a more expensive board and CPU, the systems are naturally pricier than the 2200+ and 2600+ systems that are our bread and butter right now. If I can sell a reasonably cheap custom box with socket 754, and an easy upgrade path to 64 bits when WinXP-64 comes out, it makes me happy, my customers happy, and AMD is tickled shitless because somebody just bought two CPU's when they would have bought one. w00t.

Z-160

[wiredog]

Twice as good as a Z-80!

Yes

[Billobob]

Yes, but for whatever reason AMD decided to phase out Duron (the name wasn't "sexy" enough, they needed a new brand name to spark popularity, it's anybody's guess) and put the Sempron in its place. The new Semprons also significantly outperform the last Durons, which were meant to go up against Intel's previous P4-based Celeron. When the D's came out, only the AthlonXP could compete with it, and the name "AthlonXP" still isn't associated with "budget" in the eyes of the consumer.

No x86-64???

[Anonymous Coward]

Sigh. Yet another year to wait for non-register-starved software then.

Not a Duron you Moron......

[djk001]

This sounds like just another pretty name at a cheap price, designed to gain market share by selling processors to the same bunch of people who buy cars based on the color.

ED: I found the car I'm going to buy.
JOHN: That's good. What is it?
ED: I don't know, but it's RED.

Re:Not a Duron you Moron......

[iBran]

BRITNEY: OMG, I found the car I'm going to buy. JESSICA: OMG, that's totally good. OMG what is it? BRITNEY: OMG I don't know, but it's RED. OMG! fixed.

Re:Not a Duron you Moron......

[2nd Post!]

Why shouldn't someone buy a car based on color?

Black cars get hotter in the summer
Brightly colored cars get into less accidents
Red cars get more tickets
Silver cars have the higher resale values

Re:Not a Duron you Moron......

[djk001]

Some times a Silver Yugo is still just a Silver Yugo.

Re:Not a Duron you Moron......

[2nd Post!]

Yes, but a Silver Yugo will still sell for higher than a brown, beige, or blue Yugo :P

Re:Not a Duron you Moron......

[djk001]

Ok, analogies aside. The point is that the Sempron is a low end processor with limited application ability that the name belies.

Re:Not a Duron you Moron......

[2nd Post!]

Agreed, if low end processor with limited application ability means Doom3 and Half Life 2.

They've been ignoring it for years now.

[Illissius]

The Celeron D is actually a pretty decent chip, in that it even comes close to AMD's offerings. Previously, the Athlon XPs (which are fundamentally the same as Semprons with a different name) were actually faster for the same rated speed (eg, the 2500+ was 1.83GHz, now it's 1.67 iirc) and cost less, and Intel's previous generation of Celerons were so mind numbingly bad that the 2.8GHz model was routinely - and by this I mean in every single benchmark, by a margin - outperformed by the Athlon XP 1700+ and the 1.6GHz Duron. While being in parity in price with an XP 2800+. I shit you not. Read the review linked in the reply a few comments above mine.

ObPythonRef

[garignak]

Am I the only one that saw the name and immediately thought: "Semprini!?" [Google cache]

Re:ObPythonRef

[Anonymous Coward]

No, I immediately thought of this.

Simper on, little processor.

Re:ObPythonRef

[boristdog]

Thank god someone else thought of S*mpr*n* besides me!

Their processors were always strong and stable...

[Illissius]

...it was the crappy motherboards and chipsets at the time that gave them a bad name. In particular, VIA's godawful KT133. Intel never really had this problem as they make their own motherboards and chipsets. AMD is on equal footing now that nVidia has started making some excellent chipsets for them, though, and VIA has made some major leaps in quality since then as well.

Oh... wait, value depends on price right ?

[crashedbutterfly]

And according to this :
http://www.slcentral.com/boards/showthread-4615.ht ml?s=/

The AMD price are being reworked at the same time as the launch...

So... better re-consider the whole thing

Re:Oh... wait, value depends on price right ?

[dknj]

I never understand why people don't link to the original article..

From the register...

-dk

HotHardware not so hot

[xconslash]

I find the HotHardware review rather clumsy compared to the Tom's Hardware. In Tom's, they compre the Sempron to it's intended competitor, the Celeron D, but the HotHardware stacks it up against a full P4, a chip that costs more. So naturally Tom's shows the Sempron doing well in most of the test and HotHardware shows it doing "abysmally". What gives?

Re:HotHardware not so hot

[DudemanX]

The Anandtech review is the best in that compares the new Semprons with a range of Celerons, Athlon XPs, and even the Duron 1.6.

The Namby Pampon

[Didion Sprague]

Well, I'd call it the "Namby Pampon."

Of course, I'd probably shorten it to the "Pampon" if marketing insisted.

Buy Sempr0n!

[Anonymous Coward]

To speed up your pr0n downloading!

That was a lousy benchmark report.

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm not talking about the results or as to which processor did what. The problem was that they failed to show what they were using in their benchmarks. Telling us that in video encoding this processor took two minutes and the other took two and a half is pretty worthless if you're going to keep it a secret what video you used.
The same problem was repeated on almost every page. I gave up on it about half way through. If you're going to do a ten page benchmarking story, why not share with the readers the details of what kind of test you ran. Even the charts were pretty much bare of details. What's the point of a chart that doesn't even tell you waht is being measured?

So this is another...

[bob670]

exercise in branding and pricepointing aimed not so much at benefitting the consumer as hurting the compeition?

While I am quite happy that things have gotten as fast as they have, the short release/upgrade cycles and numerous paper releases ::cough::ATI::cough:: are starting to bore me. I happened to be on the other side of town Tuesday night where I was in a shopping district that had both a CompUSA and a MicroCenter, neither of which I had visited in a while since I prefer to use Newegg for most purchases. Apparently I'm not the only one who is bored since both locations were virtually empty and the product assortment was nothing short of yawn inducing.

I know my deep, dark geek side should only want the fastest and the newest yet my wallet only allows the slighly older and cheaper. Therein lies the issue that Intel, AMD and their brood can't break. If you aren't a gamer or scientific user then any PC built in the last 24-36 months is more than adequate for most users. Take away Windows XP and substitute the GUIest Linux install and an Athlon XP 1800+ with a GeForce4 MX440 is still peppy and responsive, and will probably run Doom 3 at lowest settings.

I'm torn by this apparent plateau the industry has reached. On one hand it proves that software has greatly matured and that commercial software makers clearly can't provide the next "killer app". Of course I believe OSS can provide such and app and as MS seems to be mired in assorted issues the probability of this kind of breakthrough seems imminent (with a rekindling of the browser wars leading the way). And on the other hand this should be an exciting time as the possiblity of commodity boxes at low price points (and hopefully free of the Microsoft tax) can put PCs within price reach of everyone.

I'm waiting for the Fullpr0n!

[scoser]

The hell with this Semipr0n crap, I'm waiting for the new processor instructions for streaming video and integrated XXX chat that come with the Fullpr0n chip!

Just a general observation

[Alzheimers]

Is it just me, or has Toms Hardware turned into "Press Release Central?" All of their latest articles read like they were copy-and-pasted right out of an AP announcement or C-Net review. I haven't seen any hint of their old skeptical, insightful commentary in months. It was a change that happened first over at Sharkyextreme, but is creeping slowly across the independent review landscape.

Re:Just a general observation

[arose]

Is it just me, or has Toms Hardware turned into "Press Release Central?"

Yes.

Re:Just a general observation

[BestNicksRTaken]

Yup, they do 50-page reviews full of marketing speak and they feature so many banner ads that they can only fits about five words onto the page!

I wish they'd do an RSS feed (or other text-only version) that would consist of just the single page of about 80 words worth reading in their reviews!

Re:Just a general observation

[drinkypoo]

What really bothered me about the tom's review was that there were more technical details about the celeron than there were about the sempron. I gave up on it and went to anandtech, which is what I should have done in the first place, as they are a much more trustworthy publication and they seem to have a better grasp on english over there in spite of being run be an "anand" instead of a "tom". Makes no sense to me either, but there you have it.

Re:Just a general observation

[Anonymous Coward]

Is it just me, or has Toms Hardware turned into "Press Release Central?" All of their latest articles read like they were copy-and-pasted right out of an AP announcement or C-Net review. I haven't seen any hint of their old skeptical, insightful commentary in months. It was a change that happened first over at Sharkyextreme, but is creeping slowly across the independent review landscape.

You must be new here...

Tom's Hardware has been widely recognized as nothing more then an industry shill for at least a year or two.

Semprini?

[CommanderData]

(Gratuitous Monty Python rip...)

Naughty Chemist: Right, who's got a boil on his Semprini then?

Seriously, really awful chip naming. Who knows what nonsense they'll think of next.

Go Semporn, er... "pron"

[mnemotronic]

Gotta like any registered & trademarked moniker that can be easily misspelled into something more "interesting".

whoa

[chaosmage42]

Their doing reviews of pr0n now?

Semprini?

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't know, "Sempron" comes awfully close to one of the Words Not To Be Used.

One word:

[warrax_666]

CALCULON!

Re:One word:

[chris_mahan]

I say branch off into medical-sounding terms and let the PharmaCorps earn their money:

The Paxallum Processor
The Pronicum Processor
The Fasolam Processor
The Azeron Processor
The Rodanex Processor
The Trachno Processor
The Fibrilen Processor
The Emenat Processor
The Vicolen Processor

I could go on... (really, i could)...

Re:One word:

[PedanticSpellingTrol]

Emenat? Isn't that one already a laxative?

Re:One word:

[chris_mahan]

Wouldn't know... I just pulled all these names out of my ass...

Oh wait...

Celeron Successor

[Kenshin]

I always thought the successor to the Celeron would be the Asparagon.

Re:Their processors were always strong and stable.

[kryptkpr]

VIA has made some major leaps in quality since then as well

VIA sucks. I have a KT400 based board that's been flaky from the get-go, the onboard USB seems to crash the system after about 20 minutes of use. Very unstable with Radeon cards, unless you don't mind AGP4x (and you HAVE to disable Fast Writes).

Sextium - better than pentium and has sex!

[ZeekWatson]

I'd call my processor a Sextium. Sextium sounds like its higher than pentium so it must be better. Plus it has sex in it.

We all know that sex sells. Imagine the ads!

Put it another way

[corngrower]

The Sempron 3100+ is a brain damaged Athlon64.

So to summarise in 3 points.....

[BestNicksRTaken]

1. This is a Thoroughbred-B core AthlonXP, so it's not even as fast as the later Barton core AthlonXP's, so clued-up people will still buy XP's instead of Sempr0ns.

2. They've upped the rating to reflect that it's competing with a Celeron not a Pentium4, e.g. what used to be a 2400+ to compete with a 2.4GHz P4, is now a 2800+ to compete with a 2.8GHz Celeron (which is about the same as a 2.4GHz P4).

This renaming will convice AOL users that these chips are now faster than the XP's they are actually slower than!

3. I'm sticking with my 2600+ Mobile Barton @ 2.51GHz, the next upgrade will be Athlon64 FX ;o)

Re:Their processors were always strong and stable.

[Illissius]

I have a KT400 system that's been giving me zero problems for close to a year now, running a Radeon card at AGP8x with fast writes enabled. (Although mine is a KT400A, dunno if it makes a difference.) I'm not saying VIA is perfect, but they've come a long way - with the KT133 your situation was the rule and not the exception (except it was probably worse).
Also helping things is that with the A64s a big chunk of the northbridge is integrated on the processor, giving VIA that much less opportunity to screw up.

This statement is out of left field.

[codeguy007]

writing "it appears as though the Socket A based Sempron performs abysmally while dollar for dollar the Socket 754 version levels every Intel CPU."


I looked at both the TH and Antech reviews and they say that for most tests the Semptron 2800+ beats the Celeron D in performance. So if it's performance is abysmal what does that say about the Celeron D?

NX bit

[Anonymous Coward]

So the NX bit didn't make it into Semprons only in Celeron D-s? Since security is becoming a more important factor than speed on "ordinary" net/typwriter PC-s, this is a real setback for AMD.

You dont need a fast pc

[a5cii]

to get things done

I have a Celeron 333mhz, 384mb 133 sd-ram, 120gb 7200rpm hdd, 4mb ati rage pro turbo, yamaha ds-xg, 10-100base ethernet

this machine runs windows 2000 pro and is used as a router, file server, web server, ftp server and is used for everything from graphics to video editing, it can be slow sometimes but most of time its perfect.

the only thing it wont do is use games but since i use another for games it doesnt matter. Its sort of used as a guest computer so that anyone visiting can browse the net or catch up on work if they are staying overnight.

if you want wordprocessing, simple games etc... an Acorn A3000 @ 8mhz with 4mb ram and no hdd works surprisingly well

Um... no

[HiggsBison]

This should be obvious from the association with "celery", the fastest of all vegetables.

Um... no, that would be Kudzu. Watch for Intel's new Kudzu line of "fast but braindead" processors in 1Q '06.

Re: Short pages at Tom's

[some guy I know]

states your point across pages 43-51 of their review

I made this same point yesterday (albeit in a slightly different manner), and got modded as flamebait.
I guess that it's how you tell it.

Re: Short pages at Tom's

[sharkey]

Some of the moderators purchase their "recreational" smokes from the same place Darl McBride does. Didn't you know that?