CPU Price/Performance ratio

  • Thread starter Thread starter harry
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harry

Hi,

Would anyone have a link to Price/Performance report on a range of the
latest processors? Or personal recommendations?

I'm considering purchasing a new pc however the cost of the top processors
(both AMD & Intel) are prohibitive for me. I also believe there may in fact
be better price/performance ratio using cheaper slower CPU's however using
mutilple pc's. My application can make use of either single or multiple
systems.

Apart from the CPU cost, the motherboards tend also to be expensive for
these top end processors.

Thanks
Harry
 
harry said:
Hi,

Would anyone have a link to Price/Performance report on a range of the
latest processors? Or personal recommendations?

I'm considering purchasing a new pc however the cost of the top processors
(both AMD & Intel) are prohibitive for me. I also believe there may in fact
be better price/performance ratio using cheaper slower CPU's however using
mutilple pc's. My application can make use of either single or multiple
systems.
Click to expand...

It seems the slowest processor is the best value for money
I would never pay almost 3 times the price for a CPU less
than 30% faster.
I would question the sanity of someone who would.
Also I doubt I could tell in a blind test which had the faster CPU.
 
Thanks for your advice.


half_pint said:
It seems the slowest processor is the best value for money
I would never pay almost 3 times the price for a CPU less
than 30% faster.
I would question the sanity of someone who would.
Also I doubt I could tell in a blind test which had the faster CPU.
Click to expand...
 
Hi,

Would anyone have a link to Price/Performance report on a range of the
latest processors? Or personal recommendations?

I'm considering purchasing a new pc however the cost of the top processors
(both AMD & Intel) are prohibitive for me. I also believe there may in fact
be better price/performance ratio using cheaper slower CPU's however using
mutilple pc's. My application can make use of either single or multiple
systems.

Apart from the CPU cost, the motherboards tend also to be expensive for
these top end processors.
Click to expand...

The basic rule is, never buy bleeding edge. Instead,
purchase one or two models older then the current model
(or whatever has been out for 6-9 months).

A 3.4Ghz CPU isn't that much faster then a 3.0Ghz CPU,
but the price difference is quite large. (At work, we
trade down on the CPU speed and use the cost savings to
bulk up on memory amounts. Over the long-term, having
1GB RAM instead of 512MB RAM is going to give us an
extra 1-2 years of useable life on the machine.)
 
If you're buying a prebuilt system, the price of a bleeding edge
system is going to be at least double the cost of an older one. Look
to buy YESTERDAY'S hot technology - ie. buy a P4 3.0GHz rather than
3.2GHz; it'll be at least 30-40% less.

If you want to save a few bucks and build your own, check out this
article at Tom's hardware for a nice gaming system for under $1000:
http://www.tomshardware.com/game/20040529/index.html

For even cheaper, try:
http://www.anandtech.com/guides/index.html
and check out the system buying guides.

The difference in price of the "slowest" and a "middle of the pack"
CPU is usually only a few dollars, depending on where you shop. And
the difference in speed and responsiveness between, say, a Celeron
1.3GHz at $42 and an AthlonXP 2000+ at $52 is going to be VERY
noticable (prices from www.newegg.com).

For a cost-effective home-built system consider an AMD AthlonXP 2600+
($90 with heatsink), with 512MB 333MHz DDR ram ($85), 80GB HDD ($68)
and an NForce 2 400 chipset MB, like the ASUS A7N8X-X ($70). A good
gaming video card doesn't need to be expensive - check out the
Sapphire Radeon 9600 Pro card ($125). Add a case, CD-WR, keyboard,
mouse and XP Home, and you'll have a good system for around $600 plus
shipping.

Good Luck!
ECM
 
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