| Intel Celeron Pro by Leonard "Viking1" Hjalmarson |
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You're chugging along on that P166 and you know its time to upgrade. You could bite the bullet for a PII 350 or 400, but add the price of the CPU to the new mainboard and your wife will skin you alive! What are you gonna do?? How about a new 400 MHz Pentium II CPU for $225 US? Its an exciting time to be alive (unless you live in Russia!). Software is rapidly catching up to the abilities of hot new 3d accelerators, and CPU prices are falling almost as fast as memory prices! The BX 100MHz bus in now in the mainstream, and a gaggle of new PCs are about to emerge. August 24th saw the release of two new versions of the low-cost Celeron processor and a 450-MHz Pentium II. But hang on.. there is more here than meets the eye! This is not just another pretty Celeron face. The new Celeron Pro (formerly code-named "Mendocino" is important to you if you are about to make a CPU upgrade. What the heck is the Celeron, let alone the "Celeron Pro?" I'm glad you asked! Remember the 486SX, the early 32 bit processor with the disabled math coprocessor? The Celeron is a similar idea, a Pentium II core chip designed to work with secondary cache memory, but Intel removed the cache to reduce cost, leading to a severe degradation in performance. Running at 300 MHz and 333 MHz, the new Celeron Pro will greatly improve upon the performance of the first Celeron chips. The new chips will contain 128K of integrated "cache" memory. Integration means that the cache runs at full CPU speed, further improving performance. Although the cache on the Celeron is one-fourth the size of the standard Pentium II memory, integration makes the cache twice as fast, according to Nathan Brookwood, semiconductor analyst for Dataquest. The upcoming Celerons will be the first Pentium II-level chips to have an integrated cache.
Early results are indicating that the Celeron Pro is faster than Klamath in 3D accelerated games such as Forsaken, Turok, Incoming, etc., though the CPU was not initially recognized by many Intel 440BX mainboads. (Note: Klamath is the code name for the standard PII chip). 3DWinBench98 Results
3DWinBench98 Results
3DGames
Tested with Riva 128 AGP, Driver V2.0 B1.5, 64 meg Ram on Sambo Detroit 440BX Mainboard(AMI Bios) What does this news mean for gamers? It means that there is a hot new upgrade path for less than half the price you would pay for a PII 400! This means that the following system configuration could be yours for about $1000 US:
Wait a minute, you are saying. I thought you said I could have a 400 MHz system based on the Celeron Pro? You can, because the Pro is based on the new .25 micron process. You can easily overclock this chip to 4x 100 on a BX mainboard to run at 400 MHz. By the weekend we should have our first test results in a batch of new and coming sims to verify the speed against our benchmark PII 300 system.
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This morning Cyrellis had posted his own hands on tests with the Celeron "A" (earlier termed the "Pro"). He ran the 3-00 "A" up to 464 MHz! Here is a part of his conclusion: Several overclockers that we routinely communicate with seem to agree that in the case of the Celeron class of CPUs the "Retail" models overclock slightly better than their OEM cousins. We've already heard reports of people taking their new Celeron 300 As up to the 504MHz level (4.5 x 112MHz) with proper cooling. Cyrellis was never able to achieve this speed, or even come close to it, but again each CPU manufactured is unique especially when they're comprised of over 19 million trace routes as the Celeron A is. Also worth noting is the fact that we weren't able to select any other multiplier with the Celeron 300 A besides 4.5x, even with the Abit BH6 mainboard. The Celeron 333 A will be equipped with a permanent 5.0x multiplier, so it's really unknown how "good" the 333 A will be for the overclocking-motivated buyer. Lately I've had a slew of letters asking about the best upgrade path. The list above is my recommendation and the system configuration we will be testing this week. If you must run Glide or prefer Voodoo acceleration then you can add Metabyte's Wicked 3d-2 or Ubisoft's MaxiGamer 3d-2 to the list and maybe swap out the D3d board for a cheaper i740 based board to maintain AGP compatability. As for the near future in CPUs, here is what's coming down the pike.... "Intel will try to push the integration concept of integrated caches across the product line," Diefendorff said. The first examples of this technology migrating to other Intel chips will come in the first quarter, he added. Then, Intel will release the first "Katmai" chips, a new generation of chips that will contain additional multimedia instructions. Katmai, which has been called "MMX 2", will appear on Pentium II and Xeon processors running at 500 MHz and higher. Intel is also slated to release "Dixon," a 333-MHz Pentium II processor with 256K of integrated memory. The processor will mostly be used in mobile computers. In the second half, Intel will then release "Coppermine," a Pentium II chip, and "Cascades," a Xeon processor. These will be the first chips made on the advanced 0.18-micron manufacturing process. In addition, they will contain integrated secondary caches, Brookwood predicted. By that time, Katmai technology will be coming to the Celeron line, Diefendorff estimated. Celerons also will get boosted to 400 MHz by the end of 1999. Celeron processors will also shift from the 66-MHz bus to the 100-MHz bus. The bus is a data conduit between the processor and other parts of the PC. Intel, of course, will not be the only game in town when it comes to new processors. AMD's 350-MHz K6-2 has drawn a great deal of vendor support and is an excellent upgrade option at its current price point. Moreover, AMD plans to release the K6-3 in the first quarter of 1999. This chip will contain 256K of integrated memory. Cyrix, a subsidiary of National Semiconductor, also will be releasing a new generation of chips based around its upcoming core, code-named Cayenne. "If nobody stumbles, you have AMD with the K6-3, Intel with Katmai, and Cyrix with Cayenne. All three will have really very hot products," Brookwood said. "It is going to be interesting to see what happens." The 300-MHz Celeron Pro is available for about $179 while the 333-MHz Celeron Pro can be found for $219. Meanwhile, the 450-MHz Pentium II is selling around $725. The Celerons will cost $139 and $179 in volume, compared to $316 and $23 for 300-MHz and 333-MHz Pentium IIs. Watch for our hands on report which will include a complete review of STBs V4400 (Riva TNT). STB has now officially shipped the new board, at a price lower than expected, and final drivers have also been released. Ed.Note: The new bios for ASUS P2L97 supports Celeron Mendocino...
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