🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <01bd2ae0$cf6e5fc0$8c1a7acc@albert>, albert@netmation.com says...
>
>Can someone over any comparisons between running NT on a Pentium 233 vs. a
>Pentium II 233.  I have seen benchmark tests showing how the Pentium II's
>are somewhat better but when using things like Microsoft Office and
>Internet Browsers can you really tell much of a difference ?? Disappointed
>with the lack of ISA slots on the Pentium II motherboards is why I am
>asking and trying to determine if I really loose that much sticking with
>the older Pentium's assuming I am not doing any high end CAD and graphics
>work ??

  It is still possible to find PII boards with three ISA slots, but two is more 
common, and expect that to drop to zero in another year or so.  Think twice 
before buying any more ISA peripherals....

  The fast L2 cache on the PII doesn't seem to accomplish very much at 233MHz.  
Your browser experience is likely to be dominated by communication speed, and 
your word-processing and spreadsheets by hard drive I/O, and so performance 
differences between CPUs are unlikely to be very noticeable.  [The Cyrix 
6x86MX-PR233 tends to do particularly well on office-type tests because its 
large L1 cache improves IDE drive I/O.]
  One difference you might encounter is if you intend to install more than 64MB 
of RAM.  The L2 cache on the PII can handle up to 1GB of main RAM, but the 
current Intel Pentium chipsets (VX and TX) can't cache more than 64MB.  [The HX 
chipset, which could cache up to 512MB, has been discontinued because Intel 
wants you to buy a PII.]  Luckily, there are non-Intel chipsets that get around 
this:  AMD 640, VP2, and VP3.

David G