Thoroughbred or Barton?

[BurningSpear]

Scouting around for future mobo/cpu upgrade. Already decided on the Asus A7N8X. Now for the cpu:

I suppose I want to keep it under $200. What do you recommend for now?

I was looking at the XP2100+, but then I glanced a little higher on newegg and saw the Barton 2600+. It has 512k cache! The Thoroughbred 2600+ has only 256k cache and is only a little cheaper.

However, if 2100+ or even 1900+ is enough for now, I'd rather save the money and upgrade my ram.

[Strygun]

I am getting a 2500+ barton in my next comp, for $170 on newegg.

[OneManArmy]

well, There is no point in buying a slower chip now just to have to buy again later. the bartons have the bigger cache and the 333fsb. plus they come unlocked from the factory so when its time to upgrade again later on you can just overclock it and save money.

even if you have 200 total to work with. the 2500+ barton is only like $160 or something. that leaves you enough to buy 512MB of PC2700 RAM. (granted you need a few more dollars but I'm sure thats easy enough to come by)

[Sentrosi]

From what I've read about the Bartons, for us gamers they really don't give us any advantage over the Thoroughbred cores. Sure, they have the extra L2 Cache, but for us gamers the performance is negligible. And with the Epox 8RDA+, it allows 333Mhz FSB performance as well. Also, you don't have to use any physical unlocking of the CPU with it, it's all done in the mobo bios.

[Strygun]

Originally posted by Sentrosi
From what I've read about the Bartons, for us gamers they really don't give us any advantage over the Thoroughbred cores. Sure, they have the extra L2 Cache, but for us gamers the performance is negligible. And with the Epox 8RDA+, it allows 333Mhz FSB performance as well. Also, you don't have to use any physical unlocking of the CPU with it, it's all done in the mobo bios.

So does that mean any kind of OCing I will do on my 2500 barton will just be done in the bios? (Someone told me that I would have to take a pencil and color in some grooves or something on the chip...)

[OneManArmy]

Ok about overclocking. The Thoroughbreds are LOCKED!!! they require the silver and glue (pencil wont work on the XP's )

The Bartons are UNLOCKED!!!
all you have to do is set the features in the bios


basrtons are worth it for that alone.

[Strygun]

Originally posted by OneManArmy
Ok about overclocking. The Thoroughbreds are LOCKED!!! they require the silver and glue (pencil wont work on the XP's )

The Bartons are UNLOCKED!!!
all you have to do is set the features in the bios


basrtons are worth it for that alone.

Yay! So all i have to do is open the bios and set the speed? don't have to touch the barton AT ALL?

[OneManArmy]

that is correct sir, No greasy little hands ever have to touch the precious.... err. . chip

[Hunter83]

Originally posted by Shogun
So does that mean any kind of OCing I will do on my 2500 barton will just be done in the bios? (Someone told me that I would have to take a pencil and color in some grooves or something on the chip...)

I wasn't aware that all of the Barton chips are unlocked. However, even if they weren't, to unlock them you wouldn't even need to touch the CPU at all. Same thing with the T-Bred.

The only XP core that u have to have surgical skills to unlock is the Palomino core.


Bartons are great overclockers.
BurningSpear. I recommend that you go for the Barton 2500+ and just increase the multipliers. You could easily beat what the 2700+ is clocked at.

[BurningSpear]

thanks so much for the info, guys. i love this forum!!!!