....aggg help me, the AMD Klan is trying to lynch me HELP!!

Nobody is going to lynch ya but the prob I have with o/c'ing reports of P4's is that the P4 is able to just slow itself down if it thinks its getting too hot. I.e., you can overclock all you want but you'll never know whether the CPU is really running at the speed you think it's running at, or for how long it's running fast or slow. That unpredicatbility and uncertainty to me is pretty much a prob. Achim

Why is that a problem? This way you don't have to worry about burning up your CPU. I think that's a plus myself.

The Temperature Threshold is somewhere around 72C I would imagine. If you have any processor running that hot, you've got SERIOUS problems. It only slows it down to keep from burning up. The original settings (at least for my coppermine P3) is 82C and to lock the processor. Slowing it down if you were to get that high(for some god unknown reason, using a P2 fan for a P3 like I did?? HAHA..yes..I've hit 79C before..then i got an orb and it doesnt get anywhere close to that hot) is a plus. It keeps the system running, and allows for less downtime. For a server that NEEDS to be left on regardless, this means for less downtime, it can potentially also mean that if u're careful enough, NO downtime as you could do a hot swap of the HSF...but I wouldn't try that one...but still, less downtime regardless. May run dirt slow for that period of time that u're running it at 100C, but at least 1) the processor will NOT die, and 2) it will not stop working. Your data will still get pushed through the processor regardless of the rate.

The reason for such the low drop in speed for cooling is because it wants to get the temperature down as quickly as possible. The lower the speed, the quicker that temperature will drop to safe levels of operation. But you surely would not notice this under normal operation. As long as your system is properly cooled, with a P4-made HSF, then u're going to be good to go and should not experience ANY drops in speed. What you see on the internet can almost entirely be lies. People will do anything they can to be top dog. That is why I don't believe these Northwood benchmarks. Both, however, agree only on one thing. The overclockability. The Pentium 4 is now cost effective solution. Unless you absolutely HAVE to have the bragging rights, then there is no reason not to buy a Pentium 4-based system. Who cares about 'faster this' and 'faster that'. That's only for bragging and under real world operation there's a million and one things running on the PC that could change those numbers just as easy. By covering SDRAM, PC1600,PC2100,PC2400,PC2700 DDR SDRAM, and PC800 RDRAM, the Pentium 4 fits everyone's budget. Hell, if you go take a look at pricewatch vs. Crucial, 1.5GB of PC800 RDRAM is actually a few dollars cheaper than 1.5GB of PC2100 DDR SDRAM(price on RDRAM from Samsung modules, price on DDR SDRAM is for Crucial PC2100 DDR, I think it was non-ecc[they were like $162 each]) The current 'battles' between Intel and AMD are totally unwarranted. Both companies make great products. It gives users a choice, but the final choice is made over what you want. Bragging rights, or compatibility and stability. Currently the hot chipset for AMD's Athlon is the Via KT266A. If you've read, all via southbridges have a PCI data transfer problem with can hinder RAID, and IDE RAID quite significantly compared to that of SiS chipsets, ALI chipsets, or Intel's chipsets. As well, Via has numerous problems with their AGP implementation, most of which have been fixed, but many users still experience problems and still have not changed their motherboards. I would give via's garbage-bin rate of about 30% of their production boards. For example, some people have had problems with 23.11 Detonator XP drivers, and I've seen others with no problems at all. In the end, I would have to say Intel-based systems have a slight lead in terms of value and what you get. However, if you want those bragging rights and do NOTHING else but benchmark your PC just to tell people "yeah, I got THIS number." Then sure, go right for it, the Athlon's perfect for you.

*Corrections* Modify the first RAID to SCSI. Input ATA133 in that little mix too. change "30% of their production boards" to "30% of their production chips" Okay, I'm done =P Enjoy