AMD Athlon XP 2800+ - Introducing the first 333MHz FSB Athlon XP

Final Words

The numbers speak for themselves, the Athlon XP 2800+ is yet another competitive part from AMD. While it fails to regain the absolute performance crown for AMD, it keeps them in the running with Intel.

As we mentioned earlier, there's only a 5% increase in clock speed between the XP 2800+ and the 2600+. Much of the performance gain we saw here today wasn't due to the increase in clock speed, but a result of the FSB and memory buses now running synchronously at a 166MHz frequency. The resulting reduction in latency provides an increase in performance across the board that helps make the jump to the XP 2800+ more than just a measly 5% bump.

The only real problem (and it's a big one at that) with this processor is that you can't get your hands on one, and you won't be able to for quite some time. Remember that at the time of publication the Athlon XP 2400+ and 2600+ parts just started popping up in the channel, it's going to be a matter of months before you can easily pick up a 2800+. By then Intel will have launched the 3.06GHz Pentium 4 with Hyper-Threading support, thus extending their performance lead even further while maintaining a steady grip on the performance crown.

It will take more than a series of paper launched processors to keep AMD truly competitive in the market; what worries us the most is that if AMD is having difficulty getting these CPUs out and into mass production in a timely manner, then what's to say that Hammer will be any different? With the release of Hammer now several months away, we can only hope that AMD can sort things out before then.