~misfit~ wrote:

PS. Not sure if I completely trust that calculator though. I just put in the
three different Celerons at a theoretical CPU speed of 500MHz and a memory
speed of 100 and got:

You should not trust the calculator. If you look at the code you will
see that it is only valid for a limited range of multipliers for each
processor variation. It will overestimate the time for lower multipliers
and underestimate the time for higher multipliers.

<checks perfcomp.xml in setispy>
Coppermine Intel Celeron II   cache 128 <min>8  <max>11.5
Tualatin   Intel Celeron III  cache 256 <min>12 <max>12
Coppermine Intel Pentium IIIE cache 256 <min>4  <max>8.5
Tualatin   Intel Pentium III  cache 256 <min>6  <max>10.5
Tualatin   Intel Pentium III  cache 512 <min>6  <max>10.5

Neither CPU is covered in this. 

To Flwrite.

Cache size and memory speed is important. I think you will find that the
Cel 1.4 and the PIII 1.1 both have 256KB L2. Check with Powerleap before
buying. In this case the cheaper Celeron will be faster. If the PIII has
512KB L2, then that might be quicker because the extra cache hits more
than make up for the speed difference. But doubling the cache size makes
progressively less difference as the absolute cache size increases, so
they might end up about the same. I would go for the cheaper option,
but...

Your new CPU will considerably outclass the rest of the Dell memory,
graphics, disk subsystems etc. and all this will still run at the same
old speed. Consider putting the $200 towards a new system where all the
components will run more than twice as fast. Even the cheapest kit will
do this these days.

Cheers,
Chris.