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Fluctuat Nec Mergitur, "Battled by Waves, it still won't sink" is probably the best way to describe Quake3 Arena as a benchmark. While it becomes somewhat obsolete as a graphics card benchmark, it still scales quite nicely with CPU power.

Demo_four 512 x 384 Fastest

521 fps at the fastest setting is a respectable score even if it required to overclock the P4 to 3.15 GHz

For Comparison

Memory bandwidth plays an equally important role in Quake3 Arena

Just increasing the memory bandwith by setting the bus at DDR 400 and 2:2:2 settings is equivalent to a NO booster. Add a few MHz in clockspeed and it sure looks like a winner.

Demo_four 640 x 480 Normal

Frames per second, higher is better: The scores speak for themselves.

Conclusion

It is somewhat hard to derive at any conclusion here. On the one hand, we see benchmark scores that are still in the future to come to a desktop near you, on the other hand, we have none of the latest AMD processors for comparison. Suffice it to say that at the present time, the Pentium4 2.8 GHz qualifies as the fastest desktop processor out there, however, performance comes at a premium and that is where AMD may be able to score.

We certainly answered our own questions, that is, the 2.8 GHz grade is not just a souped-up 2.5 GHz CPU, rather it has some hefty overclocking potential. Likewise, it may be that in the future, the mainboards will need to move to better power circuitry, for the time being, though, the current solutions will do at least up to 3.2 GHz. As long as they are provided by a quality manufacturer.

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