AMD Duron

Remember that the Duron uses the same core as the Athlon, so when it tramples over even the Pentium III running at 800MHz under SPECviewperf you can understand why. Only the much more expensive Pentium III 800/133 running on an i820 + RDRAM platform is able to outperform the Duron running at 700MHz and even then only by 0.11 fps; even by professional standards, that's not a big difference.

If you're running a lot of professional OpenGL applications under NT/2000, then the Duron may be the bargain buy you've been waiting for.

The trend continues under the DesignReview test, the Duron 700 is just slightly slower than a Pentium III 800/133 on an i820 + RDRAM setup. Don't forget that the Duron is a value processor, and here it is competing with the performance desktop parts and even beating them!

While both AMD and OEMs will position the Duron as a value competitor to the Celeron, don't forget that the Duron's roots lie with the Athlon and thus is much more than a "cheap processor."

The Data Explorer test is even more impressive for the Duron as it manages to beat the Pentium III 800/133 on the fastest platform for the processor, the BX running at an overclocked 133MHz FSB.

Here the Duron 700 is pretty much identical to the Athlon 700 and wouldn't be too far behind a Thunderbird 750 either. The Celeron is nowhere to be seen, not even the overclocked 850MHz part.

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