What's the difference between a P4 and a P4 Celeron?

[Speed Racer]

I'm looking into motherboards and I'm wondering what's the difference between a P4 1700 and a P4 1700 Celeron? Other than price, if they are both 1700 speed is there really any difference as far as the speed of the proccesors? I'm guessing that they are pretty much the same, any info on the difference would be appreciated, thanks!

[MOVIEGEEK]

AFAIK there is no such thing as a P4 Celeron,it is simply a Celeron.
Here is the differance between a P4 and Celeron:
P4-512kb L2 cache(faster processing),SSE2(higher quality multimedia)
Celeron-128kb L2 cache,SSE

[nfl2k2]

there is no p4 celeron,

p4 northwood - 512k cache, faster fsb
celeron - 128k cache, slower fsb

celeron = sucky, northwood = great.

[freak_in_cage_10k]

Basically m8, although the other 2 guys know what they are on about, Celeron is a highly cut down version of the P4, which means that when it comes to intensive processing, it falls really far behind!!!! it is MUCH more preferable to have a 1.5Gig P4 than it is to have a 1.8Gig Celeron etc! thats just an example. the difference may be even greater! Intel brought out the celeron so that they could sell what appears to be fast PCs for very cheap.

So, when encoding DVDs etc, you need to decide between P4 and AMD Althalon XP, dont even consider Celeron unless u r on a serious budget m8

[vitualis]

A little bit of semantics perhaps, but there are Celerons based on the P4 core which is what the original poster was probably asking. And contrary to someone up this thread, those Celerons do support SSE2 (just like the P4).

These Celerons are based on the Willamette core (?spelling) -- i.e., the original P4 with less cache I believe. Tom's Hardware Guide a few months ago had a look at these "P4" based Celeron processors. http://www.tomshardware.com

Basically, they suck...

Regards.

[MOVIEGEEK]

Point-Counterpoint vitualis
SSE2 is incorporated in Celerons >1.8Ghz and a 1.7Ghz P4 and 1.7Ghz Celeron will have the same FSB(400Mhz).

Speed Racer,
Whatever you decide get one at least 1.8Ghz especially if you go P4(Northwood is much better than Willimette).

[vitualis]

Cool. I didn't know that.

Best regards.

[ChrisX]

There is no such thing as a P4 Celeron, anyway the Pentium 4 is much faster with a much better performance than the Celeron.

I've seen evidence of this difference having two computers, one as a Celeron and the other a Pentium 4. The CPU speeds are similar and the Pentuim is much quicker in response time.

[Speed Racer]

Thanks very much for all the replies, they all were most helpful. I figured a P4 would be better than a Celeron (just based on the price difference) but I wanted to know some of the facts first. Thanks again!

[vitualis]

Yes, the Celeron sucks compared to the P4...

However, since there is no naming differential between the different classes of Celeron, I think that dubbing the the Celerons based on the P4 core a "P4 Celeron" is quite valid... This is as opposed to the "Tualin Celeron", the "Coppermine Celeron", etc...

Regards.