Intel's Enemy No. 1: The AMD K6 CPU

The Windows 95 Performance Of The K6

Let's say it loud and clear. Under Windows 95 the K6 is the fastest CPU currently available. The K6 233 reaches a Windows 95 performance that's higher than of a Pentium MMX, still higher than of an overclocked Pentium MMX 225, higher than of a PPro 200 and equal to an overclocked PPro 233. Overclocked to 250 MHz (3x83 MHz) and 262.5 MHz (3.5x75 MHz) it's faster than anything else under Windows 95 and even the upcoming Pentium II will have its problems with it.

The K6 166 is almost as fast as an Intel Pentium MMX 200, the K6 200 is already faster than this Intel CPU and the K6 233 shows a distance of even 4 Winstone 97 points to the Pentium MMX 200.

As you can see, the Highend Winstone performance of the K6 is at the same level as the Pentium and definitely lower than the Highend Winstone performance of the Pentium Pro. The difference in WinQuake is even bigger. This shows that the FPU performance of the K6 is lower than the FPU performance of the Intel CPUs.

The importance of the FPU in normal applications is still very questionable. Even Quake players should have got the message by now, that you rather save some money purchasing a CPU and buy a Diamond Monster 3D instead. This enables you to play GLQuake, which is faster than any 'only CPU driven' normal Quake and it is looking 100000 times better.

In terms of the normal business applications under Windows 95 the K6 is the absolute winner. The Pentium II CPU at 233 MHz will probably be just as fast or maybe slightly faster, but for a much higher price.