VIA C3 Processor

mtxblau

Mid Boss
I was thinking of building another low cost system and the VIA C3 processor caught my eye - apparently runs very, very cool. No messy fans or other things to deal with, so it seems.

Anyone have any thoughts on it? It says it can handle multimedia, but I'm not sure if it's the same way the K6-2 'handles' multimedia. ;-) When I mean multimedia, I mean gaming (nothing too intensive like Morrowind), internet, DVD playback, etc.
 
From the benchmarks i have seen a high end C3 runs better than a k62. My k62 gets just over 150 3dmark2001's and a Via Eden board (fecking small motherboard with a C3 soldered on it, about 17x15 cm) gets about 1300. It also runs quake 3 pretty well. We are planning to get one or two of these via edens to play around with them. lets face it, a tiny motherboard with everything on it for less than £100 all in is pretty fantastic!

As long as your not trying to compete with an duron or a p3 you should be fine
 
After reading some reviews on this thing, it isn't as great as it was made out to be by Via. Obviously they're going to boast that it's everything you dreamed it to be and more, but it really has some failings.

Another issue is that there are very few reviews for it. I didn't think it was that obscure.

But as far as price goes, it's all the same if I just went for a micro-ATX Duron setup, I think.
 
The C3 processor isn't really what you're after for a high-performance gaming or number-crunching CPU. It's single-issue, in-order and I would assume floating-point performance isn't exactly stellar either. And much like the P4 you probably needs specially optimized binaries to get full performance from it.
 
To sum up:

It's cheap for a reason.

It runs cool for a reason.

It doesn't have a dozen superpipelined execution units for a reason.

The reason? All other things being equal, fewer transistors means less heat dissipation, more units per wafer, and a smaller percentage of units lost to defects. This processor is the way it is intentionally- VIA's people knew that competing directly with AMD's and Intel's high-end offerings would be suicide, so they went after a different market with different needs.
 
I should add that from what I read (I keep finding these articles at unheard of review sites) it doesn't run as cool as one would think - an underclocked Duron would achieve the same effect, if used in the same way.

Those Shuttle micro PCs look stellar, though. With a decent PCI video card, they could be incredible systems. Probably not nearly as cost effective, but very cool nonetheless.
 
Yes but it runs cooler than my K62 and has more power. Its not just about the transistors. The Via c3 uses a manufacturing die of both .13 and .15 micron, something which even intel doesnt use. So it runs cooler than my .17 micron k62.

Yes, the C3 isnt very powerful but it has its pro's and cons. Use it for things like being a proxy and a router. Dont use it as a citrix server
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The Via c3 uses a manufacturing die of both .13 and .15 micron, something which even intel doesnt use.

AFAIK, Tualatin P3 and Northwood P4 cores are both .13 micron. The "micron" measurements refer to elements on the chip such as transistors; a "die" is the actual chip once it's been separated from the wafer by a dicer. Via's cores are smaller than Intel's or AMD's though, precisely because the designers eliminated transistor-heavy features.

Yes, the C3 isnt very powerful but it has its pro's and cons. Use it for things like being a proxy and a router. Dont use it as a citrix server

Exactly.
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