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This is an ever growing problem with people and the numbers that they buy.
When you go and buy a P4-HT based computer that claims to have an 800 MHz Front Side Bus, the system bus is actually only working at 400 MHz, but because of a tricky way that Intel counts clock cycles, it comes out as double.
Same deal with DDR RAM. DDR RAM stands for Double Data Rate Random Access Memory, which means that it will transfer data when you go from a 0 to 1, and from 1 to 0, essentially doubling the rate at which you can transfer data. The actual clock speed of the Ram IS 200 MHz, but because we get the data transfer twice each clock cycle, they SAY 400.
Just another point to add to this... Numbers don't really mean all that much. When you look at the actual clock speeds of AMD CPUs, you'll quickly see that they are lower than the clock speeds of Intel chips. This does not mean, however, that AMD chips are slower. On the contrary, some people have found that for similarly priced CPUs, AMD Athlons will run faster than Intel P4's. Furthermore, Mac G4 processors running at 1.25 GHz, will CREAM any Intel P4 chip at about 2 GHz. Don't even get me started on 2.0 GHz G5's.... *drools*
When you look at Sony's Playstation2 and MS's XBox, you'll see that the processors in the two systems are rated at 300 MHz, and 733 MHz. BUT.... the PlayStation2 can produce MUCH more vivid video and handle much more intensive processes than the XBox can, because of the way that the processor works. MS basically threw together a cheap computer, put a basic OS in there (and I mean basic...), and sold it on the market as a gaming console, while playing the number game on the market.
Basically what I'm saying is that the numbers don't really mean all that much in the end. As long as your computer works the way you want it to, that's all that's important.
Hope this all makes sense.
Cheers.
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You can't poke someone with an infinite rod.
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