Budget Gaming CPU Released

On Monday, AMD launched the Duron 850MHz in America, and as usual, the reviews have already started to hit the Net. Dr. Tom at Tom's Hardware has given it his once over, asking some very fetching questions of the little processor, such as whether the Duron can be classed as a success or a failure. For AMD's part, it hasn't sold as well as they would have liked, but as Tom says, purely on a cost/performance ratio, it's faultless. The reason it doesn't sell, one must conclude, is the lack of integrated chipsets, something that PC Chips and others are now rectifying. Another question many have asked is how does the Duron 850 shape up to Intel's recently released 800MHz Celeron. The answer is rather well, as it stomps on the new Celeron in virtually every test anyone has thrown at it. The Duron overclocks better too, with some punters running it at nearly 1.1GHz. Other tests, run by the likes of Sharky Extreme, demonstrate the same trends, with the Duron outpacing the Celeron in 3D benchmarks and to a lesser extent in cache-heavy applications. The only downside to the 850 seems to be that an old, overclockered Duron performs exactly the same, and for less. Although that said, your mileage may vary. Pricewise, the 850 cannot be faulted, falling into line at £82.00 before VAT. The nearest thing is the Celeron 733, which costs £89.00 before VAT. The lowest speed product in the Duron line, the Duron 700, costs £45.00 + VAT. At the time of writing, AMD have yet to get back to us about the Duron's release in the United Kingdom. We expect to have more information on the timing of it shortly. Related Feature - AMD Duron Review