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I don't think you can make a credible case that a 2024 PC is equal to a 2014 one. In 2014 you could get 4 Haswell cores in a 65W TDP, for 410 2014 US dollars. F

I don't think you can make a credible case that a 2024 PC is equal to a 2014 one. In 2014 you could get 4 Haswell cores in a 65W TDP, for 410 2014 US dollars. For the same power and less money in 2024 you get a web browser platform that is around 6x faster, or a code compilation platform that is 5-20x faster.

antisthenes 2y ago
> In 2014 you could get 4 Haswell cores in a 65W TDP, for 410 2014 US dollars. Is there a typo here? I bought a 4-core Haswell in 2014 for around $200. It definitely didn't cost anywhere near $410, except maybe for the 6-core HEDT cpu?
- jeffbee 2y ago
  I was just looking at the launch MSRP of one of the higher-end hyperthreaded ones, but sure there was a range including $182 for the i5-4460S without hyperthreading, $224 for the i5-4690S, etc.
jauntywundrkind 2y ago
The n100 that's out is on par-ish both in performance and only a little bit more power saving than a i5-6500t. A 2013 core. https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/products/sku/88183/intel-core-i56500t-processor-6m-cache-up-to-3-10-ghz/specifications.html https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/products/sku/88183/i... The price point is far better at least (iff we look at new inventory only).
michaelt 2y ago
A lot of the performance gains of the past 10 years aren't obvious from the headline specs. The desktop PC I built in 2015 for £1082.98 i7-4790K (4 cores, "4.00 GHz base 4.40 GHz Turbo") 32GB DDR3 RAM Samsung 250GB SSD nvidia GTX 960 2GB GPU The desktop PC Dell will sell me, today, for £1,174.80 [1] i7-14700 (8 performance cores, 12 efficient cores, "2.1 GHz Base, 5.4 GHz Turbo") 32GB DDR5 RAM 512 GB SSD Intel Integrated Graphics Sure, it's better. But on paper those spec changes don't look game-changing, considering it's been an entire decade. Especially if you're mistrustful of efficiency cores. But what those headline specs don't mention is that the RAM is 4x faster, the SSD is now nvme and faster, the pcie lanes are 4x faster, and the CPU cache has quadrupled. [1] https://www.dell.com/en-uk/shop/desktop-computers/new-optiplex-micro-form-factor/spd/optiplex-7020-plus-micro/s010o7020mffp_vp https://www.dell.com/en-uk/shop/desktop-computers/new-optipl...
- adgjlsfhk1 2y ago
  The other big difference is if you are comparing DIY vs DIY, you can now get a 2TB SSD for $100 which is pretty great compared to a decade ago.
  - BearOso 2y ago
    A good 2TB TLC NVMe 4.0 drive went for 100 USD when the prices bottomed out, but Samsung and friends cut the supply. You can get 2TB for cheap now, but those are DRAM-less QLC drives. I suggest paying an extra 30-50 USD to get one with the TLC and RAM.
- jeffbee 2y ago
  On paper those specs definitely look game-changing to me. The newer one has three of the older CPUs on the side, for free. The i9 is even more ridiculous, having what amounts to 4 quad-core Skylake CPUs as coprocessors (efficiency cores, in the parlance). But people are underestimating the compound effect of 10 years of 15% generational improvements. The CPUs in the article will run your web browser 4x faster than the older CPU you mentioned, about 2x faster than a Ryzen 5 5500 that is only 2 years old.
  - michaelt 2y ago
    > On paper those specs definitely look game-changing to me. The reality is that the newer processor is better in all benchmarks. Like 4-5x on the benchmarks I looked up, yes. But back in the day, the 'turbo' frequency was only available for a few seconds for thermal and power reasons, and the 'base' clock speed was how it would actually perform on big, compute-intensive tasks. If you only consider "8 performance cores, 2.1 GHz Base" vs "4 cores, 4.0 GHz base" and you also discount the 'efficiency cores', a person might think performance had barely changed.
- imtringued 2y ago
  Those are the specs you'd expect from a $500 mini PC. Step up to $700 and you will get a better CPU plus 2TB nvme SSD. https://www.geekom.de/geekom-a5-mini-pc/ https://www.geekom.de/geekom-a5-mini-pc/
karmakaze 2y ago
I can still use my casual desktop PC with a dual-core i7 for web browsing and video streaming without much noticeable degradation. I use that PC to play StarCraft 2 on medium graphics. I can do light web, Java/Kotlin dev on it, but I wouldn't try doing any kind of mobile dev.

antisthenes 2y ago

> In 2014 you could get 4 Haswell cores in a 65W TDP, for 410 2014 US dollars. Is there a typo here? I bought a 4-core Haswell in 2014 for around $200. It definitely didn't cost anywhere near $410, except maybe for the 6-core HEDT cpu?

jeffbee 2y ago
I was just looking at the launch MSRP of one of the higher-end hyperthreaded ones, but sure there was a range including $182 for the i5-4460S without hyperthreading, $224 for the i5-4690S, etc.

jauntywundrkind 2y ago

The n100 that's out is on par-ish both in performance and only a little bit more power saving than a i5-6500t. A 2013 core. https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/products/sku/88183/intel-core-i56500t-processor-6m-cache-up-to-3-10-ghz/specifications.html https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/products/sku/88183/i... The price point is far better at least (iff we look at new inventory only).

michaelt 2y ago

A lot of the performance gains of the past 10 years aren't obvious from the headline specs. The desktop PC I built in 2015 for £1082.98 i7-4790K (4 cores, "4.00 GHz base 4.40 GHz Turbo") 32GB DDR3 RAM Samsung 250GB SSD nvidia GTX 960 2GB GPU The desktop PC Dell will sell me, today, for £1,174.80 [1] i7-14700 (8 performance cores, 12 efficient cores, "2.1 GHz Base, 5.4 GHz Turbo") 32GB DDR5 RAM 512 GB SSD Intel Integrated Graphics Sure, it's better. But on paper those spec changes don't look game-changing, considering it's been an entire decade. Especially if you're mistrustful of efficiency cores. But what those headline specs don't mention is that the RAM is 4x faster, the SSD is now nvme and faster, the pcie lanes are 4x faster, and the CPU cache has quadrupled. [1] https://www.dell.com/en-uk/shop/desktop-computers/new-optiplex-micro-form-factor/spd/optiplex-7020-plus-micro/s010o7020mffp_vp https://www.dell.com/en-uk/shop/desktop-computers/new-optipl...

adgjlsfhk1 2y ago
The other big difference is if you are comparing DIY vs DIY, you can now get a 2TB SSD for $100 which is pretty great compared to a decade ago.
- BearOso 2y ago
  A good 2TB TLC NVMe 4.0 drive went for 100 USD when the prices bottomed out, but Samsung and friends cut the supply. You can get 2TB for cheap now, but those are DRAM-less QLC drives. I suggest paying an extra 30-50 USD to get one with the TLC and RAM.
jeffbee 2y ago
On paper those specs definitely look game-changing to me. The newer one has three of the older CPUs on the side, for free. The i9 is even more ridiculous, having what amounts to 4 quad-core Skylake CPUs as coprocessors (efficiency cores, in the parlance). But people are underestimating the compound effect of 10 years of 15% generational improvements. The CPUs in the article will run your web browser 4x faster than the older CPU you mentioned, about 2x faster than a Ryzen 5 5500 that is only 2 years old.
- michaelt 2y ago
  > On paper those specs definitely look game-changing to me. The reality is that the newer processor is better in all benchmarks. Like 4-5x on the benchmarks I looked up, yes. But back in the day, the 'turbo' frequency was only available for a few seconds for thermal and power reasons, and the 'base' clock speed was how it would actually perform on big, compute-intensive tasks. If you only consider "8 performance cores, 2.1 GHz Base" vs "4 cores, 4.0 GHz base" and you also discount the 'efficiency cores', a person might think performance had barely changed.
imtringued 2y ago
Those are the specs you'd expect from a $500 mini PC. Step up to $700 and you will get a better CPU plus 2TB nvme SSD. https://www.geekom.de/geekom-a5-mini-pc/ https://www.geekom.de/geekom-a5-mini-pc/

karmakaze 2y ago

I can still use my casual desktop PC with a dual-core i7 for web browsing and video streaming without much noticeable degradation. I use that PC to play StarCraft 2 on medium graphics. I can do light web, Java/Kotlin dev on it, but I wouldn't try doing any kind of mobile dev.