Cyrix 6x86 Matches Pentium

Application benchmarks show that Cyrix's new 6x86 processor deserves its "200" label.

Dave Andrews

Although the 6x86-P200+ runs at just 150 MHz, application benchmarks indicate that Cyrix's newest processor lives up to its name, delivering the same or better performance than a 200-MHz Pentium. Although results of the CPU/FPU BYTEmark test indicate that the 6x86 has poor floating-point performance (a score of 0.43, compared to 1.0 for a 90-MHz Dell Pentium system), this won't hurt the performance of most Windows 95 business applications.

Results from running the new SYSmark/32 applications benchmark on Win 95 put a 6x86 PC computer from Cyrix slightly ahead of a Dell Dimension XPS P200S with a 200-MHz Pentium ( see the chart ). The SYSmark/32 benchmark suite, f rom Business Applications Performance Corp. (BAPCo), exercises popular word processing (Microsoft Word 7.0 and Lotus WordPro 96), spreadsheet (Microsoft Excel 7.0), database (Paradox 7.0), desktop graphics (CorelDraw 6.0), desktop-presentation (Microsoft Powerpoint 7.0 and Lotus Freelance 96), and desktop publishing (Adobe Pagemaker 6.0) applications.

Although we compared similarly configured systems (both had 32 MB of RAM, a Matrox MGA Millenium graphics adapter, and a SCSI hard drive), differences between the Cyrix and Dell exist. The Cyrix system that we tested (which costs about $1500) was equipped with a 4-GB SCSI hard drive, 64 MB of RAM, a 75-MHz bus, extended data out (EDO) RAM, and a 256-KB synchronous pipeline burst cache, compared to the Dell system's 66-MHz bus, synchronous DRAM, and 512-KB pipeline burst cache.

To gauge the comparison of the two systems to a low-end PC, we also tested a 90-MHz Dell with 16 MB of RAM. The results show that power users shopping for a fast, affordable PC should investigate the latest from Cyrix ((800) 340-7501; http://www.cyrix.com ). A 6x86-P200+ PC with a 256-KB cache, 16 MB of EDO RAM, Matrox MGA millenium video, 2 MB of Window RAM (WRAM), a 15-inch monitor, a keyboard, an eight-speed CD-ROM drive, a 2.5-GB Enhanced IDE (EIDE) hard drive, a floppy drive, a sound card, and speakers costs $2299.

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Cyrix Leads in Application Performance

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The Cyrix P200 + PC edges the 200-MHz Pentium Dell XPS.