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This chipset release however is all about its FSB. The CPU bus speed also known as "front-side bus speed" (or FSB) and is the speed at which the CPU communicates with RAM memory and the motherboard chipset. Athlon XPs have a 266, 333 or 400 MHz FSB, Pentium 4s have a 400MHz, 533MHz or 800MHz and now the 1066 MHz FSB , AMD Durons have a 200MHz FSB and socket 478 Celerons have a 400MHz FSB. Having explained that, never assume that the CPU with the fastest front-side bus is the fastest performer. There are many factors that control CPU speed, the most important are its design and efficiency of its floating point unit, the internal clock speed of the CPU (the GHz speed it's rated for and the speed and amount of its L2 cache.

When choosing a FSB speed for the CPU you choose, be aware that you'll need to purchase memory capable of this faster speed. For example, many people are enticed by the remarkably low priced memory, yet you need to sync your memory to your CPU's FSB. First of all, all mainboard these days use either DDR or DDR2 memory, today's product needs DDR2 memory. In our case we know that the CPU we have uses the 1066 MHz bus so we're gonna need DDR memory rated PC4200, thus 533 MHz DDR2 memory that is capable handling that high FSB. You can also equip this mainboard with a 800 MHz FSB processor, in that case you'll need DDR2 400 MHz. Just devide the CPU FSB by 2 and you are set to go.

Secondly, make sure you buy two bars so that you can have a 'dual-channel' memory configuration, which effectively double's the memory bandwith and the Pentium 4 loves that bandwidth for sure.

DDR2 533 MHz  in Dual Channel Configuration

Here are some of the architectural highlights for the Intel Pentium 4 Extreme Edition:

Let's take a quick look at the processor and note the bigger differences between this and your 'normal' Pentium 4. The Extreme Edition biggest advantage over the 'normal' 130nm (Northwood) Pentium 4's is the inclusion of 2MB of Level 3 cache, this cache will speed up software/applications big-time, it's also extremely expensive the implement. In addition to the bigger cache, the big difference of course is the new faster FSB speed for the 3.46GHz P4 Extreme Edition.