A long time ago, in a galaxy far away, there was a processor socket that fitted each and every consumer CPU.
Sounds like a fairey tale? It is actually our own galaxy, at the end of last century and the socket is the so-called Socket 7.
As Wikipedia states "Socket 7 is a physical and electrical specification for an x86-style CPU socket on a personal computer motherboard. It was released June 1995. The socket supersedes the earlier Socket 5, and accepts P5 Pentium microprocessors manufactured by Intel, as well as compatibles made by Cyrix/IBM, AMD, IDT and others. Socket 7 was the only socket that supported a wide range of CPUs from different manufacturers and a wide range of speeds."
Intel decided to leave the socketed design for its Pentium-II and make that new socket -actually a slot, Slot 1- a proprietary one, so the other manufacturers were stuck at Socket 7 for the time being. Here enters the Super Socket 7, developed by AMD for their K6-2 and K6-III processors.
As it featured a 75 up to 100 MHz frontside bus -depending on the chipset and the settings on your mobo- and support for AGP, the other CPU manufacturers were able to compete with the Slot-1 boards with their PIIs and Celerons.
What could theoretically be fitted into a Super 7 board? (not all Socket 5 or Socket 7 designs will fit as the needed VCore value is sometimes unreachable)
Brand |
Model |
Official
FSB |
Speed
in MHz |
L1
Cache |
L2
Cache |
L3
Cache |
Instruction
Sets |
AMD |
K5 |
50-66 |
75-133 |
8 KB data
16 KB Instructions |
Onboard |
None |
IA-32(x86), x87 |
|
K6 |
66 |
166-300 |
32 KB data
32 KB Instructions |
Onboard |
None |
IA-32(x86), x87,
MMX |
|
K6-2 |
66-100 |
266-550 |
32 KB data
32 KB Instructions |
Onboard |
None |
IA-32(x86), x87,
MMX, 3DNow! |
|
K6-2+ |
66-100 |
350-570 |
32 KB data
32 KB Instructions |
128 KiB, fullspeed |
Onboard |
IA-32(x86), x87,
MMX, 3DNow! |
|
K6-III |
66-100 |
350-550 |
32 KB data
32 KB Instructions |
256 KiB, fullspeed |
Onboard |
IA-32(x86), x87,
MMX, 3DNow! |
|
K6-III+ |
66-100 |
350-550 |
32 KB data
32 KB Instructions
with 20 KB pre-decode cache |
256 KiB, fullspeed |
Onboard |
IA-32(x86), x87,
MMX, 3DNow!, Extensions to 3DNow! |
Cyrix |
6x86, 6x86L |
40-66 |
90-150 |
256 bytes primary code cache
16 KB unified data/code write-back cache |
Onboard |
None |
IA-32(x86), x87 |
|
6x86MX |
66-83 |
150-266 |
256 bytes primary code cache
64 KB unified data/code write-back cache |
Onboard |
None |
IA-32(x86), x87,
MMX |
|
M2 |
66-100 |
233-433 |
256 bytes primary code cache
64 KB unified data/code write-back cache |
Onboard |
None |
IA-32(x86), x87,
MMX |
IBM |
6x86, 6x86L |
40-66 |
90-150 |
256 bytes primary code cache
16 KB unified data/code write-back cache |
Onboard |
None |
IA-32(x86), x87 |
|
6x86MX |
66-83 |
150-300 |
256 bytes primary code cache
64 KB unified data/code write-back cache |
Onboard |
None |
IA-32(x86), x87,
MMX |
IDT |
Winchip C6 |
60-75 |
180-240 |
32 KB data
32 KB Instructions |
Onboard |
None |
IA-32(x86), x87,
MMX |
|
Winchip 2 |
60-100 |
200-300 |
32 KB data
32 KB Instructions |
Onboard |
None |
IA-32(x86), x87,
MMX, 3DNow! |
Intel |
Pentium P54 |
50-66 |
75-200 |
8 KB data
8 KB Instructions |
Onboard |
None |
IA-32(x86), x87 |
|
Pentium P55 |
60-66 |
120-233 |
16 KB data
16 KB Instructions |
Onboard |
None |
IA-32(x86), x87,
MMX |
Rise Technology |
MP6 |
75-100 |
150-250 |
8 KB data
8 KB Instructions |
Onboard |
None |
IA-32(x86), x87,
MMX |
SGS-Thompson
(ST) |
6x86 |
40-66 |
90-166 |
256 bytes primary code cache
16 KB unified data/code write-back cache |
Onboard |
None |
IA-32(x86), x87 |