Hardware Reference
In-Depth Information
Figure 3.29. Pentium II processor board (normally found inside the SEC cartridge). Photograph
used by permission of Intel Corporation.
The two variations on these cartridges are called SECC (single edge contact cartridge) and SECC2.
The SECC2 version was cheaper to make because it uses fewer overall parts. It also allowed for a
more direct heatsink attachment to the processor for better cooling. Intel transitioned from SECC to
SECC2 in the beginning of 1999; all later PII chips, and the Slot 1 PIII chips that followed, use the
improved SECC2 design.
By using separate chips mounted on a circuit board, Intel could build the Pentium II much less
expensively than the multiple die within a package used in the Pentium Pro. Intel could also use cache
chips from other manufacturers and more easily vary the amount of cache in future processors
compared to the Pentium Pro design.
Intel offered Pentium II processors with the speeds listed in
Table 3.14
.
Table 3.14. Speeds for Pentium II Processors and Motherboards
Aside from speed, the best way to think of the Pentium II is as a Pentium Pro with MMX technology
instructions and a slightly modified cache design. It has the same multiprocessor scalability as the
Pentium Pro, as well as the integrated L2 cache. The 57 new multimedia-related instructions carried
over from the MMX processors and the capability to process repetitive loop commands more
efficiently are included as well. Also included as a part of the MMX upgrade is double the internal
L1 cache from the Pentium Pro (from 16KB total to 32KB total in the Pentium II).
