In a matter of days, Advanced Micro Devices is expected to release The Next Athlon. A month later, Intel Corp. will follow up in an attempt to reclaim the title of speed champ, announcing The Next Pentium (4, to be precise). The Athlon, AMD's implicitly parallel µarchtitecure, will run at a 1.33GHz frequency (also 1.30GHz, and there's more details coming on that). Intel's more explicitly parallel (and generally more scalar) µarchitecture is, according to reviewers and hardware experts, geared towards achieving higher clock frequencies -- such as 1.70GHz in this case -- at the expense of lower average ipc (less per-clock performance) in general.

The only thing less attractive than a P4 right now is those absolutely awful commercials. When the P4 hits around 3GHz though I'm thinking they will start to finally look worth considering.