Intel Pentium 4

The Intel Pentium 4 is the successor to the Pentium III. It was released in 2000 and unlike the II and III that were directly based on P6, it introduced the NetBurst architecture, designed to favor high clock speeds. The Pentium 4 also brought the SSE2 instruction set, which is a prerequisite for many modern applications and operating systems nowadays.

They were firstly available as 1.3 GHz parts, then parts up to 3.8 GHz were released over several generations, each bringing small improvements and a smaller process. The first one are Willamette Pentium 4s, manufactured with a 180 nm process and existing for Sockets 423 and 478 on Desktop. It was followed by Northwood Pentium 4s made with a 130 nm process for the Socket 478, and then 90 nm Prescott on Socket 478 and 775, the latter being LGA rather than PGA. Cedar Mill is the final generation of Pentium 4s, using a 65 nm process.

The Pentium 4 was in competition with AMD's Athlon XP, then Athlon 64.

Adapters exist to make some Socket 478 Pentium 4s work on Socket 423.

As higher frequencies unsustainably increased heat and power consumption, Intel reverted back to the P6 architure, already during the Pentium 4 era with Pentium Ms that were released in 2003 and more suitable for mobile computers. Later Intel Core Processors are based on the Pentium M rather than Pentium 4. A Dual Core version of the Pentium 4 exists, the Pentium D.

Operating System Support

• A Pentium 4 will by itself not prevent any x86 or x64 (if supported) Windows until 7 from running.
• Windows 8, 8.1 and 10 require the NX Bit feature, which only later 64-bit Prescott (not all of them) and Cedar Mill Pentium 4s provide.
  • The NX Check can be bypassed on 32-bit Windows 8 and 8.1 with the W8CPUFeaturePatch software or via Hex Editing of some files, allowing them to run on Socket 478 or even 423 after being installed with another machine. We are however not aware of any Windows 10 running on 423 or 478 as they presumably removed the fallback software DEP/NX emulation and there are no known 423 or 478 CPU offering NX (the infamous SL8JX was confirmed to not have it).
  • We are not aware of any 64-bit Windows 8+ running on a 64-bit Pentium 4 without NX.
  • However, if the Pentium 4 does provide the NX feature, installing and running Windows 8, 8.1 and 10 x86 or x64 is straightforward.
• Windows 11 has the same requirements as Windows 10 x64. So as long as there is the NX support, it can be run. However, the LabConfig manipulation needs to be done during the installation to bypass the TPM and Secure Boot Checks.
• Any Linux Distributions still supporting x86 should work on a Pentium 4.