• The Athlon XP 2700+ processor is the first AMD processor to run at a 333 megahertz motherboard bus speed. The faster bus speed allows AMD to increase how quickly the processor has access to information coming in from memory. Even if the clock speed is slower than some of the older processors, the process is faster, giving the end user a benefit.
  
  

Clock Speed

• The actual speed of AMD processors has always been lower than the model number. This is because of proprietary technology AMD uses in processor design. The AMD Athlon XP 2700+ CPU is a 2.167 gigahertz processor, although it is rated as equivalent to a 2.7 gigahertz processor.
  
  

Bus Speed

• Clock speed is not the only essential number when rating a processor. Bus speed has a huge impact on the overall speed of the system. Bus speed affects how quickly information is accessible to the processor, a slower speed would result in system slowdowns. The AMD Athlon XP 2700+ CPU was the first in AMD's lineup to run at 167 megahertz bus speed -- the bus transmits data twice per cycle to make it 333 MHz -- compared to the 133 -- or 266 when doubled -- megahertz bus speed of previous chips.
  
  

Cache

• Pronounced like "cash," the cache on the processor is important to the whole system. Since the processor gets all of its information from memory, having that information close at hand and in the fastest memory possible speeds everything up. Cache is the fastest memory available and it's built right on the processor's die. The AMD Athlon XP 2700+ comes with 128 kilobytes of level one cache and 512 kilobytes of level 2 cache.
  
  

Socket

• During the time of development, AMD was using Socket A, also known as Socket-462, for the newest processors. The Athlon XP 2700+ was part of the line up that used this technology.