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AMD Dual-Core Performance Revealed
Timmus writes "In two separate articles, FiringSquad takes a look at the performance of AMD's dual-core Opteron CPU. The first article examines the performance of dual-core in scientific computing applications (MATLAB and LS-DYNA) as well as digital photography, while the second story focuses on the performance of dual-core Opteron paired against Intel's dual-core Pentium Extreme Edition in video encoding, Cinebench, and a few other applications. The performance improvements are pretty impressive in multi-threaded applications that take advantage of the technology."
So we have:
scientific computing applications (MATLAB and LS-DYNA)
digital photography
video encoding
Cinebench and
"a few other applications".
So what about the average user? Will the college kid who just needs to type their papers, the parents who want to do their taxes, the gamers who want to play high-end stuff, etc. get any sort of boost from this?
I am scientifically inaccurate.
...LONG LIVE COMPETITION!
I wish both AMD and Intel well. All the better for us. Lower prices and better performance.
Paleotechnologist and connoisseur of pretty shiny things.
Dr. Dobbs last month had an item regarding threading in real-world environments. The authur said that while multi-threaded applications run a lot faster than single-threaded applications, that always isn't so. In addition, there are some significant issues in running in a multi-tasking, multi-threaded environment, not solved with the use of mutexes and semaphores.
Multi-threading and mult-cores are definitely the way the industry needs to go, but the current development methodologies and application architectures (as well as computing theory) may need to catch up a bit.
It wouldn't work. Why do you think we have processors with two or three levels of cache? There is a serious speed/bandwidth mismatch between the processor and the main memory system. There are ways of increasing main memory bandwidth, but they are very expensive. There's no point in adding more processors if they are going to spend 95% of their time stalled, waiting for cache lines to be filled.
Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
> This begs the question...
No it doesn't. If anything, it raises the question.
And then detrimental again because both processes share the L1 cache... I don't know if Intel fixed that problem yet, but the cache sharing actually decreased performance compared to a processor with HT disabled while running high-demand single-threaded applications (games).
Slashdot is proof that Sturgeon's Law applies to mankind.
Now, it's struck me as very peculiar that the benchmarks where the dual dual core setup from AMD really shines leave out any comparison whatsoever to the Intel dual-core offering.
They couldn't test a dual core multiprocessor chip from Intel because one doesn't exist yet. They've only released single processor dual core chips so far.
AMD introduced dual core on their multiprocessor server chips first, with desktop chips coming later on. Intel introduced dual core on their single CPU desktop chips first, with server chips coming later on this year, or in early 2006.
The problem is that you can easily run a single multiprocessor-capable CPU in a system, while you cannot run two single-processor-only chips in a system since they lack that capability.
Given ASUS has not updated the socket 940 SK8V BIOS in over 6 months, and hasn't even had a new beta BIOS (yuck) since December, what are the odds of any motherboard really supporting these CPUs? How many companies rush to support the older boards?
In fact, the SK8V is suddenly gone from both the motherboard page and the retired products page on the asus website. Hmmm...
With comments like:
"Even grandmothers own 8-megapixel consumer digital cameras now"
I really have to question the intellegence of this poor guy. I don't know many grandma's that drop $700-$1000 on digital camera's.
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AMD single processors can't handle multiple threads at once? What planet do you live on? So you're saying I can't run multiple threads of the same application on an athlon and do it effectively? The CPU will automatically split prioritization and CPU processing power evenly between the two. While this may not be as effective as Intel's hyperthreading technology, I'd take an athlon64 3200+ 939 pin or athlon xp 3200+ over a pentium4 3.2ghz any day, simply because of the fact that I haven't noticed any difference with hyperthreading on or off on the intel systems. All it does is make a fake virtual cpu out of a single cpu and reduce the processing time given to a single thread.
If you can afford a "gaming machine" that can actually run a modern game you can certainly afford to offload some services onto a another box. Complete PIII class dells sell on ebay for $50-80 everyday.
Not sure if anyone answered this properly yet...
The main advantage of dual core over dual processor (where the processors are not in the same CPU package) is that it should be possible to allow the two CPUs to communicate at very high speed.
Inside a single CPU, data is moved around at, or very close to, the clock speed of the CPU (e.g. 2.7GHz). Outside of the chip, the longer distances signals need to travel mean that it is more difficult to run data busses at high speeds. So talking to a hard disk or other peripheral component is slower (e.g. 166Mhz).
If you had two separate CPUs (i.e. not in the same package), then they would be limited to the 166MHz buz (or whatever). However, if you have two CPUs in the same package (and ideally on the same piece of silicon), they can communicate at or close to the clock speed of the 'package' (i.e. 2.7GHz). The CPUs can then work co-operatively more efficiently.
The main drawback to putting one or more CPUs on a single piece of silicon is the cost of doing so. CPUs are etched onto silicon wafers. These CPUs are then physically cut out (e.g. with a diamond circular saw) and then packaged. If the wafer has a local imperfection, any chip that intersects with that imperfection is likely to be faulty, so you have to throw it away. If the cutting process damages a chip, it must be discarded. The smaller the CPUs, the less likely a particular one will be damaged. The larger they are, the higher the probability. As the chips get bigger (e.g. if you bolt two CPUs together into a single chip), the yield goes down, and the cost of an individual chip increases.
"The noble art of losing face will one day save the human race"---Hans Blix
How can anyone take an article seriously when the very first sentence just screams, "AMATEUR!!" like this one does:
Intel may very well go down in history as the first processor manufacturer with a dual-core solution, if only by three days.
IBM Power4, Power5
HP PA-8800
Sun Sparc IV
All full-fledged dual-core processors shipping long before Intel -- HP's been shipping for over a year and IBM's already well in to their 2nd generation of dual core processors with Power5.
Sure, you can excuse the author with some hand-waving about x86 context only or whatever. But if they really knew what they were talking about, they would have said it that way - or at least a competent editor would have corrected it. If these guys can't even get the trivial stuff right, how can anyone trust them to get the real technical details right?
When information is power, privacy is freedom.
" The question this raises, though, is whether there are any games designed to work better on hyperthreaded/multiprocessor systems."
Why worry about the past? If these processors take off, new games will support them.
"Derp de derp."
Just because it'll priortize, etc. doesn't mean that it's running the threads simultaneously which is what "at once" actually means. The only way is to have Hyperthreading or SMP for that. In the case of the SMP machine, it'll priortize the threads and divvy them up across the CPUs/Cores on the machine, to be executed as in-parallel as is possible.
On a non-Hyperthreading, non-SMP machine, it's going to execute only as fast as the one-legged man is able to get to kicking asses...
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
What is this supposed to tell me?
How does a dual core opteron stack up against a dual core pentium? Seems a simple question. But I guess they thought a better comparison would be to compare two dual core opterons against a single dual core pentium...brilliant.
This just re-inforces my belief that review sites never tell you anything of any use. Horrendous graphs (like showing scores of 1660 vs: 1640, but starting the graph at 1600 so the 1660 looks 150% times better than 1640, instead of 2%).
The hyperbole also gets to me....chips/systems are always 'blowing away the competition' when they are like, 5% faster. Hey...get real. When I upgraded my P166 to an Athlon 2400+, did I really care that it might have been 5% faster/slower than it's competition? It was over 10x faster than the system it replaced! Let's get some reality in here....
But of course, we know it's all about scoops and page views for advertising anyway...integrity is gone, if it ever existed in the first place.
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