Quad core processors

M

morningreis

[H]ard|Gawd
Joined
Aug 10, 2005
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Are we going to see Quad cores? Apple is putting out Quad core G5s... Will AMD do the same thing? Will Intel take over where the Quad core G5s left off? God knows people could use more CPU power. I know I wouldn't mind some.
 
Intel has said by 2007 they will have quad-cores. AMD is saying 2008 for their quad-cores.
 
AMD is talking about 2007 for quad cores (probably on opterons first).
Intel is looking at a quad core desktop in 2007, probalby sooner rather than later if the current roadmap sticks.

There is no quad core G5 (that I'm aware of), and with Apple moving to intel I doubt there will be. There is a "G5 quad" that's a dual CPU dual core G5.
 
Dav5049915 said:
i'd like to see more programs that work with my DUAL processors first. :)
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:edit: crap didn't see the few posts above.


double crap, mod please delete my post above. (man i got owned)
 
Obi_Kwiet said:
I'd like to see apps with two threads first.
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You have to think about where dual-CPU has been established. Almost all graphics/workstation apps are multi-threaded, but applications are always a generation behind the technology.
 
Oh wells, at least you can run 4 single-threaded applications that take 100% cpu :)
It's good for folding at the least :p
 
Sun is currently shipping 8-core processors that use ~70W and handle 4 simultaneous threads per core ;)
 
Borgschulze said:
Quote for Truth.
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Uh, if you use windows, right click on the task bar and go to task manager. In the options, show "threads". Most apps use more than 1 thread these days.

Rob
 
Robstar said:
Uh, if you use windows, right click on the task bar and go to task manager. In the options, show "threads". Most apps use more than 1 thread these days.

Rob
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True they do use more than one thread, but that doesn't make them a candidate for gaining any performance in SMP. Almost everything is multithreaded these days, the problem is it's not threads that can perform operations on their own. A good portion of the time the thread is waiting for input from another thread before it can do anything, and while it's doing whatever it is, it does, the thread it was waiting for doesn't have anything to do because it's waiting for the output from the second thread. It's a horrible circle.
 
kumquat said:
Sun is currently shipping 8-core processors that use ~70W and handle 4 simultaneous threads per core ;)
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If I remember correctly I think IBM has a 16 or 32 core version of the Power4 out there.
 
will windows vista be able to intelligently break up an applications execution to make it perform better on a multicore processor?
 
defakto said:
True they do use more than one thread, but that doesn't make them a candidate for gaining any performance in SMP. Almost everything is multithreaded these days, the problem is it's not threads that can perform operations on their own. A good portion of the time the thread is waiting for input from another thread before it can do anything, and while it's doing whatever it is, it does, the thread it was waiting for doesn't have anything to do because it's waiting for the output from the second thread. It's a horrible circle.
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Exactly, I could have an application that uses 10 threads but if only one thread is running at a time then performance wise it is about the same as a single threaded app. Coding for multiple threads increases the complexity of the code greatly which is why all applications aren't currently coded for multiple simultaneuos threads. This won't be an overnight thing. True multitreaded apps will probably be a slow but steady improvement over the next several years.
 
kumquat said:
Sun is currently shipping 8-core processors that use ~70W and handle 4 simultaneous threads per core ;)
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Yup, just read about them in the recent issue of iX
 
Martyr said:
will windows vista be able to intelligently break up an applications executionto make it perform better on a multicore processor?
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Unlikely, that would be a MAJOR feature and I do not recall MS talking about it. But don't worry, considering that VISTA will require a core to itself for running, you will see much benefit from DC:
One core of Windows
One core for each Windows of IE

:D

haha I made a funnny.
 
kumquat said:
Sun is currently shipping 8-core processors that use ~70W and handle 4 simultaneous threads per core ;)
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Niagara, it fills a very niche market: webserver / database servers. Many many requests need attention in parallel, but none are very demanding. Each core has its own encryption/decryption unit, but there is but one FPU on the entire die.

NulloModo said:
If I remember correctly I think IBM has a 16 or 32 core version of the Power4 out there.
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There were only every Dual core Power4+s.
there are now quad core Power5+s. Meaning your basic 4-way SMP IBM server can pack 16 cores.


Martyr said:
will windows vista be able to intelligently break up an applications execution to make it perform better on a multicore processor?
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No.
Multithreaded applications have to be built that way.
You can't break up a thread ad-hoc on the fly and expect good results, well at least no more than we already do it with super scalar, out of order execution CPUs. And we hit a wall on how well that works quite a while ago.
 
Shameless Liar said:
Are we going to see Quad cores? Apple is putting out Quad core G5s... Will AMD do the same thing? Will Intel take over where the Quad core G5s left off? God knows people could use more CPU power. I know I wouldn't mind some.
Click to expand...


Apple does NOT have quad core processors!

They have dual core dual processor machine.

And so does AMD they are called opterons.
 
defakto said:
True they do use more than one thread, but that doesn't make them a candidate for gaining any performance in SMP. Almost everything is multithreaded these days, the problem is it's not threads that can perform operations on their own. A good portion of the time the thread is waiting for input from another thread before it can do anything, and while it's doing whatever it is, it does, the thread it was waiting for doesn't have anything to do because it's waiting for the output from the second thread. It's a horrible circle.
Click to expand...

I didn't say because it was multithreaded dual core would help. I did say that most programs are multi threaded.

Rob
 
FreiDOg said:
Niagara, it fills a very niche market: webserver / database servers. Many many requests need attention in parallel, but none are very demanding. Each core has its own encryption/decryption unit, but there is but one FPU on the entire die.
Click to expand...

It's a niche that Sun's really trying to compete in, though. Considering Sun's announcement that they'll be subsidizing Oracle on Solaris as well, Sun's really trying to make a strong push to fend of IBM.

Sun still needs to get their hardware partitioning set up similar to the pSeries boxes. Nothing like a few clicks and some data entered and you've got an LPAR built. Sun's domains just aren't as flexible and their Solaris 10 zones don't give enough isolation to give comfort to management for use in production systems (for us, at least).

Another seperate thing is that Sun was touting their relationship with AMD and how they're working together on CPU architecture. It'll be interesting to see what both sides take away from this in the future.
 
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