quad core clockspeed

ffallic said:
Unless you are boiling the amount of a single kettle in all four kettles - basically if you have a 2 litre kettle, if you divide that up between 4 (of the same) kettles, then it will boil faster - less water takes less time to boil.
Click to expand...

Not everyone has multithreaded water for their kettles though!
 
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iv always wondered how the core speeds on the c2d and quad cores worked, now after reading this lot, KETTLES!!! thats all i can think of now :( and im still confused!
so lets go back to basics, 1 x Q6600 CPU = 1 CPU with 4 cores. Speed of CPU = 2.4 GHz.
now the question: is it; 2.4 x 4 = 9.6 |-=OR=-| 2.4 / 4 = 0.6 Ghz per core. OR am i completly wrong with both options???
 
QlimaxUK said:
so lets go back to basics, 1 x Q6600 CPU = 1 CPU with 4 cores. Speed of CPU = 2.4 GHz.
now the question: is it; 2.4 x 4 = 9.6 |-=OR=-| 2.4 / 4 = 0.6 Ghz per core. OR am i completly wrong with both options???
Click to expand...

None of the above :p

You have x amount of work to do, say that a single core takes t time to do this.
If your application is only single threaded, it will take t to generate the results; but ther other programs can use the other 3 cores for other things at the same time.
If the program has two threads(and processing doesnt have to be sequential), it would take t/2, so half as long.

Older games will only be single threaded, so you get no benefit from having 3 spare cores other than background tasks bineg able to use them. Many current games are multi threaded, so will use different cores for different things at the same time (physics calculations etc)

There is no way to convert to/from GHz ratings as they are now fairly abstract for most problems.
 
Well all the cores run at the same speed so you would have 4x 2.4 Ghz cores but it is not the same as having a 9.6Ghz processor.
 
Both.

A programme will only use one core unless it is programmed to use more.

Say a programme takes a 2.4ghz core 10 minutes to do something.

It will take just as long on a quad core as on a dual core as on a single core....

HOWEVER. If the application is multithreaded, it has been programmed to use all cores.

Say our programme has been designed for 2 cores (2 threads), it will take 5minutes.
If the programme was designed for 4 cores, it would take 2.5 minutes.

In theory :)
 
ok the issue i have heres is basically i have a P4 3ghz with HT, the quadcore is 2.4 ghz but i know theres no way that mine is better, so it has to be thought of as 9.6 ghz then, understand???
 
i can't really see any app or game stressing out all cores at once. i'm either surfing/msn or im gaming. the main thing i've noticed though (using G15 performance monitor helps) is that i can pretty much game, burn off cds, surf and msn without the whole pc drawing to a halt. It's also great for music creation with all the virtual synths attached etc. All the cores seem to get used to some extent more often than not, but when gaming i notice one core maxxed out and the rest fluctuating. I love the stability of the multicore PC and for the price of the q6600 today, its worth it.
 
iv been wonderin if its worth upgrading cuz my current system (now i have the 512 mb x1950) will run all the latest games, but it can get a little laggy, not much though. so i was wondering if to get a e2180 or Q6600, a year ago my P4 cost me £150 as i didnt want to shell out that again but if its runs at 'equivalent' of 9.6 GHz then id be very tempted :) otherwise ill just get the e2180.
 
I don't think i can explain it any better then is previously done in this thread.. but it's not the same as a 9.6ghz processor.

It's 4 cores. One application may use 1 core, or 2, or 3 or 4. But not all will use 4 cores ( Or your 9.6ghz ..)

What do you use your pc for specifically?
 
i use pc for gaming mainly as the only thing that puts 'load' on my cpu.
so will the latest games; UT3, crysis, gears of war, bioshock, nfs pro street, MOH: airbourne, COD4, use as many cores as it needs, or will 2 cores be plenty enough meanings the e2180 is a cheaper more sensible option
 
The E2180 would be better value for money for you.

However, you better overclock the thing ;)

Maybe a nice cooler to accompany it?
 
Video Encoding
3d work ...eg rendering
Supreme commander xD
E-penis
it's cheap, and it's a quadcore, and it overclocks well.
 
To be honest i think im just looking at a Q6600 for some kind of 'status symbol' or Ego boost LOL) im sure the e2180 is good enough, im just greedy i guess + i know someone with a Quad core :) :)
 
Performance != Cores x Clockspeed.

Even on multithreaded applications.

There're many factors towards performance of a microprocessor.

A Pentium D 3.2 Ghz (dual core) would lose quite significantly to a Core 2 Duo 2.4ghz. This is because of its architecture. Despite the two processors having the same amount of cores, the same amount of cache, the Core architecture is faster. To describe in detail why it's faster would take me more typing than I really care to right now, I'll just give you a brief look at what factors you should consider:

Architecture. Check this first. Look for reviews of similar processors, just google its model number and it'll spit benchmarks out at you.

Clockspeed. Of course this is important, but only when comparing processors of the same architecture. I'm gonna go a little on the rough here and give you a brief idea of how several popular microprocessor architectures perform. 1 being the lowest and everything higher being better: (kind of 'rough n' ready' but whatever)

Netburst (Pentium 4/D) 1
P6 (Pentium Pro through Pentium III) 1.3
K8 (Athlon 64/X2) 1.6
Core 2 (Core 2 Duo/Quad) 2
K10 (Phenom)2

If all things were equal that's about how I'd expect them to perform.

L2 cache: The jump from 1MB to 2MB is far greater than 2MB to 4MB. This, despite popular opinion does affect performance in games, sometimes by a 10FPS difference depending on the scenario.

Number of cores: Only really matters when the software is written to take advantage of it - remember the kettles? Although, the extra cores can be used by background tasks giving whatever needs it a little performance boost. The extra L2 cache given by the extra cores can give some extra performance, too.


Hope this helps explain why x CPU can beat y CPU despite z scenario.
 
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