Quad core versus Dual core

[bhtooefr]

Well, even in singletasking, a dual-core can provide benefits, just by putting the background apps on their own core.

Although, I'm a fairly heavy multi-tasker, the best workload for a multi-core CPU, and I rarely top out both cores on my 1.6 GHz Core 2 Duo (but I often max one out with Flash video.)

[bigpook]

Here seems a rational explanation:

http://www.geekstogo.com/2007/07/24/do-you-need-a-quad-core-cpu/

[bigpook]

Boy, Pook, you're really analyzing this one:confused:.  Especially when you've said you don't need the extra power.   Just get some cableties and strap that heatsink down:eek:

Anyway, being stubborn I'm still pushing for quad.   Ya gotta look at articles written in 2009, not 2007.

http://alienbabeltech.com/main/?p=4090&page=18

http://www.tomshardware.com/forum/259381-28-quad-core-dual-core

http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview.aspx?catid=28&threadid=2242735

The last is the best.  It all depends on what software you run.

- Ripster

Sorry, you are right. I can be obsessive compulsive sometimes.
While you would think that is a negative it does have its uses. The phone switches I program spin like tops. Makes my customers happy and no one has to clean up behind me.
But in my defense, have you read some of the threads here on geekhack?
: ) I think I have lots of company : )



But I don't like the idea of tie wraps : ) There is just no way I will do that.
The thermal adhesive seems to be holding. Actually, I don't think that heatsink is going anywhere. lol, I was actually thinking the damn thing was going to separate and the chip would overheat and burst into flames.

Let me read the links you posted. I have been doing some additional reading and overall I think I made the right choice.

[bigpook]

Just ribbing you.     Anyone with more than 2 keyboards can be considered obsessive.



I missed this though.  What did you order?

- Ripster

I went with the phenom 920 that runs at 2.8G. The 940 looked interesting but it seemed to be aimed at overclockers. But from what I am reading, the 920 overclocks well too.
But I don't do overclocking : )
Seems kind of pointless to me but that is just my opinion.

I looked at the intels but I think the amd's still have the best bang for the buck. I could have went with this though
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115036

but from what I am reading the phenom outperforms that. Not by much though.

I should add that there are some people that are way serious about CPU's. The flaming between Intel and AMD can be intense and the overclocking guys with their water cooling apparatus are a hoot.

[bigpook]

Hah, I thought you'd go quad in the end.

Show Image

- Ripster

Nice.
For what I am doing, and for the price/performance I can't see why not.

[Hak Foo]

I went with the phenom 920 that runs at 2.8G. The 940 looked interesting but it seemed to be aimed at overclockers.

I had a 9950 and swapped for a 940 because there was a one-day special selling them locally at $180; found it tended to be less "sticky" than the 9950.  I don't even use the unlocked-multiplier gimmick, but the extra 400MHz and cache over the 9950 seems to produce extra smoothness in everyday operations.

What board are you running?  I had an Asus AMD770 board, but I just didn't like it (it seemed so threadbare, and it had this huge hairball over a specific TV card I wanted to use), so I got a Gigabyte 790X.  I wonder if subliminally, I hated the 770 board because it only had one PS/2 port, and so it was representing a sign of the looming threat posed to my 1391401.

[eugenius]

I have an old q6600, I run it at 3200MHz 1.2V with all the powersaving tech on, full undervolted noctua cooler and fans. Silent as a whisper, cool enough (hdd in a suspended scythe box).

There's no reason to not go quad. Only benchmark overclockers care about dual core now ....

[Manyak]

I have an old q6600, I run it at 3200MHz 1.2V with all the powersaving tech on, full undervolted noctua cooler and fans. Silent as a whisper, cool enough (hdd in a suspended scythe box).

There's no reason to not go quad. Only benchmark overclockers care about dual core now ....

Gamers also care, because no games (other than GTA4 which sucks anyway) take advantage of a quad. So higher clocked dual > lower clocked quad for gaming.

[Hak Foo]

Also because, for many games, "$150 CPU + $300 video card > $300 CPU + $150 video card".  Apparently, you can still get pretty decent gaming performance with just about anything Athlon X2 / Core 2 or higher.

[Des]

Quad  vs Dual, quickie. ( as short as I can possibly write about a subject Im passionate about)

Intel/Amd:
Price/performance contest = Intel win. ( been "by far!!" a few years not "far!!" anymore but still obviously clear leader )

only performance (fastest few CPU's avalible) = Intel win, ( By far!! )

( Ive switched back / forth between AMD / INTEL always choosen either what is the fastest avalible OR whats the best price/performance. Always bought platform based on atleast 40+ reviews / test and forum discussions and months thinking and planning looking at whats comming down the line. I read hardware news every day a minimum of 30min to 1 hour ^^ .  Its a Hobby)

Quad for:
Multitasking!
future proof

Dual for:
everything else
non (long time)future proof

Games:
(Dont matter at all. all GPU bound in any decent resolution(1920x1080+)))
(... but IF you are updating your system very seldom.. research)

Reason to go Quad:
*You wish to use multiple heavy programs(or multithreaded's) at once,  I.E. Photoshop + After effects + 3D studio max and Maya ( dont forget to raid and or atleast use system drive SSD's to match the CPU though ! )
*heavy gaming some games are now multithreaded(check any review on tomshardware anandtech etc, etc. but this is a future issue since all is GPU dependent on any good resolution) , only Shows on SLi-systems. (did some and read lots testing on a single gtx 285 before I popped the 2nd in on my most resent build)
*you are in a standard bussines productivity settup or more ( I.e. 2+ monitors and lots of multitasking )

reason to go Dual:
Dont really game much.
Not really a heavy computer user.
are a "regular" computer user.
Game only on single GPU and/or low resolutions

extra:
reason to go i7 and DDR3  : none, really.
(exeption = long long time semi-system future proof)

If you do not do any serious work, or game at high resolutions..  well get a 2nd hand old computer and pop a slightly newer GPU in it.   you dont need anything else.


Why quad is great:
3monitors
1 screen running Crysis(max everything)
1 screen running  Grafics programs+chat+50tabs Firefox + + + etc.
1 screen running HD content
(and the computer don't complain at all, smoooth)

Not that this is what you whant to do at all times but that this is possible is what makes the difference.
that you close to never need to close a program.
or for instance.  open 3 games in windowed mode. and just minimize the one your not playing.    *for the fun of it.

original poster: you mentioned you didnt really game etc etc.  
well you should really get the cheapest thing you can get, cause you will not be using the hardware anyway ^^

on i7 ( and comming i5) and ddr3:
this is also a non-issue:
check the multitude of articles written on the subject, most resent one was on tomshardware I belive. showing how No games today in any way what so ever would ever need or use more then 3GB of ram. and Showing zero difference with more ram then that.
[Some gets fooled into getting expensive parts just so they can use ddr3 now that Ram has become dirt cheap.]
Fast processors theese days are a strange thing and only for REALLY heavy computing use not games.
*lets hope the GPU's catch up. and started multithreaded computing continues to develop.


But yea, first thing: try and realise what you -actually- Use your computer for.  almost 90% of computer users today buy more powerful or miss-managed computer setups.  Stuff ya dont need.  That you could have bought another 2 keyboards instead.
*Its like buying a 4x4 city-Jeep and driving it around in the city..
Not bloody needed! sure It is cool n'all, But a Volvo is safer.
It is ok to buy stuff cause its cool, just be selfaware enough to realise you buy it cause its cool and not cause u need it or use it.

[Manyak]

Ok that's a pretty long post so I'm just not gonna hit the quote button on this one....

But there's two little errors in your post:

1- Quads do absolutely nothing for multitasking in a "business productivity" setting. All the standard business programs - Word, Excel, whatever browser, etc - all sit idle 99% of the time. So even if you want to run 3 monitors a Dual, hell even a single, is enough for that. For that level of multitasking RAM is king. Not the CPU.

2- Also, for price/performance, AMD is way ahead of Intel right now. Just look at newegg: You can get an AMD Phenoum II Quad for $170, while a Core i7 at the same speed costs $280. And that's not even including the fact that the Core i7 needs more expensive motherboards and 3 sticks of DDR3 memory (PhenII can use 2 sticks of either DDR2 or DDR3). The main reason Intel has been selling more is because their CPUs have been more overclockable - but the PhenII has pretty much caught up.

[Des]

1) By "business productivity" setting  I was referring to first the standardised use of 2 monitors, and On 2 monitors at home You really could be doing other things then Office and if not you should use only a 10 year old computer cause that is all you need.
I figured that was obvious.
So, office suite, no I was thinking on far more complex computing then that, I surely should have been clearer, appologies. Although I also thought that would have been obvious from the situation I described a few times there.

2) amd 2.6 Ghz and intel 2.6 Ghz is not the same speed. period, check reviews wikipedia whatever. Pure Ghz has never been the "same speed", as they do different amount of tasks per clock cyckle. so to speak.

If you get into  CPU's youīll see this, this is the way it has always been.
there are so many mistakes because of this, an easy slip but changes can be as wide as one 2Ghz Chip beeing half as fast as another 2Ghz chip from another manufacturer.  It is a measurement of clockcyckle, but different CPU's gets more or less done so to speak in a clockcykle.  can be double can be tripple.

to make it easy, look here:
http://www.tomshardware.com/charts/desktop-cpu-charts-q3-2008/benchmarks,31.html
there are reviews everywhere but that makes a general comparason clear, fast.
and you do not need an i7 to beat the phenom II's  you can get much much older adn cheaper Intel Chips. in fact I did talk about not gettin a pricey i7 in the post if you have a look again.

I guess I should say google a review but its a common misstake.
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/socket-am3-phenom,2148.html
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/phenom-ii-x4-810.html
http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,2845,2343564,00.asp?kc=ETRSS03039TX1K0000564
http://www.insidehw.com/Reviews/CPU/AMD-Phenom-II-X4-810.html

In many tests the i7 you linked are infact Double teh speed of the X4 810, and some reviews dont even put it up against i7's but rather Core2's and Core2quads.  where they do often enough "win".

However a CPU review is a delicate matter, and to really undersand it they should all be read. And you use the CPU for the task at hand.

in any case a AMD Phenom II Quad for $170, vs Core i7 at the DOUBLE the speed costs $280.  isnt to bad. certainly not considering  that Phenom should be put next to Cheapo Core Quad. and the higher Phenoms do use DDr3 aswell.(and some of the Expensive Phenoms with DDr3 (not teh chip but as you said mobo+ram) Is beaten by old CoreQuads aswell.)
http://www.insidehw.com/Reviews/CPU/AMD-Phenom-II-X4-810-DDR3-vs.-DDR2.html
*I keep remembering things to ad, But grabbing  phenom for DDR3  one shoudl really read up on all the  laughable issues They have had with DDr3 in even their sold production models.
*I still have 2 AMD boxes here at home doing their thing, But the last few years.. AMD's been and still are in really really bad shape, and that is damned sad. Hell I remember my trusty K6 Chip, sticking it to the man ( so to speak ). I do think they will recover, but itīll take  atelast 1 or 2 incarnations more.
*and to be clear ( I guess i should so no further missunderstandings come)  as said before IF your heaviest Computer use is from games, You are well of with a 3 year old Core2Duo.  It really dosn't matter. So in the end what matter's in the CPU choice is -only- If you actually have some more professional demanding use of your computer. getting a SSD would increse overall system responsiveness and "feel" much more then a faster CPU.
*"The main reason...selling more because ...more overclockable" And If you really think that small-time enthuseast overcklocking has anything to do with marketshare, you are way of mark in many ways.

[keyb_gr]

I would agree that a quad core is way over the top for a typical "office productivity" setting. It's a good thing to have two cores though (system feels so much smoother in certain situations), plus the fastest harddrive you can justify.

Other points important for an office productivity setting are:
Longterm quality - as it affects how well the system works and how stable it is. My work PC has a cheapo Asrock board of 2003 vintage or so (that also was the first and last time the department bought an off-the-shelf system), and the darn thing needs its 'lytics to warm up for a few minutes until it's stable with bus disconnect enabled, plus it lacks the retaining thingy at the AGP port, and at least one of the USBs is flaky. At least it takes the old G81-1000 without complaint. My P2B-D, on the other hand, has been running like a champ, and any stability issues turned out to be either driver related or due to cooling problems (one of the procs had bad thermal contact, eventually solved with a healthy dose of thermal grease).
Noise - obvious.
Keeping dust out - not so obvious, but a good idea when you want to keep noise levels permanently low. Otherwise it may be necessary to clean out the power supply (and maybe more) once a year or so, which is what I do.

[Manyak]

Pfft, I've been into PCs since the 386 days

And yes, I know the Ci7 is faster than the PhenII in most situations. But there are times the PhenII is equal or better, so you can't really say that its double the speed, hands down. Its only mainly in server and high-end workstation applications (like databases or rendering), where the Ci7 is king. Though just last year, for those same applications, Opterons were better than Xeons for the same things, and are a better choice if you don't need the performance of an i7. But either way, what we're looking at here are the prices you're going to pay for a decent computer based on the two platforms.

So since the case and HDDs can be the same, lets take into account the parts that differ:

Ci7 Setup:
CPU - $280
Motherboard - $200
RAM - $50 for 3GB
PSU: $55
Graphics card: $25

Total: $610

PhenII setup:
CPU: $170
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16813131381"]Motherboard[/URL]: $84
RAM: $41 for 4GB
PSU: $38
Graphics card: Not needed

Total: $333

So once you take into consideration all the parts you'll be getting, the overall price is a lot cheaper. How much more performace will a Ci7 get you with regular desktop use anyway? An few seconds shaved off when you want to convert some audio file in iTunes? Most people don't have their PCs encoding music or video 24/7, so its not like those few seconds are worth the extra $280. Then again, if you have a company that does a lot of rendering, the added bonus of an i7 would be much more beneficial since everyone will be able to work faster, and therefore cost less since you won't have to pay as much in wages.

Another way (actually a better way) to look at this is to look at the best PC you can get at a certain price point. Including all currently sold CPUs (C2s, Athlons, etc), AMD gives you better bang for your buck at the low and mid price points. So if you want to spend around $500 or less on a PC AMD is a better choice than Intel. Look at the price of the system above - just try and build an Intel setup for that same price that matches its performance.

And yes the enthusiasts have a big say in what the market share is, believe it or not. How many families do you know who don't have a relative or friend who is an enthusiast? All those families end up asking that person what kind of computer they should buy, what they should upgrade, etc. So while the enthusiast market is relatively small, they do have a big influence on what gets sold. And most enthusiasts, sadly, don't know as much as they think they do. A lot of them apply false logic, like for example, that because an E8400 is the best for them, Intel in general is best for everyone. Or sometimes the people asking the questions understand it wrong - the statement "Intel makes faster processors than AMD" could mean many things, none of them taking into account the price.


But all in all yes I agree, for general usage the best upgrade you can do to a computer is get it an SSD, or at least good 15k SAS drives if you can't be bothered to do a SECURE_ERASE every few months to keep the speed up (or can't afford SLC drives).

[bigpook]

Hey guys, I appreciate the give and take thats going on here. It makes one pause to re-consider.

I got the phenom a week or so ago and from what I am doing with it I don't really see a performance increase over what I had previously ( amd x2 @ 2.8 ). I have absolutely no complaints with the phenom either. It runs cool, and on occasion I actually get all 4 cores to hit their top clock speed. Most of the time it just lopes along, unstressed.

I like what Manyak says in his last post, going to a SSD or 15k drive would give me a better upgrade. For me anyways, I am thinking that today's CPU's more than meet what most people will be needing.
The overclockers, gamers and people running whatever it is that they are running that require the latest and greatest  are a small percentage compared to the rest of the computer using community.

My first computer was a 486/33 DX. From that day till now I guess, it was always upgrade, upgrade and upgrade. I always saw an improvement over what I previously had. This last go around I think that is coming to an end. Especially with the latest version of ubuntu.  Now it looks like faster harddrives are the component that needs to be looked at.

Wonder what I will be buying next year.

[bigpook]

I think Balmer is doing some great things at Microsoft. I hope he continues on that path that he is on.

[bhtooefr]

Great things like talking about developers, helping create jobs in the chair industry, and ****ing killing Google?

[bigpook]

Great things like talking about developers, helping create jobs in the chair industry, and ****ing killing Google?

Exactly. He is the best man to run MS at this time. I wish him continued success.

[Des]

Manyak

Good mornin.
I disagree, read the reviews again,  As already said You putting that i7 against that phenom is wrong, use an old cheaper Core2Quad you end up with a cheaper and faster system.

Im not saying this all reviews published are saying this, read them.

.
Now for coffee.
.
got coffee "ahhhhhh"
So read the reviews,  this is the point, as one says for instance the Cheaper Intel Core 2 Quad Q8200 Is faster then AMD Phenom II X4 810, other reviews use other processors and this is the point.
Another said that very Chip  AMD Phenom II X4 810 was AMDs try to get in on Intels Price/Performance but it Does right out fail.
I never go by views, Go by facts. and hell all facts are saying this. why are you debating this? Not read reviews?
AMD catching up yes. But it is obvious they need another year or so, and some luck.

[bigpook]

Maybe comparing the phenom to the i7 is a bit unfair. I still think that bang for the buck AMD is a better deal. I need to read the reviews again. If I can remember to do so tonight when I get in I will post what I am reading.

[Des]

Maybe comparing the phenom to the i7 is a bit unfair. I still think that bang for the buck AMD is a better deal. I need to read the reviews again. If I can remember to do so tonight when I get in I will post what I am reading.

Yea its all back and forth, and the discussion is pretty useless anyway.

"AMD will most likely adjust its product range accordingly within the next few months"  <- this has happened a couple of weeks back and Im resonable sure Itīll recieve another cut next month or so. ( By then AMD should be in a great position, but its so useless cause most everybody dont need a new CPU anyway)

"Our tests showed that its performance is comparable to that of Intel Core 2 Quad Q8200" <- theese are now the same price (although the intel can be found at lower price point)

"AMD try to compete with Intel's Core 2 Quad Q9400 model"
Itīs not Like AMD is in anyway phasing this Chip towards an i7. They arent stupid.

All in all you cant really make a "wrong" choice. Mostly based on that Iīd be willing to bet not a lot are actually using their CPU's anyway.

NVIDIa have made some controversial press conferences lately about all new CPU's beeing unneeded.

And this is the sad thing really. Its all fun to buy a speedcar, but If your only gonna be stuck in queue's on your commute to work, whats the need?

But as we come from a world where CPU's did matter its hard to make the change. With SSD's around and GPU's domminating the game performance, this is where debates should go when buying a new computer. Anything else is useless.

And I do tend to call real CPU use for professional use only cause it would involve  pricey  software like Maya After Effects AutoCad and very large projects in theese software.
Itīs all so silly.

Really a focus on computers should be on,  Monitor(anyone noticed how cheap theese things are now?, grab a 26" or two) keyboard(!!!!) Harddrive(SSD) and Grafics card(your only focus for gaming). nothing else really.

Unless you actually need the CPU power for real computing ( I do) but that is such a minisqule part of humanity its almost laughable.

[IBI]

Really a focus on computers should be on,  Monitor(anyone noticed how cheap theese things are now?, grab a 26" or two) keyboard(!!!!) Harddrive(SSD) and Grafics card(your only focus for gaming). nothing else really.

Unless you actually need the CPU power for real computing ( I do) but that is such a minisqule part of humanity its almost laughable.

I largely agree (although you do need a decent CPU for some gaming) and encourage people to look at the screen and keyboard/mouse quality and well as how noisy the thing is. Unfortunately, manufacturers and sellers don't provide any useful information on the quality so the only real way to decide is to limit your search to those products that have several reviews availible (assuming you don't have a large range of computers to go and play with locally). This is more of a problem with laptops since at least you can generally fix whatever's wrong with a desktop.

[Manyak]

Manyak

Good mornin.
I disagree, read the reviews again,  As already said You putting that i7 against that phenom is wrong, use an old cheaper Core2Quad you end up with a cheaper and faster system.

Im not saying this all reviews published are saying this, read them.

.
Now for coffee.
.
got coffee "ahhhhhh"
So read the reviews,  this is the point, as one says for instance the Cheaper Intel Core 2 Quad Q8200 Is faster then AMD Phenom II X4 810, other reviews use other processors and this is the point.
Another said that very Chip  AMD Phenom II X4 810 was AMDs try to get in on Intels Price/Performance but it Does right out fail.
I never go by views, Go by facts. and hell all facts are saying this. why are you debating this? Not read reviews?
AMD catching up yes. But it is obvious they need another year or so, and some luck.

I did read the reviews (which I had seen before), and they said pretty much the opposite - that the PhenII 2.6GHz is faster than a Q8200. Actually, the only test they were bad with in those reviews was Photoshop.

I largely agree (although you do need a decent CPU for some gaming) and encourage people to look at the screen and keyboard/mouse quality and well as how noisy the thing is. Unfortunately, manufacturers and sellers don't provide any useful information on the quality so the only real way to decide is to limit your search to those products that have several reviews availible (assuming you don't have a large range of computers to go and play with locally). This is more of a problem with laptops since at least you can generally fix whatever's wrong with a desktop.

That's why you build it yourself!

When you do it yourself there are a lot of things you can add to make it quiet that OEM PCs don't do. Such as rubber grommets for the fans and hard drives, sound dampening foam for the case walls, rubber case feet, giant CPU heatsinks with low RPM fans, underclocking to reduce heat (and therefore turn the fans down), choosing low-noise hard drives....

[IBI]

That's why you build it yourself!

When you do it yourself there are a lot of things you can add to make it quiet that OEM PCs don't do. Such as rubber grommets for the fans and hard drives, sound dampening foam for the case walls, rubber case feet, giant CPU heatsinks with low RPM fans, underclocking to reduce heat (and therefore turn the fans down), choosing low-noise hard drives....

My desktop has got rubber grommets, a giant heatsink, low RPM fans and a low-noise hard drive (and would have had a great monitor If I'd not been forced to buy a year ago).

Unfortunately, laptops and all in ones (which make up a significant portion of 'computers' these days) are a lot less friendly to that sort of thing. You can't even specify it to come without HDD so you can install an SSD.