- Apr 27, 2005
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A intro guide to Dual Core CPU's By mpasternak
1. What is a Dual Core CPU?
A> A Dual core CPU is in fact 2 separate Processors that are packaged or created and put within 1 die or 1 package. This will allow 1 "chip" to be used instead of two separate processors on a motherboard, saving space and money.
2. So a processor runs at 2 times the speed?
A> NO! This is not the case with dual core / dual CPU's. a 2.2Ghz dual core system does NOT give you 4.4ghz to work with. it gives you 2 individual 2.2ghz CPU's to handle two separate threads at the same time.
3. What’s a Thread?
A> When a task / program runs, it creates what is called a thread. a thread is a open string of data that needs to be processed. This must go through the CPU in order for a program to work. Most programs create 1 thread and send all it's data linearly through that thread. When multiple applications are running, the Operating system breaks up the threads so that the processor can run them all and simulate multi-tasking.
3. How Do dual-core CPU's effect these Threads?
A> Simple. it allows the computer to actually process 2 threads simultaneously.
In a single CPU system, all threads must be processed through 1 CPU.
*(Each Letter represents a thread)
CPU1: ABCDABCDABCDABCDABCDABCDABCDABCD
in dual core (or more) they're broken up and then sent to different CPU's
CPU1:ABCDABCDABCDABCD
CPU2:ABCDABCDABCDABCD
4. Seems to good to be true, What’s the Downside?
A> while they handle multiple threads well, Single threaded applications will still only use 1 core / 1 CPU at a time, Leaving the 2nd CPU core often underused or not used at all. Games in particular are virtually all single threaded. (We’ll call thread A)
CPU1:AAAAAAAA
CPU2:BCDBCDBCDBCDBCDBCDBCDBCD
What ya can see that if you set the game to use up an entire Core, yes, you can run other threads on the 2nd core without a hit to the game performance. BUT those background threads will all have to share the 2nd core and will take a bit longer to run. to further this problem. The OS doesn’t fully optimize the CPU's this way. and there are some intermittent threads that make it onto Core 1.
CPU1: AABCABDAAAACDA
CPU2: BCDBCDBCDBCDBCDBCD
The game is still slowed down even more by the other CPU intensive applications.
5. What’s this mean really?
A> that yes, a Dual core CPU allows you to run multiple threads, and resource intensive applications at the same time. But when you get into something like gaming where the game requires intensive use of 1 CPU only, you run into a situation of the OS / Thread scheduler not appropriately controlling the threads for maximum performance. Often gaming performance is either sacrificed while the CPU evenly assigns other threads to the CPU the games using, or the 2nd CPU runs mostly idle or underused because you don't run anything else while running the game.
6. What does the future bring?
A> for a Dual Core CPU to be most effective, it requires better scheduling of the OS (Vista is supposed to be better than XP). for gaming, it requires that games be written to be multi-threaded and be able to be evenly spread out amongst the processors in order for them to really run at the peak performance. Until this happens, a dual core CPU is NOT the best buy for a gaming rig. You will get more performance in your game if you run just the game on a single core that runs faster.
7. Why would anyone want a dual core then?
A> if your NOT a gamer and do a lot of processing that requires multiple threads. Like Cad work, encoding, decoding, and pure multitasking. These are all tasks that dual core will help with, any software that fully takes advantage of multiple threads really. As I’ve said though, Current games DO NOT!
1. What is a Dual Core CPU?
A> A Dual core CPU is in fact 2 separate Processors that are packaged or created and put within 1 die or 1 package. This will allow 1 "chip" to be used instead of two separate processors on a motherboard, saving space and money.
2. So a processor runs at 2 times the speed?
A> NO! This is not the case with dual core / dual CPU's. a 2.2Ghz dual core system does NOT give you 4.4ghz to work with. it gives you 2 individual 2.2ghz CPU's to handle two separate threads at the same time.
3. What’s a Thread?
A> When a task / program runs, it creates what is called a thread. a thread is a open string of data that needs to be processed. This must go through the CPU in order for a program to work. Most programs create 1 thread and send all it's data linearly through that thread. When multiple applications are running, the Operating system breaks up the threads so that the processor can run them all and simulate multi-tasking.
3. How Do dual-core CPU's effect these Threads?
A> Simple. it allows the computer to actually process 2 threads simultaneously.
In a single CPU system, all threads must be processed through 1 CPU.
*(Each Letter represents a thread)
CPU1: ABCDABCDABCDABCDABCDABCDABCDABCD
in dual core (or more) they're broken up and then sent to different CPU's
CPU1:ABCDABCDABCDABCD
CPU2:ABCDABCDABCDABCD
4. Seems to good to be true, What’s the Downside?
A> while they handle multiple threads well, Single threaded applications will still only use 1 core / 1 CPU at a time, Leaving the 2nd CPU core often underused or not used at all. Games in particular are virtually all single threaded. (We’ll call thread A)
CPU1:AAAAAAAA
CPU2:BCDBCDBCDBCDBCDBCDBCDBCD
What ya can see that if you set the game to use up an entire Core, yes, you can run other threads on the 2nd core without a hit to the game performance. BUT those background threads will all have to share the 2nd core and will take a bit longer to run. to further this problem. The OS doesn’t fully optimize the CPU's this way. and there are some intermittent threads that make it onto Core 1.
CPU1: AABCABDAAAACDA
CPU2: BCDBCDBCDBCDBCDBCD
The game is still slowed down even more by the other CPU intensive applications.
5. What’s this mean really?
A> that yes, a Dual core CPU allows you to run multiple threads, and resource intensive applications at the same time. But when you get into something like gaming where the game requires intensive use of 1 CPU only, you run into a situation of the OS / Thread scheduler not appropriately controlling the threads for maximum performance. Often gaming performance is either sacrificed while the CPU evenly assigns other threads to the CPU the games using, or the 2nd CPU runs mostly idle or underused because you don't run anything else while running the game.
6. What does the future bring?
A> for a Dual Core CPU to be most effective, it requires better scheduling of the OS (Vista is supposed to be better than XP). for gaming, it requires that games be written to be multi-threaded and be able to be evenly spread out amongst the processors in order for them to really run at the peak performance. Until this happens, a dual core CPU is NOT the best buy for a gaming rig. You will get more performance in your game if you run just the game on a single core that runs faster.
7. Why would anyone want a dual core then?
A> if your NOT a gamer and do a lot of processing that requires multiple threads. Like Cad work, encoding, decoding, and pure multitasking. These are all tasks that dual core will help with, any software that fully takes advantage of multiple threads really. As I’ve said though, Current games DO NOT!
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