Is an era of rapid change amongst us in the near future CPUs

My crystal ball is on the fritz at the moment, so I haven't a clue. I'm planning a build in the spring, but except for a few components, I don't know for sure what's going into it. CPU, graphics card, motherboard? Only thing I know is that its going to cost a lot of money to build a new rig, so I hope to buy the good stuff the first time and not have to upgrade quickly cause I picked wrong.

Wow, Miecz is back. Oh Joy.

No matter what you do and no matter how long you wait there will always be something bigger and badder around the corner. Quad and octo-core are nice, but I'm still putting a dent in my dual-core system. Until software catches up quad-core will be overkill for a very long time.

That is unless your a megatasker that needs a hummer with platformance.

A few ravenous, mutated half-beasts scrounging through the radioactive debris of our cities to fight over scraps of maggot-infested human flesh.

Now that I have you in a good mood...   If you wanna go for QuadFX, you'll likely be able to have OctopusCore before '08. However, I couldn't possibly agree with TC any more when he sez that sw won't catch up with quadcores for a long time. Personally, I'm one of those guys that when it comes to computers, I don't want a Hummer, I want a Hummer X6, three-axle and preferably limo-stretched. I'm currently pricing out a 2 x Clovertown system and trying to figure out how many liquor stores I have to hold up to buy it. But even my own mother thinks I'm weird... :twisted:

You can wait forever for the next best thing. Drive a stake in the ground and buy the best available product and enjoy it now, the future will take care of itself.

Usually i would agree. But i believe that the transition from single to dual is the only relevant one. Once companies start to shift from single to dual, the step to multi-core is rather small. The only question is, how many cores can be fully utilized?

Again, the question is when? 2015? Quadcores will be running wristwatches and hand calculators. I think that by late 2008 the majority of popular software will be fully multicore compliant and that won't be a problem any longer. That should qualify to fulfill TC's "long time" standard.

Any PC in the future will be faster, period. I bought my P4 3.0 630 in February this year. The benchmarks for the X264 and 8xx 9xx series at that time weren't worth the $400 or more extra for me given my budget. Should I have waited for core 2 duo? Well yes but, there wasn't even a mention of them in Feb '06. BTW, what do you have now?

I have my eye on the next CPU socket type. But I am finding nothing on this. I don't know what CPU socket "Bearlake" uses or the Intel 45nm CPUs for example.

hahahahaha, couldn't have said it better myself!!! This type of comments are priceless!!!

hahahahaha, couldn't have said it better myself!!! This type of comments are priceless!!!

Hey, you're having too much fun. From now on I'm gonna charge ya admission. Gimme your Visa card number...  

I just put it in my sig! keep it coming and I'll donate money to your cause!

Quad core just became available on the retail market and all indications are that it will be the next big thing for a while. Plus, you're asking about an upgrade your not planning on doing for at least another 9 months. My advice to you is to wait until you actually have cash in hand and then worry about what kind of system you're gonna upgrade to.

If I knew what the future looked like...well, let's just say there would be one less thread asking what the future looks like.

From what little I've been able to read up on it, Bearlake/Yorkfield should be socket 775 but who knows?

Wow, dude, that's my first sig. That's quite an honour. Just for you, I'll let you have my future pearls of wisdom free!  

or who cares? really. The lifecycle of every brand new pc is 3-4 years tops. Sockets gonna keep changing, as everything else. Bottom line buy something that will satisfy your needs now, and don't worry about it.

They keep saying that multicore is the answer, since they hit a brick wall with the ghz race, but nobody knows for sure if that is the answer. After a couple of years they may just as easily say: you know what? bummer. This isn't working, lets try something else!

Wow, dude, that's my first sig. That's quite an honour. Just for you, I'll let you have my future pearls of wisdom free!  

Anything that will make me lol, trust me it's gold!

Thanks! I appreciate the props! 8)

I'm much more interested in what might be still two years down the road. Right now, the mantra is mutli-core, which for now means multiple copies of the exact same core in the computer. I think that specialised cores may have more to offer. I am inspired, for instance, by the way folding@home can take advantage of the floating point performance of the specialised gpu architecture. Adding speicalised cores to the cpu to handle very common OS tasks, virus protection, etc. could be much more efficient than just throwing more general cores at the problem.

AMD has been toying with the idea of integrating a graphics processor into the CPU since their acquisition of ATI. For AMD, this is a similar move to their moving the memory controller from the northbridge to the CPU. AMD seems to be moving ever more towards a system-on-a-chip. The market for this integrated processor is not the high-end, for which discrete graphics will rule, but still if software can be optimised to take advantage of the extra floating point performance, everyone wins. Certain applications could see a 10x or greater increase in performance from specialised cores.

I have an old 800Mhz P3 and a 2.4mhz P4 in my laptop. The laptop is too unstable though, and that is why I want a new computer. I have a 3.2mhz P4 I can get fro free from my brother, but I am not sure if it would be worth it to use it because if I get it, I need a MOBO, RAM, and all the rest. It seems just better to spend maybe 200 more and get a new processor.

They will be Socket 775.

My advice: plan for now and how much you want to spend. Don't worry about what's coming out a year down the road. If you try to keep up with the market, you would have to build a new system every three months it seems.

What do you do on your computer that would require massive multicore? :?

Pr0n.  

Yeah, if you need new mobo & ram then a newer core 2 duo would be better, if you can spend the extra 200 or so. Also consider if you have/need newer dvd drive, bigger hd, memory card reader, usb 2.0 & firewire ports, etc. Can eat up 200 easy. Take a few days & do price comparisons.

As for the laptop, maybe a virus scan & registry clean would help the stability.

You remember me? Maybe I should ask some of my old Qs: Why do you guys buy 2 Raptors? Will a cooling system help a CPU that is not overclocked?

You remember me? Maybe I should ask some of my old Qs: Why do you guys buy 2 Raptors? Will a cooling system help a CPU that is not overclocked?

1) Two Raptors are better than one since you can mate them and end up with your own private Jurassic Park.

2) A Non-Overclocked CPU does not require a cooling system. Just remove the stock HSF and watch carefully. It will soon provide an exciting fireworks show.

 

You remember me? Maybe I should ask some of my old Qs: Why do you guys buy 2 Raptors? Will a cooling system help a CPU that is not overclocked?

1) Two Raptors are better than one since you can mate them and end up with your own private Jurassic Park.

2) A Non-Overclocked CPU does not require a cooling system. Just remove the stock HSF and watch carefully. It will soon provide an exciting fireworks show.

 

lol that raptors joke is priceless  

I'm not charging minim3 for the laffs so I guess you're welcome to them for free as well...  

Great news !
No time to waste then getting a new PC   If I can upgrade to Yorkfield some day, this is good enough.
No point in waiting 2 years for the new socket!
Thanks!

Only question I have is if Bearlake is a chipset, any current 775 MB should not work with Yorkfield, right? Wrong? Any guesses?

From what little I know, the chipset just needs to support the CPU if there is pin compatability. The early 975x did not support the Conroe, then with a flash update, the 975x did support the Conroe and Kensfield.
What I am hoping for is the Yorkfield is socket 775 and the p965 chipset just needs a flash to support the Yorkfield. At worst case I need to wait until Q3 2007 for the x38 or p35.

If Intel is able to pull that off, it would really be a serious slap in the face AMD. After all, 775 and 754 were coexisting. If Intel can hold onto 775 until 2008, how many sockets will AMD have gone through by then? Five? Six?