AMD: You Want More Cores? OK, You've Got It!
Yes, Of Course More CPU Cores are Better!
Instead of ramping up clock speed, the processor industry is moving towards putting more cores inside of computer chips. We all find this to be a good thing, and AMD recently blogged about a fact that we all think to be true – the more cores, the merrier.
In a post titled, "Cores – More is Better", AMD's John Fruehe, Director of Product Marketing for Server/Workstation, revealed some of the chipmaker's shipment data – information that is usually kept confidential.
"In looking through sales data for the first half of 2010, 12-core processors clearly outsold their 8-core counterparts – by a wide margin. I was expecting that there would be a slight bias towards the 12-core, but I figured there were plenty of applications where the extra clock speed of an 8-core might be popular," Fruehe wrote. "Apparently I was wrong, customers are voting with their budgets, and cores matter."
Fruehe came up with three scenarios that could be driving the demand for the company's 12-core Magny Cours chip over the 8-core version.
Virtualization – Many customers have told me that they have a rule of “one VM per core”, so with 12-core processors, their consolidation can get even denser. With 24 cores in a 2P server, there are plenty of resources to allow all of the VMs to have plenty of access to compute power whenever they need it.
Database/Business Apps-Databases are the kings of simultaneous multi-user access. Having a dozen cores in a socket helps ensure that all of your queries come back quickly, your reports aren’t delayed and when you are making new sales, you’re not waiting behind that bonehead in marketing to finish finding out who bought toothbrushes in Toledo last Tuesday.
High Performance Computing – If you are breaking a big problem up into millions of smaller pieces and pushing that out to a cluster to solve, having 12 cores per processor means that you can dramatically cut the time involved through parallel processing. Folks like CSCS in Switzerland are taking advantage of AMD’s 12-core technology with their new Cray XE6 system that was recently installed.
This demand for more cores is a good sign for AMD, as the company is set to sample Bulldozer later this year, with roll out for the next-gen chip in 2011.
"That message is very good to hear because next year will see 16 total cores in our Bulldozer-based products," concluded Fruehe.

Faster cpus with 2-4 cores is more what consumers want. But for businesses and server environments more cores make sense.
I wonder what will be Intel's counter-offer besides Sandy-bridge?
Wrong. People have been somewhat vocal about rather having ramped up clock speeds than more cores. Oh well though, now we are just waiting until coding will actually make good use of the cores.
lmao
Unless we see a major hardware change in the next 5 years, in 2015 you can expect to see 12 core chips at ~3.0Ghz making it into the mainstream.
Faster cpus with 2-4 cores is more what consumers want. But for businesses and server environments more cores make sense.
While I agree with the people who would prefer more GHZ, I also see the wisdom in adding more cores. At some point, our desk top PC will be capable of all sorts of things that current models just can't do. Of course I am talking about AI.... and that will need more cores....
Also I reckon to a phaze in the industry. We were adding more GHZ, now we are adding more cores. Once we get 100+ cores, I reckon they will shift back into making those cores faster. Its all a matter of time.
based on what testing did you find that from?
With all these new hardware, 12 cores cpus, 2-4 gpus, intergrated processing for voltage controls and power consumption and etc. 4-24gs memory. YOu need a monitor to work with all these so you can get some of the greater benefits of newer tech under some control to what you need it for.
Heck, they even have multiple monitor support somewhere. Rather one decent sized monitor or having more then one fits the bill is hard telling. Either way, bigger screen space for UIs usages is the outcome of these greatly. Otherwise you are stuck with a taskbar function of need to use these things, and not saying that a taskbar isnt needed, just when actually using it sometimes even on modest means, it is very short coming. And to sit and say that adding another taskbar is any more help is like saying, since i can tie my shoe, im going to add a second shoelace to my shoe and make it a double helx tie with it. Which is fine, but time taken and benefits aside, tiing my show with one shoelice always fit the bill nicley and adequetly. Its not till getting more Screen space to work with that needing the second shoelace is needed with the double helx tie. Either way, the consumers that that tend to have this tech tends to all the tech, and not much an issue.
Either way, good innovations and nice products, should keep up the work.
1 cpu core per vm? wow... that is one dangerous rule of thumb... There are generally three resources to think about in regards to a virtual machine, cpu, memory, and disk... each application will stress these and other resources differently.