Quad Core Processing Question

I have been looking at Quad Core desktops.

Most of the Dell's have processprs with a speed of 2.33 Ghz

My quiestion is....

Does this figure apply to each core individually, i.e. mutiplied by 4.

Giving total proceessing speed of over 9Ghz?

Possibly a stpuid question, it's just tat I have seen other computers with more than 2.33 but a lot less expensive.

Doesn't exactly work like that, but yes it is for each core

For normal quad cores I think they have 2 physical cores running 2 threads each at that specific speed. However it's being run in parallel, so it doesn't really multiply the speed. Instead it means that you can run 4 different programmes on those 4 different threads. Some programmes (like FM for example) can take advantage of multiple cores and split the work over them, therefore speeding them up, much in the same way racking up the clock speed would.

At least that's how it was explained to me, I'm not 100% sure...

Each core operates at 2.33GHz, but you can't just multiply that speed by 4 and say your computer is running at 9GHz. Having four cores means the chip can process 4 things at once. What this means to you is either:

4 single threaded programs can run simultaneously at 2.33GHz, whereas in a normal processor you could only run one program and the others have to wait (in reality it is more complicated by interweaving the operations of each program so they all seem to run at the same time).

or

Most modern programs are split into threads, where each thread performs a particular task within the program. In a normal processor this is exactly the same as the example above where one thread has to wait for the other to finish in order to do its business. But with a quad core 4 of the threads can all run at 2.33GHz simultaneously.

In theory if you have a multi-threaded application (like FM is) then a quad core processor should cut the processing time in quarter. But in reality you have to remember that when Windows is running you have loads of applications running at the same time using up the CPU. So the overall effect of the quad core won't be to quarter loading times, but it will speed them up greatly and allow you to still do lots of other things at the same time (e.g. chatting on MSN, writing an email, reading these forums, etc etc) without noticing any slow down as you would on a single core processor.

For normal quad cores I think they have 2 physical cores running 2 threads each at that specific speed. However it's being run in parallel, so it doesn't really multiply the speed. Instead it means that you can run 4 different programmes on those 4 different threads. Some programmes (like FM for example) can take advantage of multiple cores and split the work over them, therefore speeding them up, much in the same way racking up the clock speed would.

At least that's how it was explained to me, I'm not 100% sure...

Quad cores have 4 physical cores and dual cores have 2 physical cores. Each core can run 1 thread. But there are some tricks that will make it seem like a core is actually running more than one thread by optimizing the use of the core (I think that is what HyperThreading does).

Only on eBay do they say 9Ghz of processing power. Liars!

There is still little quad support in games. But most new games can fuly utilize 2 cores, so in gamy game you will run it faster on a dual core at a higher clock speed than on a quad. And if you use WinXP you can't use more than 2 cores at all.

And if you use WinXP you can't use more than 2 cores at all.

You can't use more than two separate processors - however it will run more than 2 cores

XP Pro that is - Home doesn't allow multiple processors at all, but will run multiple cores

For normal quad cores I think they have 2 physical cores running 2 threads each at that specific speed. However it's being run in parallel, so it doesn't really multiply the speed. Instead it means that you can run 4 different programmes on those 4 different threads. Some programmes (like FM for example) can take advantage of multiple cores and split the work over them, therefore speeding them up, much in the same way racking up the clock speed would.

At least that's how it was explained to me, I'm not 100% sure...

There is still little quad support in games. But most new games can fuly utilize 2 cores, so in gamy game you will run it faster on a dual core at a higher clock speed than on a quad. And if you use WinXP you can't use more than 2 cores at all.

That is wrong. You can use quad cores with Windows XP. It is more a question of whether or not applications actually make use of the fact that 4 threads can be run at once. They may use multiple threads but they may not actually split a big task into multiple threads, rather they split multiple tasks into multiple threads.

Intels new i7 chips have upto 4 threads per core

AMD are still only doing upto 2 threads per core

so with an AMD Quad you can run 8 instructions per cycle, with the best i7 Quad you can get 16 instructions per cycle, all of this is redundant if your OS or application are incapable of utilising them.

you can over clock a 2.3 upto 3.2 v easy and its very stable

Intels new i7 chips have upto 4 threads per core

AMD are still only doing upto 2 threads per core

so with an AMD Quad you can run 8 instructions per cycle, with the best i7 Quad you can get 16 instructions per cycle, all of this is redundant if your OS or application are incapable of utilising them.

Not to mention the cores still share the rest of the resourses in your computer. Which means if the rest of the computer isn't up for the task something else will slow it down no matter how well your cpu work.

Intels new i7 chips have upto 4 threads per core

AMD are still only doing upto 2 threads per core

so with an AMD Quad you can run 8 instructions per cycle, with the best i7 Quad you can get 16 instructions per cycle, all of this is redundant if your OS or application are incapable of utilising them.

Strictly speaking they use the HyperThreading Technology, which basically makes the OS think that there are more processors than there actually are. So instead of saying here is an instruction let me know when you are finished, ok here is the next; it says here are two instructions. The processor can't execute two instructions at once, but by having the two instructions at the same time it can optimise the use of resources to make it seem like they are being executed simultaneously. So the net effect isn't doubling the speed but just optimising it.