RE: Dual or Single CPU?

["Colin J. Raven" <cjraven ddf-lab com>]

Now *there's* an interesting and thought provoking perspective from a real
"power-user"
Dan, thanks for the input (from this neck of the woods anyway)
Tell me something though...You say that you are running two instances of E,
how do you allocate each instance of E (I assume you mean "enlightenment")
to each cpu? How do you know that one cpu isn't actually handling both
instances??
Now *that* would be interesting to learn :-)
Regards to all,
-Colin
--
Colin J. Raven


>
>
>Okay ill have to admit, i have done a fair amount of testing being based
>where i am!
>SMP servers do work faster and handle better loads over their single
>cousins, but for the "average" use he wont be able to utilise them
>enough to
>notice a difference!
>
>i run a Dell poweredge using Dual 500mhz's (okay im Running FreeBSD..but..)
>and that handles the load i place on it (kernel compiles all day long and
>other heavy duty compiling
>
>plus im running dualhead and have two instances of E running so they both
>take 1 cpu and balance the load
>
>At the end of the day, a decent single cpu will do most people well
>
>Dan Cuthbert
>European Hosting Research & Engineering
>PSINet Datacentres
>mobile: +44 77 1279 0646
>
>-----Original Message-----
>From: redhat-install-list-admin redhat com
>[mailto:redhat-install-list-admin redhat com]On Behalf Of Colin J. Raven
>Sent: 27 October 2000 16:52
>To: redhat-install-list redhat com
>Subject: RE: Dual or Single CPU?
>
>
>OK, let me take a moment to clarify the "why" here, just so that you folks
>know; "where I'm coming from" on this project. It's not a hobbyist's dream
>(well, I guess it is in a way) but has more serious overtones.......
>
>This is a "proof of concept" exercise that I have undertaken on
>behalf of my
>company. I gave up smoking, so I decided to buy myself a present using the
>equivalent amount 'o cash that I would have seen go up in smoke and do the
>project as a personal learning exercise.
>
>I too wondered about the single/dual cpu question. In truth I always wanted
>to see what a dual cpu  fire breathing monster would feel like...(yeah, I
>know...F.A.S.T) so in ths case it was a real dilemma believe me. It was
>exactly as you wrote...one top 'o the line cpu...or two? I punked out when
>the dollars climbed, and although I *could* have squeezed just a
>little more into this project, I was shellshocked enough to call it quits.
>Essentially I figured that I probably needed more memory as opposed to CPU
cycles,
>since this machine will probably never see a graphics program, and I am
unlikely
>to be cruching 1 million record database queries.
>
>So, I'm interested in this thread too. It's not too late to change
>to a dual cpu config if there is a consensus that *that* setup would
deliver a
>"better" result. (The VMWare/Win side will be doing significant
>Access small database work, so maybe there really is a clock cycle issue
here, but I
>thought that a Xeon chip would have the architecture [stamina? "Right
>Stuff"?] to do the job. The darned machine will take up to 2GB of RAM as
>well as a second CPU, so my options going forward are fairly wide open I
>think.
>
>This was just for clarification, that's all.
>
>Regards to all, and thanks for the many suggestions that have flowed this
>way so far...and my guess is that we're far from finished yet.
>
>-Colin
>--
>Colin J. Raven
>
>>-----Original Message-----
>>From: redhat-install-list-admin redhat com
>>[mailto:redhat-install-list-admin redhat com]On Behalf Of Rob Toner
>>Sent: Friday, October 27, 2000 11:14 AM
>>To: redhat-install-list redhat com
>>Subject: Re: Dual or Single CPU?
>>
>>
>>"C. Bryan Young" wrote:
>>
>>> This is sort of related to Colin's earlier post -- regarding the
>>specs for
>>> his new workstation.  I'm just curious whether -- for the same
>>price -- it
>>> is better to get 1 top-of-the-line cpu (in his case a 933MHz Xeon) or 2
>>> lesser cpus (say, PIII 800 MHz).
>>>
>>> I know this depends on intended application.  Let's say one
>wanted to run
>>> dual OS's using VMWare.  I would tend to think that dual cpu's would be
>>> better, but don't know enough about smp -- especially in Linux
>-- to know
>>> for sure.
>>>
>>> Any thoughts?  I'm just curious -- want to learn more about smp
>in Linux.
>>>
>>> --Bryan
>>>
>>> -----Original Message-----
>>> From: Jeff Lane [mailto:jlane redhat com]
>>> Sent: Friday, October 27, 2000 9:23 AM
>>> To: redhat-install-list redhat com
>>> Subject: RE: RedHat 7.0 and Matrox G400 compatibility
>>>
>>> On Fri, 27 Oct 2000, Colin J. Raven wrote:
>>>
>>> > Anyone from RedHat care to comment on this one?
>>> > There's a $5500 workstation on hold until we can successfully
>>resolve this
>>> > issue.
>>> > Regards,
>>> > -Colin
>>>
>>> Hey... read my other posts... <grin>
>>>
>>> I have the Precision 420 here wiht the 32 MEg G400.  the original mga
>>> driver didnt work too well with the card.  I was forced to use X
>>> 3.3.6.  there is a new driver
>>> http://www.matrox.com/mga/support/drivers/files/linux_03.cfm here!!
>>>
>>> I found it!!!
>>>
>>> from the matrox site:
>>> This driver is based on the open source development being done
>within the
>>> XFree86 Project. The driver remains unmodified, with the
>exception of the
>>> display adapter initialization, which has been replaced with a closed
>>> source Matrox library. This special library enables features such as
>>> DualHead, TV out, and support for digital flat panel monitors.
>>>
>>> The readme included instructions for gettiung DRI and multihead
>>working as
>>> well.
>>>
>>> I feel much better now that i have found htat driver again.
>>>
>>> cheers
>>>
>>>  --
>>> (-0-)  (-0-)  (-0-)  <-0->  (-0-)  (-0-)  (-0-)
>>> Jeffrey D Lane
>>> Geek, Star Wars Fanatic, and collector of
>>> obselete technologies.
>>>
>>> 2600 Meridian Parkway   (919) 547-0012x168
>>> Durham, NC 27713        (888) REDHAT1x168
>>>
>>> "I propose that every city have a telephone
>>> number 119 -- for dyslexics> who have an
>>> emergency." -George W. Bush
>>> (-0-)  (-0-)  (-0-)  <-0->  (-0-)  (-0-)  (-0-)
>>>
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>>
>>If you go with dual, lets say two 500 you get almost the same as
>>one 1gig.  Of
>>course the price is a little cheaper.  The main thing is you get
>>smp.  VMWare
>>you take a large hit on performance, but if you must, then go for it.  It
>>really depends on the app that your running.  RH supports SMP but
>>if the app
>>doesn't then there isn't any gain (for that app).
>>
>>
>>
>>
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