why did you buy your last computer?

[mrmitchell]

I'm planning on trying to steal something from NASA. Could anyone tell me where they keep their top secret information? That would recoup the cost of all the effort of trying to steal it. (I'm sure you don't just walk in, take a laptop, and leave, right?)

[Neutrino]

But dual AthlonMPs are probably cheaper than an Opteron (for now, at least) and offer acceptable performance for most applications. *thinks in cheapskate college student mode*

[David Floyd]

Mine was an impulse buy.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Neutrino
But dual AthlonMPs are probably cheaper than an Opteron (for now, at least) and offer acceptable performance for most applications. *thinks in cheapskate college student mode*

Of course, but take it in context...

Sava said he'd get dual Athlon MPs faster than a Pentium 5. This is already not the case for the Pentium 4, it certainly won't be for the Pentium 5.

So I said you can't get a dual Athlon, because I'm thinking in the timeframe/performance to be competitive with the Pentium 5...in which case the only way to get a dual Athlon is the Opteron.

[Kramerman]

other:

this was my first computer... i needed it to do stuff that computers are used for, everything from word processing and internet, to games and playing music

[Kuciwalker]

It was my parent's money

[Kramerman]

Originally posted by Asher
My Pentium 5 3.4GHz is merely a few months away...

whats the deal with those new processors that can do like two things simultaneously? my frined was kinda telling me about those. is that what the p5 is? he called somehting like "duel-threading' processors or something like that

[Asher]

Originally posted by Kramerman
whats the deal with those new processors that can do like two things simultaneously? my frined was kinda telling me about those. is that what the p5 is? he called somehting like "duel-threading' processors or something like that

HyperThreading is the marketing term (Simultaneous Multi-Threading is the technical term).

It runs two threads (or strings/strands/streams of computer instructions) at once, rather than one. It gives very large benefits for multitasking, since instead of running just one program at once it can run two. One thread usually only uses part of the processor, like the floating-point unit, so the other thread can use the integer-and-logic unit which would otherwise sit idle.

It makes for a far more efficient processor. It'll get even faster in future apps that are designed with it in mind. It also gives performance benefits in apps that are designed with multi-threading in mind (which is becoming far more popular, due to Apple's dual G5s and HyperThreading on the P4)

It's available on the P4 2.4C, 2.6C, 2.8C, 3.06, and 3.2s only.

The Pentium 5 has the second, enhanced version of HyperThreading (plus way more )

[MrFun]

Yesterday, I bought a Dimension model computer from Dell -- and it will have a Dual thread on Pentium 4.

[Kuciwalker]

Ummm... last time I checked, my p3 1.0 GHz processor could run multiple threads too...

On another note, despite having a 2.0 GHz p4 computer (winXP) with half a gig of memory, I often use this computer (the p3, winME) for most things. It runs civ3 perfectly fine (I've never had the slowness people complain about), runs any Office program just as quickly, and is just as good for web browsing. In fact, the XP interface (even when set to normal windows look) sometimes feels a bit unresponsive, or at least slow. Plus, it's ctrl-alt-delete window seems to be really slow, and I can't disable it.

[Asher]

Originally posted by skywalker
Ummm... last time I checked, my p3 1.0 GHz processor could run multiple threads too...

No.

[MrFun]

Originally posted by Asher

No.

And thus, the great computer guru has spoken.

[Kuciwalker]

Oh, you mean built into the processor, not the OS. Windows can run multiple threads on any computer, just not truly simultaneously.

[Kramerman]

Originally posted by Asher

HyperThreading is the marketing term (Simultaneous Multi-Threading is the technical term).

It runs two threads (or strings/strands/streams of computer instructions) at once, rather than one. It gives very large benefits for multitasking, since instead of running just one program at once it can run two. One thread usually only uses part of the processor, like the floating-point unit, so the other thread can use the integer-and-logic unit which would otherwise sit idle.

It makes for a far more efficient processor. It'll get even faster in future apps that are designed with it in mind. It also gives performance benefits in apps that are designed with multi-threading in mind (which is becoming far more popular, due to Apple's dual G5s and HyperThreading on the P4)

It's available on the P4 2.4C, 2.6C, 2.8C, 3.06, and 3.2s only.

The Pentium 5 has the second, enhanced version of HyperThreading (plus way more )

will they have hyper threading on laptop processors anytime soon (im gonna by a laptop at some point)? and what is the 'way more' you speak of???

[Kramerman]

Originally posted by skywalker
Oh, you mean built into the processor, not the OS. Windows can run multiple threads on any computer, just not truly simultaneously.

right.. windows switches back and forth between running programs really really quickly, so it is essentially running them at the same time, but really isnt. I beleive it is the switching back and forth that these new ones will not have to do, and therefore be more efficient, but that is just a guess.. asher?

[MrFun]

Originally posted by Kramerman


will they have hyper threading on laptop processors anytime soon (im gonna by a laptop at some point)? and what is the 'way more' you speak of???

Asher . . .

you gave Kramerman something to masturbate over tonight.

[Kramerman]

nah, a girl walked up to me and gave me a condom today... i think im gonna use it

[MrFun]

Originally posted by Kramerman
nah, a girl walked up to me and gave me a condom today... i think im gonna use it

SCORE!

[Kuciwalker]

Wow. That's a big hint....

[geeslaka]

My gf caught me with someone else and insisted I buy a computer to make up for it.

[Asher]

Originally posted by Kramerman
will they have hyper threading on laptop processors anytime soon (im gonna by a laptop at some point)? and what is the 'way more' you speak of???

You can get HT in laptops today, provided they use the regular Pentium 4 or Pentium 4-M.

The Pentium M doesn't have it, but it's still a much better mobile chip (much faster and uses less power).

The Pentium 5 comes with lots of advances, most of them are techie stuff but do translate into performance boosts.

The Level 2 cache (L2) doubles from 512KB to 1024KB.

The Level 1 cache (L1) doubles from 16KB to 32KB

Physical address register increases from 36-bits to 40-bits

The Integer register file increases from 128 x 32-bit to 256 x 64-bit (though the 64-bit aspect of it is useless until they enable x86-64 support next year)

The Floating Point register file increases from 128 x 128-bit to 256 x 128-bit

Load buffer increases from 48 entries to 96 entries

Store buffer increases from 24 entries to 48 entries

Adds SSE3 (includes special instructions to improve hyperthreading performance)

Is smaller and runs cooler than the Pentium 4

[loinburger]

Originally posted by skywalker
Wow. That's a big hint....

Yeah, condoms are great -- they make masturbatory cleanup much more efficient, and they prevent you from "misplacing" your seed. It's far less embarassing to have a girl give you a condom than to have her say "Hey, it looks like you've got some spooge on your ear..."

[Kuciwalker]

I understand the 3rd and last ones. Care to explain the others?

EDIT: in response to Asher

[Asher]

Originally posted by Kramerman
right.. windows switches back and forth between running programs really really quickly, so it is essentially running them at the same time, but really isnt. I beleive it is the switching back and forth that these new ones will not have to do, and therefore be more efficient, but that is just a guess.. asher?

The new ones still have to switch back and forth, unless you only run 2 processes/threads on your computer (impossible ).

The difference being, with HT it's much more efficient because it can run twice the number of threads/processes at once.

Future versions (in late 2004) will handle 4 threads.

[MrFun]

Originally posted by loinburger

Yeah, condoms are great -- they make masturbatory cleanup much more efficient, and they prevent you from "misplacing" your seed. It's far less embarassing to have a girl give you a condom than to have her say "Hey, it looks like you've got some spooge on your ear..."

You know what -- I don't think there is any limit in the ways a thread can be thread-jacked.

From purchasing computers to sex.

wow

[Kuciwalker]

On your ear???

On second thought, I don't want to know

[Kramerman]

Originally posted by loinburger

Yeah, condoms are great -- they make masturbatory cleanup much more efficient, and they prevent you from "misplacing" your seed. It's far less embarassing to have a girl give you a condom than to have her say "Hey, it looks like you've got some spooge on your ear..."

aah... good old loins here to give me a reality check

[Kramerman]

Originally posted by MrFun


You know what -- I don't think there is any limit in the ways a thread can be thread-jacked.

From purchasing computers to sex.

wow

i rarely see a thread get thru a second page before getting jacked. mine usually dont last till after a few posts

[Asher]

The Level 2 cache (L2) doubles from 512KB to 1024KB.

The Level 1 cache (L1) doubles from 16KB to 32KB

The caches are ultra-fast memory pools that sit, physically, on the processor chip. They're thousands of times faster than RAM, and millions of times faster than the harddrive. The L2 cache is the larger but slower than the L1 cache. The stuff the CPU uses most gets stored as close to the CPU as possible. So the most common stuff ends up in L1, then in L2, then in RAM, then on the HD. L1 is nearly instantanous, L2 slightly longer, and RAM is 96ns for the Pentium 4. HardDrives are usually in the 30ms range.

The Integer register file increases from 128 x 32-bit to 256 x 64-bit (though the 64-bit aspect of it is useless until they enable x86-64 support next year)

The Floating Point register file increases from 128 x 128-bit to 256 x 128-bit

These serve two purposes: The number of registers has doubled, this will help HyperThreading performance substantially. The precision has also moved from 32-bit to 64-bit, because the Pentium 5 is actually capable of being a 64-bit processor: It's just disabled until 2004, when a new variation of the chip will be released. Much like how all Pentium 4s are capable of HyperThreading, but it was disabled until recently.

Load buffer increases from 48 entries to 96 entries

Store buffer increases from 24 entries to 48 entries

These exist to help boost HyperThreading performance, again.

Adds SSE3 (includes special instructions to improve hyperthreading performance)

SSE instructions are "Streaming SIMD Extensions"
SIMD means Single Instruction, Multiple Data.
Simply put, instead of using four instructions and four values, it uses one instruction and four values. This is very helpful for 3D graphics, media encoding, etc. Anything that can easily be represented by a matrix. SSE3 adds 13 new instructions that allow developers to do things much faster.

Is smaller and runs cooler than the Pentium 4

The size of the transistors (the low-level components of the chip) shrink from 130nm to 90nm, with a new technology called "strained silicon". Essentially, the chip takes less power, is much smaller, allows more transistors to be added, and runs cooler.

Another thing I forgot to mention is that the Pentium 5 has reduced integer multiply latencies (lag time, how fast it can do it), too.

[geeslaka]

There are two kinds of jacking - thread and off.