Quad core processors

Quad cores are indeed a waste at the moment unless you are doing massive amounts of video encoding which is the only application type that is actively making good use of all four cores. Right now you are much better off waiting on the higher clocked E8000 C2D line to come out and pick one of those up. You will still see much better application and game performance from a cheaper, higher clocked dual core than you would from a quad core.

Jam it back in, in the dark.

And all you'll need is a new bottle of liquid nitrogen every month.

80 cores? IBM was having issues manufacturing a chip with 8 cores so this thing would be a yield nightmare. Pretty interesting though as this is pretty much Intel's version of the Cell processor.

Man quantum computing needs a breakthrough quick.

There's nowhere I can't reach.

Originally Posted by Bigblah

I've noticed some familiar applications taking advantage of quad core -- dbpoweramp has four threads running at once for batch encoding, for instance.

And considering that Q6600 doesn't cost much more than dual core at the moment (and is quite OC friendly), it's not really a waste.

A quad core costs a significant amount more than an equally clocked dual core. You are better off spending the same amount of money for a higher clocked dual core unless you are doing what I said, and you mentioned -- lots of encoding.

And again if you don't need a new processor RIGHT NOW, the E8000 series will be out in a few months and offer higher clock speeds, less power consumption (45nm process meaning higher overclocking potential) and improved cores than the current C2Ds and Quads and will be priced roughly at what the current C2D series is at now. The top of the line E8500 for example will be $270, matching the current E6850. And it's pretty obvious which you want by looking at the primary benchmarks:



This thing is sticky, and I don't like it. I don't appreciate it.

Originally Posted by Bigblah

What do you mean?

A 2.4Ghz Q6600 costs SGD 443 here in Singapore, while a 3.0Ghz C2D E6850 costs SGD 440. That's a whopping SGD 3 difference (2 US Dollars).

The difference is in the clock speed. Look how much an E6600 costs, which is the C2D clock equivalent to the Q6600. I was pointing out that you are going to get better performance from a 3.0Ghz dual core in most applications than you would a 2.4Ghz quad core. So buy the 3.0Ghz dual over the 2.4Ghz quad because most application use one, maybe two cores at most and the extra clock speed will net you more performance than the two extra, slower, un-used cores on the quad.

Quote:

And for a 1/4 increase in dual core clock speed the price balloons to just about the same as a quad. I'd rather get a quad and overclock it.

A Q6600 will probably stably overclock to 3.2Ghz. An E6850 with stably overclock to 3.8Ghz. You're still better off with the dual core.

I am a dolphin, do you want me on your body?

Originally Posted by AcerBandit

Woah, what? Current top of the line Intel chips cost upwards to one thousand bucks. How are the new, faster, better chips yet to be released going to be a quarter of that right out the door? Seriously, where do you get this info?

Those are the extremes. The E8000 line is to replace the 6000 line. Also..well I don't really want to get into the complexity of yields are pricing.

Roadmap + pricing:

Tech ARP - Intel 45nm Core 2 Desktop Processor Pre-Launch Update Rev. 2.2

Amazing what a 45nm process does to the price, eh? BTW The E8000 series will have SSE4, larger cache sizes and the people are overclocking the E8500 samples to 4.7Ghz on air. There is no reason not to wait for one of these things.

I was speaking idiomatically.

I've always preferred HardOCP for technology news and reviews.

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What kind of toxic man-thing is happening now?