Dual Core Processing: Intel and AMD,

Dual Core Processing: Intel and AMD,

The latest buzz in the processor industry is about dual core processors. AMD may be the first to take the limelight with their announcement of dual core AMD Opteron processors set to launch in mid-2005 but Intel and IBM are cueing up their dual core processors as well.

A dual core processor is exactly what it sounds like. It is two processor cores on one die essentially like having a dual processor system in one processor. AMD's Opteron processor has been dual processor capable since its inception. Opteron was designed with an extra HyperTransport link. The relevance of it was mostly overlooked. HyperTransport Technology simply means a faster connection that is able to transfer more data between two chips. This does not mean that the chip itself is faster. It means that the capability exists via the HyperTransport pathway for one chip to “talk” to another chip or device at a faster speed and with greater data throughput.

We knew that HyperTransport Technology would provide for a faster connection to system memory, the GPU and the rest of the motherboard but back in the fall of 2003 we thought of the extra HyperTransport link as a connection to another physical processor.

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It didn't dawn on us that the "extra" processor could be on the same die. While some will say "I knew that" most didn't pick up on it.

AMD have the added punch of being able to drop their dual core Opteron processors into existing 940-pin sockets. This upgrade path is extremely favorable as all it will require is a processor swap and, perhaps, a BIOS update.

Intel are continuing with their Pentium 4 cores by releasing two flavors codenamed Paxville and Dempsey. The codenames will very likely change once the marketing department gets their hands on it as "Introducing the new Dempsey" has a very lackluster ring to it.

MAC orientated Think Secret posted IBM plans on the PowerPC 970MP codenamed Antares and rumored to clock in at 3GHz with a 1GHz EI (Elastic Interface) bus.

The horses are now in the paddock. AMD, INTEL and MAC loyalists are beginning to group at the fence to eye up their favorite and the competition. The post parade is still a ways off and with post time now set at mid-2005 it's anybody's guess who will be out of the gate first.

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Intel & AMD Dual-core Desktop Processors
The Intel Pentium Processor Extreme Edition 840 running at 3.2 GHz and Intel 955X Express Chipsets are being built into computers that are now entering the market. This is Intel's first desktop dual-core product supporting Hyper-Threading Technology. Processor features include the following:

• Hyper-Threading Technology: Enables you to run multiple demanding applications at the same time.
• Intel Extended Memory 64 Technology: Provides flexibility for future applications that support both 32-bit and 64-bit computing.
• Dual-Core: Two physical cores in one processor support better system responsiveness and multi-tasking capability than a comparable single core processor. [Source: Intel Dual-core Desktop Processor]

WHY??

Why the shift to dual core and how will this impact the gigahertz performance race? Who or what will dual core processing benefit and will it be sought after by enthusiasts or left buried deep inside the dark recesses of server rooms?

The broad brush paints a processor as a device that executes a series of instructions to tell it what to do which, in turn, tells everything else it interacts with what to do. The faster it can do this the better. "Faster" can be directly related to clock speed but don't make the mistake of thinking that INTEL's higher clock speeds make it "faster" than AMD.

Both AMD and INTEL scaled up the clock speeds of their processors in a very short amount of time but have recently slowed the curve. AMD moved from the 1GHz "Thunderbird" to the Athlon64 FX53 in In a little less than 4 years which is impressive considering from 1997 until 2000 the K6 processor family saw a mere 4-500 MHz clock speed increase.

It is the flattening of the clock speed curve that some are reasoning why a shift to dual core. Some have surmised that AMD and INTEL have hit clock speed walls and another route is being taken to continue the performance curve and stay top of mind with new product releases. The problem with winding up clock speeds is heat. At present the processor engine can operate at only so much RPM before the engine will seize. Heat is the enemy of any processor and high clock speeds mean high heat and that means errors. A Windows PC running at 10GHz isn't much good if it can't make it past booting up before crashing.

That heat comes from power. It takes a lot of juice to crank up a processor to high clock speeds and a processor with that much electricity running around the die is prone to noise. It's not audible noise like a high RPM cooling fan but electrical noise otherwise akin to interference. The pathways on a processor are microscopically close together. The more power that runs through these pathways due to the requirement of higher clock speeds means that there will be a small amount of electrical radiation from one pathway to the next. That leakage could corrupt the data in another pathway. Corrupted data means errors which means a program could get cranky.

Think of it like a hot element on a stove. A hand can be placed fairly close with the burner on low. Turn the burner up to high and it get's pretty uncomfortable to keep a hand at the same distance it was when the burner was on low. It may even burn a hand. The radiated heat from the burner "corrupts" the hand resulting in a burn. In a processor the thermal heat is an issue but it's also the electrical noise like a radio station that isn't quite tuned in. The data is "dirty" and the song isn't clear enough to understand.