DUal core or Dual cpu??

[imperfectcircle25]

What are the benifits of each and which is better from a performance standpoint?? Just for example how would the following compare

Dual single core Opteron 150
Singledualcore Opteron 175

They are pretty close in price how would they compare in performance if everything else was the same(mem, HD...etc)??

 

[slvr_phoenix]

If you're talking purely about performance, I believe that two actual CPUs are better than one dualcore. This is, assuming of course, that both platforms have exactly the same clockspeed.

However, that's darn expensive. Not just for the two CPUs, but the motherboard, case, power supply ... it all adds up.

This is where dualcore is advantageous. Not only can you use just a standard ATX everything (or even micro ATX) for a dualcore, but the dualcore CPU itself is a heck of a lot cheaper than buying two otherwise identical single-core CPUs of the same speed.

So while dualcore isn't quite as efficient in a technical aspect, it's shite loads cheaper, and easier to work with.

And for this reason, given your comparison, the dualcore Opteron would totally blow away the two single-cores, because with dualcore being so much cheaper, that means when comparing a price-to-price system, the dualcore is going to give you much better performance out of that money.

 

[paulbag]

Also are all the 1xx series Opterons not socket 939.. I have never seen a dual cpu 939 board. Only dual 940 boards, and for that you need seriously expensive 2xx chips.

Correct me if I'm wrong (which I seem to be a fair bit 😛)

 

[mpjesse]

THG did a article on this. In all but one benchmark the single dual core opteron outperformed 2 single core opteron's at the same clock speed.

However, the dual core opteron didn't beat out two single core opterons by very much.

Additionally (after doing some price research), dual core opterons are a hell of a lot cheaper. Here's an example:

A 1 way dual core Opteron 175 (2.2Ghz) is $467 on pricewatch.com
2x 2way Single Core Opteron 248's (2.2Ghz) are $308 a piece for a total of $616.

Note: you have to by 2 way single core opterons in order for them to work in a dual CPU motherboard.

The logical choice in every aspect is dual core.

Here's the article:
http://www.tomshardware.com/2005/11/07/single/index.html

-mpjesse

 

[mdd1963]

"Only dual 940 boards, and for that you need seriously expensive 2xx chips.
"

True!

ANd the 2xx dual cores are even *more* expensive....!

 

[slvr_phoenix]

Also are all the 1xx series Opterons not socket 939.. I have never seen a dual cpu 939 board. Only dual 940 boards, and for that you need seriously expensive 2xx chips.

Correct me if I'm wrong (which I seem to be a fair bit 😛)

Actually, as far as I know, you're spot on. (Of course we both could be wrong.) The CPU-to-CPU HT layers needed for dual processors only exist in the 2xx and up, which is all socket 940 as far as I know. So yes, very expensive indeed.

 

[HideOut]

yep, get ya a nice 175 or 170 opteron and its usually faster, so long as your hard drive controllers arnt a hold up. That depends on what you are doing. if your gonna do a massive high bandwidth SQL database then RAID 5 is the thing ya need, in that case there are more options for PCI-X instead of PCI-e. There are new PCI-e cards out but they are a bit more pricey. But overall, the cost still might be better cause if the card is more, the chip vs chips and mobo of the dual core vs dual processor solutions still might favor the newer dual core setup. its gonna use alot less electricity and therefore cost less to run and take up less space to boot. Keep in mind also, you can run a dual core 939 on a mATX motherboard. Most dual opteron 940 boards worth their wait use the EXTENDED atx format, even bigger than ATX and case selection is thinner and more expensive. THey also HAVE to use Registered ECC ram with is slower and more expensive. All in all, its far better off to use the 939 opteron in low to mid range servers these days in almost all situations...

Other sources for CPUs are newegg.com, tigerdirect.com, mwave.com and monarchcomputer.com and maybe even zipzoomfly.com (formerly googlegear.com)

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