Extreme FSB 2: The Quad-Core Advantage?

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gardeda84

Heres a good point though, do you actually know how much boost theyd get from a quad then a dual? Beacuse I havent seen any reviews taht show any games getting this supposed boost, some apparantly do and I think that thatss true, but their havent been any reviews on it at all.

So how do you know tom's is wrong? CPU clock may well be a bigger boost then 2extra cores for the new games, it may not.

Unfortunatly we dont m ake them so we have no idea.

But I suggest you leave things like this to toms, and other hardware review sites.. because they all seem to be saying the same things. They are the experts not us.
 


did you watch that youtube video for alan wake? they use an entire core just for the physics of a single tornado.

and i think you are missing the point, dual cores might get higher clock speeds, but once games use the quad properly the higher clock becomes irrelevant. quad cores allow games to use one core to do one specific thing.so one core could be used just for physics, and 3 cores for the rest (see alan wake video). so you will get better / the same frames per second as a dual core, but also twice amount of physics. try using a one entire core for physics on a dual core, however, and the dual core with struggle with the other calculations.
the point of quad core, and games that will use it, is that they will be able to have the best frame rates and be able to do lots of physics calculations at the same time.

who says i am not an expert? do you know what my job is? for all you know i might be working for intel or crytek and have access to the latest cpus and be able to test them on games that arent even out yet. and just because they are hardware review sites, doesnt mean they 100% correct all the time.
 
"and just because they are hardware review sites, doesnt mean they 100% correct all the time. "

and lets not forget that the quality of toms reviews have severely declined in the past year
 


Hey I made my point. If the games companies want to continue to make money they better optimize the games for all game systems. Including single, dual and quad. Also lets wait for the benchmarks on some of these new games before you start predicting the future. How many more frames you gonna get with those extra cores? 10 or 20? Most of the world probably games at 1280x1024 or lower resolutions and since Tom's is for the masses I doubt they will do benchies just for you so you can decide which game or cpu you want to buy.

People are getting ahead of themselves here. Where are the DX10 games? Where are the multi threaded games taking advantage of all of these cores. By the time that happens we will be looking at 8 or more cores on a cpu and then more and more...........yes it is a big advance in technology and exciting but lets not get too far ahead of ourselves here. I have a dual core and I have yet to see any big advancements in the games that I play or games that are coming out. What are these big enhancements they are promising? Just make a good game and people will buy it no matter what.
 


Contradiction perhaps? If he is trying to do this review for the masses (which makes me wonder why he would use top end CPUs with watercooling cranked to ~4GHz, cause i'm sooooooo sure the same masses of people who play at 1280x1024 would spend that much on one component) then why is he not informing them (or me i guess) which processor is acutally better? I think people with such little gaming rig knowledge such as yourself (you think that an 8 core processor is going to come out before october?), need to be informed that there are more important changes to games coming IN AS LITTLE AS 2 MONTHS and that pure FPS will no longer be the only factor of how good a setup is. Please take some time to read either article I listed and see what i'm talking about. The problem besides that he tested 3 year old games is that he failed to even mention about the future that most games are taking with multi-threading. Like i said before and other people in this thread have mentioned, who upgrades their computer to play old games/software?

Also please inform me how a developer is supposed to optimize a game for single/dual core? Why would they take a step backwards? I believe what you mean to say is that they should SCALE games for single/dual core setups, and once again if you would read the article, they do. It's not like all the added effects are going to be in there by default and if you have a slower rig you wont be able to play, I imagine the new effects will be adjustable just like video quality settings, and with a quad core you are going to be able to crank it up all the way.

As far as DX10, thats a whole different topic dealing with vista, coding, and hardware problems, although not entirely unexpected, but only idiots think that there is supposed to be some instant change from DX9 to DX10 games.

Please I urge you, go read those articles (ESPECIALLY the vALVE one) and try to post something a little more knowledgeable next time.
 



Optimize is the correct word to use......scale is incorrect.............. :pt1cable: Also they have 8 core systems.

Here is your link for an 8 core system. Not on the same chip but still an 8 core system and you seem to think it will be years before they put 8 cores on a single chip. :pt1cable:

http://www.apple.com/macpro/

Also I did not say that this article was for the average user but overall Tom's is for the masses. Look at the cpu, gpu charts. :pt1cable:

If you want to brag about how much you know why not post your resume on here and then I will shut my mouth. Why don't you go out and buy all these new games and a new quad core system and then do some testing and do a post about it. Now that would impress us. :pt1cable:

:pt1cable: :pt1cable: :pt1cable: :pt1cable: :pt1cable: :pt1cable: :pt1cable: :pt1cable: :pt1cable:
 
The problem with this thread its all about software and not the cpu if the software is multi-thread capable any multi-core cpu with more cores will always win in bench marks, and any non-multi thread software will always win on faster cpu vs more cores.

As more and more apps and games continue to become multi-thread capable we will see a large increase in speed, the new 3dsmax and maya performance boost is huge ,more multi-threaded engine.

Crysis will run faster on a quad vs dual because its multi-threaded engine allows each core to handle specific tasks.

So for future proofing a quad would be way to go, for older games, apps a faster cpu would work better, problem is the performance difference is really not that much, in a few years that software would be phased out anyways.

 


Don't you think though that a lot of people who bought a dual core cpu are going to want to get a couple years use out of it before they start switching over to a quad or what ever is next? I agree with you it makes sense that the more cores would be faster........I just hesitate to get on the band wagon of the people or the sites that are now telling us we need a quad or the quad is the future.......I ask if the quad is the future how long will that future be before the next new cpu comes along. That is why (I was kinda joking but not completely) that I will wait for an 8 core cpu. I doubt I will upgrade from a dual core cpu I just purchased a month ago to get a quad that is going to give me a few more frames or save me a few min off loading a program.

Not that long ago people were raving about the core2 chips and overclocking them.....how quickly things change....now it is all quad and esp the Q6600. I wonder what will be next........ :hello:
 



It's like you are running circles around yourself right now. First off, you said they will have 8 core CPUs. That mac pro has DUAL quad cores, there's a big difference. Also please explain how there is a significant difference between 'average user' and 'masses'. Like i said before, if you send me free parts to overclock and benchmark with, I would be more than happy to test some games that might actually differ with quad vs. dual core and make sure to keep in mind that gaming is becoming multi-threaded and soon a dual core wont qual a quad core in performance.
 
Good lord let me see. There are over six billion people on this planet.....lets say you have the average user (average intelligence) who uses a computer at work and at home but might not have any real working knowledge of a computer. Then from there you go down in ability to people who don't even know what a computer is. Then the other way you have varying degrees of knowledge of computers all the way up to the people who invented the things.

So I guess if you look at it that way when I say (masses) I mean the masses that have some working knowledge about computers and who could get on a web site and read Tom's or some other computer site and have a fairly good understanding of what they are talking about.

Of course with anything there is a learning curve and some people might catch on more than others and say hey I know what they mean while others will say what do these benchmarks mean.

If Tom's would do their testing with this in mind they might not forget to cover what the layman might want to know and what the enthusiasts might want to know. They seem to always fall somewhere in between.

 
Can I be the first to ask - if they got 4.0Ghz on a Quad-Core, why couldn't they get 4.5Ghz on a Dual-Core?

And to the people saying that the Q6600 is better than the G0.. I'll make it short.
There are no games that support 4 cores, and when there are I will have my Yorkfield CPU, clocked at 4.2Ghz with 8 threads and 12MB of cache and I will stick it in your FACE until you cry. Till then, I will stick my E6750 at 4.2Ghz in your face.
 


what are you on? i didnt even get whether you agree or disagree with the people (like me) saying the q6600 is better or not. besides which, the q6600 can have g0 stepping as well.

as to not getting 4.5ghz on a dual core, its cos current generation of intel chips have a "invisible wall" that stops them going over 4ghz, except with extreme solutions like liquid nitrogen.


@caamsa the 8 core argument is invalid in this thread. the article was comparing q6600 with dual core, and so are we. and we are talking about games, so that 8 core mac is irrelevant, cos no games run on mac (or very few).

if you are upgrading now, including for gaming, quad core is the best choice because new games will fully utilize the 4 cores. end of. period. this is, as previously stated by a few of us, because new games arent just relying on frames per second, but also physics. for realistic physics quad core is best - due to the fact you can have one or two cores for physics and the others doing the other calculations.

 



There are multi-threaded games out already that do take advantage of multicores

* Quake 4 (and Quake 3)

* Call Of Duty 2

* The Elder Scrolls 4: Oblivion

* Supreme Commander

http://wiki.extremeoverclocking.com/wiki/Multi-Threaded_Games


As well as a few other titles not mentioned here like two-worlds

http://board.zuxxez.com/showthread.php?t=28489&highlight=multi

As well as new titles or titles still in works such as:

* UT2007

* Crysis (Far Cry 2)

and more sure a dual core is ok because its multi-core but a single core cpu is not worth it anymore since dual cpu's are so cheap atm.

 



Nice link. Man I can't wait for my Q6600 (GO). It should be in next Tuesday. XtremeTiramisu got his to 3.7 Ghz + and it was torture tested at that speed :ouch: . That's pretty awesome on air IMO. It gives me hope. I don't have the same Mobo though. I wonder what my Abit IP35 Pro will be able to do. I lapped my Tuniq Tower 120 last night. Honestly, I'm not gonna get too exteme with the OC (want my chip to last). 3.2 or 3.4 would be nice though.....I'm ready....

My new Christmas games should do nicely on the Quad.... :bounce:
 
@caamsa the 8 core argument is invalid in this thread. the article was comparing q6600 with dual core, and so are we. and we are talking about games, so that 8 core mac is irrelevant, cos no games run on mac (or very few).

if you are upgrading now, including for gaming, quad core is the best choice because new games will fully utilize the 4 cores. end of. period. this is, as previously stated by a few of us, because new games arent just relying on frames per second, but also physics. for realistic physics quad core is best - due to the fact you can have one or two cores for physics and the others doing the other calculations.[/quotemsg]


:hello: Dude I could not agree with you more. If you are upgrading now get a quad core if you can afford it. What I was trying to say is that I am willing to bet that a 6 or 8 core system (on a single cpu) is around the corner. Think of all of the people who purchased dual core cpu's, myself included I doubt they will run out and buy a quad after reading this article........I doubt very much I will ever own a quad core. I will prob go right to a 6 or 8 core or even a 4X4 system (if they come down in price)

Also I will wait and see how much of an increase you will truly get with a quad when the games are optimized for them. Let's see what the game developers can truly do with these extra cores and see what a difference it will make. To me a good game is a good game regardless of how good the graphics are. If I get over 60 frames while playing a game I will be happy.....if not then it will be time for an upgrade.
 
@caamsa the 8 core argument is invalid in this thread. the article was comparing q6600 with dual core, and so are we. and we are talking about games, so that 8 core mac is irrelevant, cos no games run on mac (or very few).

if you are upgrading now, including for gaming, quad core is the best choice because new games will fully utilize the 4 cores. end of. period. this is, as previously stated by a few of us, because new games arent just relying on frames per second, but also physics. for realistic physics quad core is best - due to the fact you can have one or two cores for physics and the others doing the other calculations.[/quotemsg]

Dude I could not agree with you more. If you are upgrading now get a quad core if you can afford it. What I was trying to say is that I am willing to bet that a 6 or 8 core system (on a single cpu) is around the corner. Think of all of the people who purchased dual core cpu's, myself included I doubt they will run out and buy a quad after reading this article........I doubt very much I will ever own a quad core. I will prob go right to a 6 or 8 core or even a 4X4 system (if they come down in price)

Also I will wait and see how much of an increase you will truly get with a quad when the games are optimized for them. Let's see what the game developers can truly do with these extra cores and see what a difference it will make. To me a good game is a good game regardless of how good the graphics are. If I get over 60 frames while playing a game I will be happy.....if not then it will be time for an upgrade.
 
Builders who use both games and multi-threaded applications must ponder which processor choice provides the greatest overall benefit to their usage patterns, but they'd better be careful whom they ask for advice. Many so-called "experts" will always recommend a slower-clocked four-core CPU such as the Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 rather than a faster and cheaper dual-core such as the Core 2 Duo E6750, even to builders who use their machines exclusively for games!
Click to expand...
Got to love the bill gates types of remark. I guess games will only be dual core optimized for another 2 years. LOL!!! Try these tests on Valves new patches and supreme command. Try testing how fast you come out of games between dual and quad.

A cheaper dual core like maybe the E6550 down but not the E6750 as the price nears 3/4 that of Q6600 the quad is the better deal. Crytek's crysis will put down any dual core in favor of the Q6600 which is less than 3 months away.

The biggest problem with this article is to think that any high priced dual will make a difference over say a cheaper E2140 in resolutions above 1280X1024. The extra is better spent on the GPU. For the price difference the E2140 with a 8800GTS 320mb will beat an E6750 with a 8600GTS in 1280X1024 and higher.

In ending unless you buy the 8800 Ultra you may as well get a quad worth a GPU upgrade next year.
 
I think that this test was meaningless, and was rather poor of tom's to do such a stupid test.

If you take a Ferrari, and put it against my E-Class, in a 10ft race, my benz might even win. Now if you move the finish line a further 2 or 3 km away, the difference becomes outstanding.

Applications don't necessarily need to be optimised for multi-cores. If windows was designed to scale multiple cpus, the test results would have shown major differences. Since windows doesn't benefit from the multiple cores, ONLY the multi-threaded applications benefited from the quad-core.

Having more cores will slow down performance, if you were to run multiple single threaded applications. This is because, context switching takes much longer when the no. of cpus increases. Each core, has to save stack into memory and switch, hence taking up more Cache (more cores), and taking up more Main Memory and more time. More cores also means, there are more chips trying to take over the system BUS, hence congestion occurs with I/O.

Put more memory into the quad core box, and run a meaningful test on a platform designed for scaling up cpus.


PS: If anyone thinks i'm a windows hater, think again, I do heavy duty development solely on the windows platform, and know exactly how ridiculously poor it is.

 
exactly. quad core owns. hands down. if it doesn't own a dual core its because it hasn't been supported yet ( aka futureproof).

if you have a quad core right now (q6600) that thing is blazing fast just at 2.4 ghz. i am converting with winavi mp4 converter and winavi converter at the same time while i am playing a game ( oblivion max setting with my 8800gts and 4gigs of ram pc2 8500) and i dont feel any lag. i am too lazy to figure out what 4.0 ghz will do for me ( havn't oced yet because i haven't lagged). note: i am using windows vista 64bit ultimate ( take up almost 2gigs of ram on load lo but when i am using 4gigs of ram it doesn't matter muchl)

now think about that for a second.... most people in the world right now don't even need quad cores unless they are doing what i am doing. no point of getting a quad core and doing regular multitasking because you should just go with a e6550 ( i think).

note: i got a b3 going at 29c ( 80F in house) non oced yet.



another note: that test that toms did was stupid. it made no sense.
 
All CPU's are bios and software dependent. Intel is about to release a software compiler that will be open source. This program well help software writers take advantage of the CPU multiple cores. The over clocked dual core will not be able to out perform a Quad if the software is written to take advantage of its Quad cores.
 



well if you already bought a dual core, fair enough. i think we'll see 8 core (or intel v-8 system) mid/end 2008 at reasonable prices.

@techguy, crysis is not far cry 2 - in fact ubisoft are developing far cry 2 seperately. crytek is a brand new crytek production and since crytek split with ubisoft they no longer have the rights to farcry. so crytek cannot produce a farcry 2.

the 2 most imprssive multi-core games are, IMO, crysis and alan wake. just check out the quad core alan wake video on youtube. simply amazing.
 


I would have rather have seen the Q6600 used in the review. It's now the same price as what I paid for my E6600 less than a year ago. Isn't it wise to utilize that $1000 difference somewhere else in the system? It's also got a new stepping.....let's see what that allows. I believe the Q6600 has been tested previously, but now there's P35 chipset. The P965 chipset has the multiplier quirk....limiting what the FSB can reach. I think I remember the whole downside to the Quads is there's a bottleneck with the fsb pertaining to memory bandwidth and the way to overcome that shortfall was to OC it. I haven't heard that the P35 has that same quirk with the multi reduction.

What ever happened to real world tests with a real world budget? If you want to clock the snot out of the QX6850, go for it. But to try to compare it to a dual core that's 1/4 the price is ludicrous. The current pricing of the Q6600 is very tempting for those of us who might want to play with a Quad without the second mortgage.
 
Reviewer tried to get an E6600 G0 but couldn't get a guarantee of which stepping he'd get. Intel isn't handing out Q6600 samples to reviewers any longer. Article was only meant to point out the differences in overclocking capability because the quads are supposed to come up around 10% short of duos in the same stepping, but that didn't happen. So be happy that the article confirmed the opposite theory.
 
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