AMD to Demo '8-socket' Dual-Core Opteron System 243
flynn_nrg writes "AMD will make the first public demonstration of a system built out of its dual-core processors today, the result of a strategy first made public almost a year ago. Two-core Opteron chips aren't due to ship until the middle of 2005, but AMD will have four of parts running inside an HP ProLiant DL585 server at its Austin plant later today."
Four of parts? (Score:4, Funny)
Speeeed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Speeeed (Score:2, Troll)
Re:Speeeed (Score:2)
Re:Speeeed (Score:3, Interesting)
Performance of a CMP chip relative to a dual-processor system depends on the load. On one had, you have shared L3 (and maybe L2) caches (depends on whose CMP implementation you're talking about), which means you have two (or more) processes trying to use one chip's worth of cache space. On the other hand, if you have loads that are not cache-bound, you get faster inter-process communication than with a dual-core
Re:Speeeed (Score:2)
If I recall correctly the Power4 has a shared L3 (which they call "single-transistor SRAM", but which is actually DRAM backed by a number of SRAM buffers acting as cache for the cache).
I haven't checked on Sun's offering for a while, but IIRC it was supposed to have shared L3 as well. Not certain about that, however.
Re:Speeeed (Score:5, Interesting)
OTOH, I fully expect a 2.4Ghz dual-core Opteron available for purchase by July 2005. Meanwhile, Intel has absolutely nothing to throw at this, except for vaporware.
Re:Speeeed (Score:5, Funny)
Intel has nothing to throw at this? (Score:4, Funny)
Let me count:
-They have speedy Celerons,
-They have shiny 32bit HT P4s
-They have shiny blue and orange stickers that say "You just paid too much for a CPU... err, I mean Intel Inside!"
The Only Speed that Counts: Rate of Market Growth (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:The Only Speed that Counts: Rate of Market Grow (Score:3, Insightful)
Or, more importantly, how fast is the Opteron market growing compared to
the Xeon's?
Itanium - high-performance graphics engine (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Speeeed (Score:2, Insightful)
Itanium? (Score:5, Insightful)
Does this mean HP is offically ditching the Itanium2? If so, strange move, albeit likely a smart one...
Re:Itanium? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Itanium? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Itanium? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Itanium? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:Itanium? (Score:3, Interesting)
Granted the Itanium is still "alphaware" and who knows when it will have a full release, I find it hard to believe that the AMD64 doesn not have a superior FPU, or at very least a comperable one.
Re:Itanium? (Score:4, Informative)
Re:Itanium? (Score:3, Interesting)
Here's the Itanium/Opteron SPECfp numbers.. (Score:4, Informative)
Basically, 2.0 ghz Opteron SPECfp peak 1170
1 ghz Itanium 2 SPECfp peak 1356.
Re:Itanium? (Score:2)
Re:Itanium? (Score:2)
Re:Itanium? (Score:2)
What are you talking about? Itaniums have been shipping since May/June 2001, and the Itanium II came out July-August 2002. You can buy one [dell.com] today. So it's pretty well known what's in Itanium and that it's faster for floating point than AMD64 (though not more cost effective, except for certain very high-end computing loads).
Re:Itanium? (Score:5, Informative)
The roadmap looks something like this:
- Tandem (NSK) will eventually turn to Itanium (as soon as lockstep is deployed and working fine);
- Alpha and PA-RISC will evolve into Integrity (Itanium2);
- Proliants (IA-32) will evolve into Opteron.
It's just that 32-bit computing is taking its last breath, and it's time to move on.
Now that looks like a smart move.
Re:Itanium? (Score:2)
It depends what you mean by computing. Network appliances and embedded systems will be 32 bit for a looong time.
I also don't expect the HP IA-32 systems to all shift to Opteron. I think that was a hedged bet in case Intel didn't ship its chips with AMD64 compatibility soon enough. It isn't as if the two brands of chips can't coexist in the same model line either.
Re:Itanium? (Score:5, Informative)
HP doesn't view itanium and opteron as an either/or proposition. Given their product porfolio, it's quite reasonable to use both. Itanium is fast and expensive, a good fit for a 128-way superdome. Opteron is pretty-fast and inexpensive, a good fit for a 4-way proliant.
Re:Itanium? (Score:2)
Ad on site (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Ad on site (Score:5, Funny)
(We all use adblock)
Re:Ad on site (Score:4, Funny)
How are you gentlemen?
Comparison (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Comparison (Score:3, Interesting)
There is a 96-CPU Workstation [arstechnica.com].
Specs should be somewhere there.
At this to your to compare list.
8-socket? (Score:4, Informative)
Re:8-socket? (Score:2)
core opteron chips. Different articles on the web
seem to indicate different things.
Re:8-socket? (Score:2, Insightful)
Actually, 8 sockets would be correct. There's three flavors of opteron: single cpu (1XX), dual cpu (2XX), and eight cpu (8XX).
Of course, nearly all the motherboards you can buy today only use four of the eight way SMP capability. The slashdot title is a bit misleading, they're only demoing a 4 socket / 8 core version today but an 8 socket system is doable right now, today, with the 8XX series CPU's.
As the article says:
So what today might be an eight-way serve
Re:8-socket? (Score:5, Informative)
The possibility of making an 8-socket board doesn't make using "8 socket" correct in this context.
Re:8-socket? (Score:2)
Are they made of... (Score:5, Funny)
Oh wait, that's something else...
Re:Are they made of... (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Are they made of... (Score:2)
http://it.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=112052&c
Cheaper Processors (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Cheaper Processors (Score:5, Insightful)
You can get a Chaintech K8T800 socket754 mobo for $64, an Athlon 64 3200+ (newcastle) cpu for $218, a WD SATA hd for $68, maybe a 512 meg stick of DDR400 ram for $78, a case for $60. What else do you need? Most people probably have everything else they can canibalize from their old machine. All that comes up to $488. These prices are all from newegg.
I'm looking at a new setup myself, but using a nicer, probably nforce3 mobo with better sound (hopefully it won't pick up USB/HD noise as I hear some people are complaining about) either from MSI or Asus.
Re:Cheaper Processors (Score:5, Informative)
On another note I should mention if you are into gaming the amd64 core does far more than a high end video card. Obviously the fusion of the two is stellar, however if you have to choose get the cheaper $100 video card and focus on the amd64 core (for all you skimpers out there) with at least 1GB of RAM, you will be very happy with the result.
Re:Cheaper Processors (Score:2)
Actually I bought new ram awhile back, 1 gig of corsair pc3200, so hopefully that should work in an amd64 board just fine. I already have an NV 6800GT, which is really what sparked this whole upgrading mess for myself.
Re:Cheaper Processors (Score:2)
Re:Cheaper Processors (Score:2)
64: Intel vs AMD (Score:5, Informative)
adverts for intel (Score:3, Funny)
Interesting, but realistic? (Score:5, Interesting)
Clearly there is a performance benefit in both bandwidth and latency respects in multithreading/multioperating in this manner, but it's not difficult to see that the footprint limits the factor to which this technique can be exploited. Indeed even if they were able to fit three cores in the same chip the thermal energy would most likely outstrip the dissipation potential of conventional heatsinks -- unless of course the user is willing to invest in air conditioning or other mainframe-style cooling technologies (which may make sense for servers.)
Re:Interesting, but realistic? (Score:5, Insightful)
Given the cothermic limitation on implementing 'cores' (or independent dies) on one surface, it seems a clever but limited hack to increase the performance by effectively implementing multiple CPUs on the same chip.
Of course, in my experience, AMD64s are fairly cool compared to Intel's stuff. You could porbably do a dual core AMD64 at 2Ghz for way under 100W.
Re:Interesting, but realistic? (Score:3, Informative)
Most of the losses for chips like these are dynamic - i.e., caused by switching capacitive loads. A 90nm chip has features with half the area that a 130 nm chip has. Even with thinner layers for some features, this results in lower capacitance, and so less heat generation for the same clock rate.
The key words are "for the same clock rate". These chips are hot becau
hot because they are run faster, not because of fe (Score:2)
Re:hot because they are run faster, not because of (Score:2)
Of course it is realistic... (Score:5, Informative)
Granted, this is only true if the task is parallellizable, but with todays multi-tasking computers I could at least use two cores. (If main task is blocked, there's probably a dozen other background processes who'd like a few cycles).
Kjella
Re:Of course it is realistic... (Score:2)
The real reason to go dual core is that manufacturing processes have been reaching a frequency barrier but arä
Re:Of course it is realistic... (Score:3, Informative)
Power scales linearly with both frequency and the number of cores (or more accurately, with the amount of capacitance being switched per clock). It scales quadratically with _voltage_ (as capacitively stored energy is (1/2)CV^2).
Multi-core chips are used because we have more transistors available on a die, and both increasing cache size and increasing issue width on processors have reached diminishing returns for perform
Re:Of course it is realistic... (Score:2)
Re:Interesting, but realistic? - Yes... (Score:3, Interesting)
Actually - if you have two cores on the same die you can minimize the needed bus transport path and use processor scale path => less heat... you still need the same components to provide the bus external to the two processors, but the speed gains from having a dual core sh
Re:Interesting, but realistic? (Score:2)
Opteron brings the price point for this down, but they will probably do it at a lower cl
Re:Interesting, but realistic? (Score:2)
Take a look for example at Zalman's Cu radial cooler [zalmanusa.com], this thing cools high performance AMD or Intel CPUs while still running nearly silent at 1350 RPM.
You're a buffoon and karma whore. (Score:2)
Please.
Names? (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Names? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Names? (Score:2)
And of course a small cluster would be a DecAthlon?
(Sorry, couldn't resist.
Upgrading servers (Score:5, Insightful)
And just think, it was only last week when it was shown that most servers are never upgraded (Core Components), and that most people already buy their servers with growth in mind.
This kind of stupid comments are not helpful.
My question is this, how is this going to affect M$ licencing of OSes? I buy a dual socketed board and put in a couple of these babies is M$ going to complain that I have 4 CPUs and XP won't load because I have the 2 CPU version?
The idea of licencing software by HW is stupid, don't you think?
Re:Upgrading servers (Score:2)
Re:Upgrading servers (Score:3, Interesting)
Four of parts? (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Four of parts? (Score:3, Funny)
The Four of Parts... The Eight of Processors... The Hanged System... The Processor Affinity, inverted.
The Ten of Consultants... The Two of Millions... The Meltdown...
Fate bodes ill for your server upgrade.
Benefits of dual core? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Benefits of dual core? (Score:3, Informative)
And if you take into account that both Intel and AMD decided to go for dual-core, it might be the most logical way to improve the performance of the chips.
Re:Benefits of dual core? (Score:3, Insightful)
CPUs is that I can double the processing power of an existing machine without
having to upgrade the motherboard if the motherboard already supports the
correct socket.
Also, it means that smaller form factor machines can have more processing
power.
Re:Benefits of dual core? (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:Benefits of dual core? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Benefits of dual core? (Score:5, Informative)
Less packaging overhead, and faster communication between cores (on-die bandwidth and latency are far, far better than any motherboard's crossbar's bandwidth and latency).
You also have less contention over memory, for single-chip systems with multiple cores vs. multi-chip systems. Instead of having to muck about with cache coherence across a bus, the chip looks like a single processor as far as the memory subsystem is concerned, with coherence operations only involving the first one or two cache levels on-die.
yield decreases roughly exponentially with die size, which argues for 2 separate cpus.
Processes are optimized so that you can build a chip with 1-2 square centimetres of area with reasonable yield (as this is what chip manufacturers demand). This has been pretty constant (or if anything, has been increasing). However, with each design generation, the number of transistors available in this area has doubled. We're now at the point where we can get high yields on chips with enough transistors that multi-core designs make sense.
A chip with N cores also doesn't take N times as much area as a single-core chip, as the lowest levels of cache aren't duplicated (just L1 and usually now L2). So overhead is reasonable, and the real estate is there. It makes a lot of sense to use it.
Re:Benefits of dual core? (Score:2)
I bet we even see processors with more than 2 cores in the near future.
Re:Benefits of dual core? (Score:2)
They are probably two independant cores manufactured seperately, they are just combined in the die. So if any given core fails along the way, you aren't discarding a second perfectly good core. Unless they fail when manufacturing adds them to the die.
No, they are manufactured together. If one core happens to be defective, it is disabled and the package is sold as a 1 core processor. Same as is commonly done with cache today.
IBM also a few years ago sold a "HPC Regatta" p690 system with 1-core power4 pr
Dammit, AMD -- quit inventing shit so fast! (Score:5, Funny)
It's not like AMD fanboys like me are going to let you go out of business. We'll still be buying your underpriced processors in lieu of Intel chips for a while to come. And we'll show up in droves to events that really tout your existing product line. We swear it!
Plus, Intel isn't moving that fast these days. I've read more about trouble for Intel in the past 2 months than I have in 5 years. "We can't frabricate this processor, or we're not responsible if that processor burns your house down when you overclock it." Come on! Let 'em catch up for the sheer thrill of beating 'em again with the Athlon128 a few years down the road.
Why? Why my insistence on your taking a g'damned break from inventing shit? You wanna know why?
I can't f---ing afford another upgrade for awhile. So stop it. Now. Dammit. Give us poor home built computer bastards a break.
And pass the f---ing message off to those asshats at ATI and Nvidia.
John Carmack too -- the "we're gonna change the world of gaming hardware every time we release a new game" motherf---er.
IronChefMorimoto
Re:Dammit, AMD -- quit inventing shit so fast! (Score:2)
Re:Dammit, AMD -- quit inventing shit so fast! (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Dammit, AMD -- quit inventing shit so fast! (Score:2)
Re:Dammit, AMD -- quit inventing so fast! (Score:3, Insightful)
Seriously, its soo great that we have an "Underdog" performing so well! I used to be an all intel person, until the AMD Thunderbird came out, since then, i cannot be convinced to buy a Intel, even if my life depends on it..
Re:Dammit, AMD -- quit inventing shit so fast! (Score:2, Interesting)
But just a bit of information. Intel is coming out with a similar chip with either 4 or 8 (I can't remember now) processors on the same chip. Then when compaines order them they can designate how many processors are turned on.
Pretty cool stuff.
Backwards compatible, too! (Score:5, Interesting)
I think that a lot of folks are going to go for this type of upgrade, just because the upside is so huge.
Re:Backwards compatible, too! (Score:2)
8-way is nice... (Score:2)
Or maybe I'm just antsy because my main PC is unstable (mysteriously so for the last 2-3 months, can't find anything wrong in hardware, nor software) and I'm itching for something new... sigh. Computer addiction should be qualified as an ill
Re:8-way is nice... (Score:2)
Fire up the Prime95 client from Mersenne.org - it's not a hardware test program, but it may as well be for as often as it will stumble over a hardware issue. Even hardware issues that Memtest86 / Memtest86+ miss. Overclockers have been using it for years to figure out if their systems are stable.
A close runner-u
Bad terminology (Score:4, Informative)
Why Austin? (Score:2)
Re:Why Austin? (Score:2)
but AMD will be have four of the parts running inside a usually four-way HP ProLiant DL585 server at its Austin plant later today.
That certainly sounds like it is AMD's plant since they are the subject for the sentence.
Wait, 8 Sockets? (Score:5, Funny)
Wait... four-way with dual core processors... so what they are saying is
THERE ARE FOUR SOCKETS!
Blockwars [blockwars.com]: free, multiplayer Tetris like game
Intel Demoed Dead Wafer of Dual-Core Itanics (Score:2, Interesting)
Somehow a Slashdot thread on Itanium and Opteron [slashdot.org] did not get into the Intel section.
Cache coherency implications (Score:5, Insightful)
OS loaders and schedulers can help keep chatty processes allocated to the right mem/processor, but something more has to be said about hardware-level coherency standards. The X-box was fast and efficient largely because its CPU used the video RAM natively, but PCs still have to slog data over the slow and non-coherent PCI, AGP, or PCI-Express busses between the CPUs and GPUs. An inter-vendor standard could bring PC CPU-GPU interaction efficiencies much higher. ccPCI-Express or HyperTransportx16 slots anyone?
I'll be at the dual core demo (Score:5, Informative)
English Please (Score:3, Interesting)
This shit, however, needs to stop. What the fuck do all these 'employees' do all day? How hard is it to read the submission and realize "FOUR OF PARTS" doesn't sound right?
I would have subscribed awhile ago, and continued contributing but not with this kind of crap. Slashdot is on top the same way MS is, mindshare and sheer numbers. They don't do anything better than anyone else these days.
Re:Imagine ... (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Why don't they..... (Score:3, Interesting)
On the flipside, HD/Video card companies make money off SLOWING DOWN technology so people get hooked and play the upgrade game.
Companies don't make money off selling something that lasts 5 years anymore... they make money off selling something you buy every year. Thanks to consumer demand. We don't want to pay 500 bucks for a video card that lasts 5 years, we want to upgra
Re:Why don't they..... (Score:2)