CPUs, Cores and Threads: How Many Processors Do I Have?
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@LAH3385 That was the short version
Per-processor OS licensing has been based on the total number of physical chips in use, more than what is in each physical chip.
But the operating system sees the total number of logical processors that are available. This number is based on the number of physical chips, but also on the number of CPUs in each chip, the number of cores in each CPU, and the number of thread handlers in each core.
The board, socket, physical chip, die, CPU, and cores have separate definitions that can sometimes be confused by marketing.
Multithreading can offer benefits by moving specific responsibilities from the OS to the processor, but only for specific uses that can take advantage of that. In the past, operating systems generally weren't designed to take full advantage of multithreading.
I'm not sure that shorter version will leave you any better off, though.. I imagine it'd be hard to continue learning a language through reading about IT, too.
If you can work through the definitions and examples @scottalanmiller laid out, each section follows straight from the explanation before it. -
"In my job role I am very often called upon to determine how many “processors” a machine has or how many we will need for a specific task."
That was a great, very detailed, explanation of the what, but I'm actually rather interested in the method of determining how many are needed for specific tasks. Another article, possibly?
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@art_of_shred said:
That was a great, very detailed, explanation of the what, but I'm actually rather interested in the method of determining how many are needed for specific tasks. Another article, possibly?
Oh sure, now you want a HARD one!
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@scottalanmiller said:
@art_of_shred said:
That was a great, very detailed, explanation of the what, but I'm actually rather interested in the method of determining how many are needed for specific tasks. Another article, possibly?
Oh sure, now you want a HARD one!
I'll join @art_of_shred - You definitely gave a great what... now a how for the question you posed yourself
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I have had college level PC hardware and OS classes at 2 Universities, and that is the clearest, best explanation of CPU's I have ever read. Well done.
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I enjoyed your presentation, having run a IBM Power 7 series, where you pay to have additional processors (Cores) online. You can use one, or pay to open up the other's. Novel concept. Hyperthreading has always been misleading IMHO when you suddenly see 2 representations of a processor in area's like task manager, 1 core, 2 processors, Hyper. I am always amazed at the speed of a system travelling up, now bus configurations need to be changed so memory is more efficient, HDD - always seems to bottleneck, you never want your processor starved for information to be processed. What of systems that cant get information to the processor fast enough or efficiently -32 on a 64 comes to mind. Even SSD cannot cope, and any SATA will be for drive speed not processor power. Seems information arriving to the processor, cannot be fast enough - you will eventually, in clock cycles, empty cache - just a pipe dream of moving slow to faster, but still you need to fill cache? To truly implement speed, many bus, sources, and methods of moving data will need to be re-examined.
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@ChrisJ that's primarily why investments are rarely in processors but in other areas. Drives have made huge advancements in speed while processors have mostly stagnated. Even in the AMD64 world people are moving towards single CPU systems instead of dual because even entry level CPUs are often far and away more processing capacity than a normal business can utilize.
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Even SSD's work on the SATA subsystem - SSD efficient, but what of the SATA limit? Drives will need to be 'on the board' with more efficient connections (Direct SSD?) Chip storage is going that direction I believe.
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You can already get PCIe based SSD drives - much faster bus than SATA bus.
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@ChrisJ said:
Even SSD's work on the SATA subsystem - SSD efficient, but what of the SATA limit? Drives will need to be 'on the board' with more efficient connections (Direct SSD?) Chip storage is going that direction I believe.
Not fast ones. PCIe cards have been standard for most of the decade. Look at FusionIO cards, as an example. That's what servers normally use. And faster 1.8" hot swap SSDs come with an M.2 interface. SATA and SAS are only used for entry level SSDs.
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High speed SSDs today are just one step removed from being system memory.
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PCIe is good, but in most cases I have seen it is primarily for graphics, so it is designed for large data transfers to the bus, and transactions back seem to be for result based calc's. I would like to know more about PCIe, and its connection to the source, time to visit a Maker's site.
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@ChrisJ said:
PCIe is good, but in most cases I have seen it is primarily for graphics, so it is designed for large data transfers to the bus, and transactions back seem to be for result based calc's.
I've never seen it used for graphics. Not that it isn't, but I've never seen that come up.
PCIe SSD cards are the standard for high end servers. Million plus IOPS per card. Very low latency, huge bandwidth.
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Sorry, I was thinking of your Compaq Deskpro. Compaq, do not age yourself that way. (HP thrown in for good measure).
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@ChrisJ said:
Sorry, I was thinking of your Compaq Deskpro. Compaq, do not age yourself that way. (HP thrown in for good measure).
Article was from 2008, they were still Compaqs then.
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@scottalanmiller Sure, I 'believe' you. Yes old with no good formal bus training. I am impressed to see your article, and the depth of your input. Thank You.
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@ChrisJ said:
@scottalanmiller Sure, I 'believe' you. Yes old with no good formal bus training. I am impressed to see your article, and the depth of your input. Thank You.
If you check the Google cache, or the Internet Archive Way Back Machine, I'm pretty sure that it shows it from early 2008. That was one of my first articles written while working at the bank. Back before SMBITJournal was around.
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@scottalanmiller No, I am sorry, the first part was in jest, the rest true. PC (Compaq) is old with no good formal bus training, should have clarified this. I 'believe' you wish not to age yourself as I do. I have removed Compaq from my vocabulary. Sorry thing, once I was certified for their products. Hmmm.
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I was always a Compaq fan. I came to Compaq by way of being a DEC fan in the 1980s (@Minion-Queen is an ex-DECer BTW!!) and then to HP by way of Compaq. It's the Proliants and DeskPros that won me over, not the NetServers!
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I still own a 200 hz proliant, in my garage somewhere, whole 6gb drive and all. Backplane made upgrade's a Compaq only design. Great proprietary machine that will never be more than it is.
