10.2GHz Intel "Nehalem" with a 1200MHz FSB by 2005

[krackato]

10.2ghz chip - 650 dollars
2 terabyte harddrive - 200 dollars
Geforce FX 4 - 399 dollars
Telling your kid about YOUR first computer - priceless

Somethings, money can't buy. For everything else there's Mastercard.

 

[arcenite]

Originally posted by: Adul
with that much speed i better ba able to tlak to my pc and have it responcd back

I'd have to change my ways if that happened.

ie. not cursing at it and calling it names when it's not working right, cause then it might make it so i don't have any hot water in the morning.

Bill

 

[Sunner]

Originally posted by: BoberFett

Originally posted by: Sunner

Originally posted by: MadRat
Dual-processors would do it if they wrote the program for SMP.

Not all programs are suitable for SMP systems.

Since games is an obvious target for high end CPU's, let's take Quake III as an example.
I remember reading John Carmack's .plan file about his effort to make the most out of SMP system, and in the end it seems like he came to the conclusion that in most cases, the performance gains wouldn't be too great.
And not to just on the "Carmack is God" bandwagon, but he is no doubt one of the most talented programmers out there in his field, and frankly, if he can't figure out how to do it, I don't think many, if any other programmers are going to.

Carmack is a graphics programmer, not necessarily an AI programmer. The graphics do have to be done in some sort of order, there's not a whole lot that could be done that could speed it up beyond pure brute force Mhz. AI however could be split up. Perhaps a separate thread for every opponent in a game.

No argument there, I don't have a clue about Carmack's skills in AI programming.

However, he did mention that in the Q3 engine, the vast majority of time was spent in the GFX thread, hence the relatively small performance increase when enabling r_smp on an SMP box.

 

[Mr.IncrediblyBored]

Originally posted by: MadRat
The memory could run at 100MHz and it will still outpace the hard drive speed.

My point is that the internal caching is more relevant than memory speed.

Good point. The article mentions nothing about L1/2/3 cache. One could assume that by 2005, Nehalem will have much more than 1MB of L2 like Prescot.

 

[Mr.IncrediblyBored]

Originally posted by: kidjan
In all likelyhood, Intel has accounted for what I'm about to say (they're not a billion dollar company because they're a collection of idiots) but I'll say it anyways.

I think a good take on the future of processors is in this article:

Good article on what the future is like -<snip>-

I'm sorry, but who cares what the consumer needs? Technical innovation is a byproduct of competition. Innovation comes from companies that fight for your dollar by putting the best possible product on the market at the best price-point. Whether or not you need a 2Ghz system... well it doesn't matter. You really don't have a choice since low-end solutions are phased out in favor of higher performing products.

Fortunately, those of us that deal with enterprise level environments, either directly or indirectly, appreciate these speed bumps because they can greatly increase our productivity. Faster databases, faster networks, larger file servers, greater CPU density, etc, etc.

Wake me when my clients can replace their database clusters with a single ATX-sized computer.