Dual Core = When is multi-tasking TOO MUCH?

[aka1nas]

Originally posted by: Duvie

Originally posted by: jwalker46
Duvie, How would you change your setup IF you wanted to keep your OS on a separate hdd from your data/images? Would you want a Raid 0 for the OS, or only for the data/image disc

I would do a setup like my previous one...

Primary master = DVD-rom/RW
Primary slave = none

Secondary master = DVD-rom/RW
Secondary slave = none

SATA3 = Raptor 10k drive 36gb (fast bootup, used for applications and OS
SATA4 = Strage drive

What I would do is put my nero images or what I am burning on that drive and leave the gamesonthe drive with the OS...Keep that drive free of the stiff that feels it up and defragged...

Duvie is right on. My current setup is similar, though not optimal at the moment.

I currently have:

SATA 3: 74Gb Raptor boot drive

IDE:

PM: DVD-ROM
PS: DVD Burner

SM: 160GB in RAID 0
SS: 160GB in RAID 0

This is not as optimal as duvie's setup as I ought to have the RAID 0 drives on seperate channels but do to cable length limitations as well as lack of funds to migrate my RAID 0 to SATA it serves it purpose. The weakness in this setup would be in copying DVDs as both opticals are sharing the same channel. Copies between the raptor and the RAID stripe are still pretty speedy, though.

 

[zephyrprime]

Originally posted by: rox1co

Originally posted by: zephyrprime
How do you control what core a particular program is on? Doesn't windows just juggle that automatically? And if you have the newer video drivers which are multithreaded, that may be why you are stuttering.

i'm setting my Nero program on 1 Core and my CS:S on the 2nd Core (thru task manager Affinity)

CS:S may not be multi-threaded, but if i separate my gaming from my other programs i should be fine, but since i'm IO limited then i understand the reason why i was lagging

ps. you say that the new Video Drivers are multi-threaded, wouldn't that be good? why would i be stuttering?

Well, I'm not sure about this but if the driver is multithreaded, it may wreck your careful partitioning of workload. CS is running on one processor but the video driver thread will end up running on the other which is taking care of your drives and the video driver will probably peg the CPU and it's a system process so it may have higher priority than nero also (or maybe not).

 

[Yeormom]

Shouldn't have bought the crappy processor you have to overclock to be worthwhile...

 

[SynthDude2001]

Originally posted by: Yeormom
Shouldn't have bought the crappy processor you have to overclock to be worthwhile...

I don't know where you're getting that from; the X2 3800+ is the cheapest AMD dual core, overclocks well, and performs very well. It's not at all a "crappy" processor.

In any case, I started running into I/O issues once I got my Opty 170 a few months back too...couldn't really run a game and encode at the same time, because they were often working from the same hard drive, and (possibly more importantly), I only had 1GB of RAM at the time - so the paging file was constantly being hit, compounded with the I/O of possibly two other processes. Fast forward to now, I bought a cheap refurb 250GB IDE drive so I have my hard drives set up like this:

Primary - 250GB Seagate SATA, used for OS/documents/apps/games
Secondary - 250GB WD IDE (using a SATA adapter so it's on its own channel), used for HDTV recording and encoding workspace
Third (leftover from a previous config) - 80GB WD IDE, used for HDTV timeshifting files and additional HDTV storage area

Then I have my DVD burner on a separate IDE channel, and the DVD-ROM (reader only) is on the same channel as the 80GB drive. I also upgraded to 2GB of RAM within the last month or so, and that made a HUGE difference in heavy multitasking, especially considering both x264 and, say, FarCry can each easily use 400-500MB of RAM (not to mention whatever's being used by the OS, Firefox, etc.).

Now I can do heavy h.264 encoding work off of my secondary drive, hitting one core at 100%, and run a game at full speed on the other core (and from the primary hard drive). It's a beautiful thing.

 

[NaOH]

Originally posted by: Yeormom
Shouldn't have bought the crappy processor you have to overclock to be worthwhile...

Who says you HAVE to O/C it to be worthwhile?

 

[SlitheryDee]

Originally posted by: Yeormom
Shouldn't have bought the crappy processor you have to overclock to be worthwhile...

I love these incredibly useful and informative statements. We can end this thread now because Yeormom has pretty much summed it up. /sarcasm

There's nothing wrong with his processor. It's been fairly well established that I/O limitations are the culprit.

I agree that the best course of action is to grab a second HDD and store the stuff you want to burn on it and your games on another drive.

 

[SonicIce]

When is multitasking too much for a dual-core processor? Simple: when you run three applications

 

[jiffylube1024]

Originally posted by: rox1co
dang another thing i've learned, so it's 1 whole platter rather than split into 2+ platters to meet it's requirement

Aaagh! No! You misunderstood me! # of platters doesn't matter at all (forget that part!). The only reason I recommended the 160GB seagate is due to having only a single platter, it is a bit faster since the data is packed in more densely. All other 160GB drives on the market use 80GB platters to my knowledge, and 200-500 GB current gen drives vary from 100-150GB platters depending on model.

Originally posted by: Bobthelost

Originally posted by: jiffylube1024
The best deal right now I would say is the 160GB model Seagate 7200.9 drive, because not only is it cheap, but it's fast - it uses a single 160GB platter, which is the largest platter on a consumer hard drive. Typical 200-500 GB drives only use 100-150GB platters. Basically it means that the 160GB seagate is as fast as any 200-500 GB hard drive .

Are you sure on that, personally i think you're utterly wrong. The storage review backs it up too. Firstly there are large performance differences between brands, where seagate is distinctly average, secondly the trend is clearly that larger drives are faster than smaller ones.

Yes, I'm sure on the Seagate 160GB having 160GB platters.

Anandtech. Also I read a review where the 160GB was back and forth in terms of overall performance with the 250GB model.

Also, there is not a large performance between the brands, it's within 10% on pretty much everything with same buffer size/HD size/rotation speed/etc. You are right though, in terms of performance, the rest of the 7200.9 series is average... I like them for the warranty (5-yrs) and reliability, though.

-----

Perhaps instead of fast I should have said quick; the performance gained by denser platters is marginal. I just recommended the 160GB drive because it's quick, reliable, and cheap. I could have recommended the 100GB Maxtor (if you want to be really cheap) or a 160GB WD.

 

[jiffylube1024]

Originally posted by: Yeormom
Shouldn't have bought the crappy processor you have to overclock to be worthwhile...

So what's your angle then? Are you an Intel fanboy, a rich person, or just a jaded person who likes to stir sh!t up? Because the X2 3800+ is the cheapest AMD dual core you can get, and it's a good overclocker to boot (especially 06 ones). And Intel dual cores are crap right now: that's why they're releasing an entirely new architecture with Conroe.

 

[Bobthelost]

Originally posted by: jiffylube1024

Originally posted by: Bobthelost

Originally posted by: jiffylube1024
The best deal right now I would say is the 160GB model Seagate 7200.9 drive, because not only is it cheap, but it's fast - it uses a single 160GB platter, which is the largest platter on a consumer hard drive. Typical 200-500 GB drives only use 100-150GB platters. Basically it means that the 160GB seagate is as fast as any 200-500 GB hard drive .

Are you sure on that, personally i think you're utterly wrong. The storage review backs it up too. Firstly there are large performance differences between brands, where seagate is distinctly average, secondly the trend is clearly that larger drives are faster than smaller ones.

Yes, I'm sure on the Seagate 160GB having 160GB platters.

Anandtech. Also I read a review where the 160GB was back and forth in terms of overall performance with the 250GB model.

Also, there is not a large performance between the brands, it's within 10% on pretty much everything with same buffer size/HD size/rotation speed/etc. You are right though, in terms of performance, the rest of the 7200.9 series is average... I like them for the warranty (5-yrs) and reliability, though.

-----

Perhaps instead of fast I should have said quick; the performance gained by denser platters is marginal. I just recommended the 160GB drive because it's quick, reliable, and cheap. I could have recommended the 100GB Maxtor (if you want to be really cheap) or a 160GB WD.

I didn't doubt the 160GB platters, merely that a 160GB drive is anywhere as fast as a 400GB drive or larger.

But you say that brand differences aren't all that significant? Looking @ the WD4000KD and the Baracuda 9 500GB:
http://www.storagereview.com/php/benchm...ves=1&devID_0=293&devID_1=295&devCnt=2
(odds of that link working? Slim )
The performance difference is generally 10% or more. Which is a significant improvement.

The 160GB range is cheap, but that's the main/sole advantage, in terms of GB/$ it's rather poor, in performance terms it's very average. Seagate's advantage is theier warranty at the moment, if it weren't for that i wouldnt even consider them for a computer i'm building.

 

[rox1co]

it looks like the bigger the HD the faster it performances

i'm thinking of doing RAID 0 with 2 Hitachi 80GB

perhaps it's better if i did 2 Western Digital 250GB in RAID 0

added: this guy at HardForum said if i run RAID 0 or any RAID that i would get added latency and would make my performance slower

 

[SlitheryDee]

Originally posted by: rox1co

added: this guy at HardForum said if i run RAID 0 or any RAID that i would get added latency and would make my performance slower

I've never seen anything that would indicate that.