How future-proof is a quad-core?

[VirtualLarry]

I'm talking about ANY quad-core, Q6600, AMD Phenom / Phenom II / Athlon II , and newer Intel offerings.

How long in the future before newer software makes a quad-core obsolete? Or is it so far in the future, that it's unrealistic to talk about it.

Will we ever get software that is "many-threaded", and takes advantage of future 8-16 and higher core CPUs, in such a way that a quad-core cannot still handle them?

Or is Amdahl's law still king, and keeping us from realizing the potential of many-threaded architectures. (Of which Bulldozer is just the beginning. Wait until 16nm.)

I realize that realistically, today, single-cores are totally obsolete, for both gaming and for ordinary desktop tasks. Dual-cores are still selling, but on the verge of becoming obsolete for gaming, although they still handle desktop tasks mostly fine. Quad-cores are becoming the minimum for gaming, and are often overkill for desktop tasks.

Edit: also comment on how much RAM is going to be future-proof in the near future. Will 8GB be enough for the next few years? Or will we need to upgrade to 16GB? (Obsoleting my P35-chipset boards, that only support 8GB total DDR2 RAM.) I think that the RAM will only be an issue once 64-bit apps become mainstream, and start gobbling up more than 2GB of memory per process.

 

[Rubycon]

All a matter of time.
There is no proof you say.
No fire proof, no weather proof, no water proof.
Give it enough time and whatever you are trying proof against will come out victorious. The same is true with the future.

 

[wuliheron]

It's been ten years since the introduction of the first dual core for quad cores to start to become mainstream and we're seeing a similar prolonged change going from 32 bit to 64 bit os. Unless somebody figures out a way to automatically multithread applications I suspect it will be awhile.

 

[Maximilian]

Depends on the quad core, user, standards and also application. Quads being the "minimum" for gaming is a bit much, duals can do the job just fine, theyre not recommended due to the price of quads but people with duals can get by just fine. Also single cores are far from obsolete, they still do their job fine, a single core cannot game or do HD video alone without GPU help (but neither can some duals).

I would say 12-15 years and it will be totally obsolete. 15 years ago we had the pentium 1, it is useless today for most things, as is the pentium 2, pentium 3 can maybe struggle on with basic tasks, tualatin one should be okayish.

 

[Castiel]

IMO Quad's are good for another 2 years. Hopefully a 6 core IB will be available.

 

[VirtualLarry]

IMO Quad's are good for another 2 years. Hopefully a 6 core IB will be available.

When I was talking about obsolete, I guess I had meant "not usable", not "superceded by something better". Sorry about that.

 

[Castiel]

When I was talking about obsolete, I guess I had meant "not usable", not "superceded by something better". Sorry about that.

IMO a quad core will go the way of the single core in about 5 years

 

[Idontcare]

When I was talking about obsolete, I guess I had meant "not usable", not "superceded by something better". Sorry about that.

How could a quad-core become "not usable"?

Is a single-core "not usable"?

If it functions, turns on and still does math correctly, isn't is usable?

 

[Castiel]

How could a quad-core become "not usable"?

Is a single-core "not usable"?

If it functions, turns on and still does math correctly, isn't is usable?

IDC,


IMO a single core isn't usable at all except for basic functions.... Unless were talking about a SB single core.

 

[drizek]

Quad cores like the Q6600 and Phenom are going to become obsolete not due to a lack of cores but due to poor single threaded performance.

 

[nyker96]

I think this question doesn't make sense, it all depend on what you doing. If you ur needs exceeds the hardware then your cpu is already obsolete.

 

[TheDrD]

The switch to multi-threaded software (including games) is inevitable:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amdahl%27s_law



The way I see it is within 2012-2013 we'll be seeing games take advantage of 8 cores, while 8 core gaming wont truly be "required" (Much in the same way Quad cores are just now becoming necessary for games) for another 3-5. So if your on a long upgrade cycle and looking toward a new build in the future it only makes sense to me, to go ahead and wait for the 8 core processor's which are right around the corner.

These time frames are subjective guesses on my part, a better person to ask about this would be:

A. A CPU designer
B. Game Engine Engineer

 

[biostud]

...for mobile purposes and office applications, dual cores still have a long way before being obsolete.

 

[BTRY B 529th FA BN]

How could a quad-core become "not usable"?

Is a single-core "not usable"?

If it functions, turns on and still does math correctly, isn't is usable?

i was going to post something like this...

although I think the evolution of the OS mainly Microsoft has pushed for a faster CPU..

 

[ThatsABigOne]

The quad core has still a long life in it's frame. Now that the programs are just more accounting for multi threading, but not pure core speed, I think a quad core will be good for at least 3 or 4 more years. I use a single core pIII laptop at 850mhz. It handles office tasks very well, but of course when something demanding comes, it is struggling to get through calculations fast.

 

[SHAQ]

Well they have been future proof for 4 years and counting. I think 4GB of RAM is good for the next year or so, but it depends if you use RAM drives or applications that need over 4GB.

 

[Idontcare]

IDC,


IMO a single core isn't usable at all except for basic functions.... Unless were talking about a SB single core.

What you are detailing is what one would define as "obsolete" which the OP was quite specific to say was NOT what he means to discuss. Hence my query on the matter.

A 486 CPU in today's world is truly an obsolete product, but if you had a 486 rig you could surely turn it on and continue to do everything it was designed to do 20yrs ago...nothing about the passage of time makes the core itself stop functioning.

The topic needs clarification from its creator, we are speculating on their speculation at this juncture.

 

[VirtualLarry]

What you are detailing is what one would define as "obsolete" which the OP was quite specific to say was NOT what he means to discuss. Hence my query on the matter.

I did mean "obsolete", as in, like a 486, not usable with today's software. Sure, it would still turn on and run, but it would be useless.

As long as the software would continue to run on the quad-core, even if it were somewhat slower than future 16-core chips, then it wouldn't be that obsolete, just slow.

I suppose another danger, is the adoption of future CPU extensions like AVX, that would indeed make a Q6600 obsolete, if things like web browsers required them. (For multimedia decoding, for example.)

 

[yottabit]

I think you could typically argue for a CPU to be completely obsolete (at least to the point of irrelevance) it probably needs to be 5 or so product cycles behind. It's honestly going to be a long time before "quad cores" in general or obsolete, but the CPU's you listed like the Q6600 and Athlon II x4 will be obsolete much faster than quad cores will. It's the lack of IPC and GHz or some other important feature such as AVX like you mentioned that will kill those. But in a few years I'm sure quad cores will be in every economy box just as dual cores are today. It wont be for many years after a new successor has been adopted as the baseline that quad cores will be obsolete. Think of the timeframe it would take for a Q6600 to become like a pentium 3/ early pentium 4 is today...

 

[Idontcare]

I did mean "obsolete", as in, like a 486, not usable with today's software. Sure, it would still turn on and run, but it would be useless.

As long as the software would continue to run on the quad-core, even if it were somewhat slower than future 16-core chips, then it wouldn't be that obsolete, just slow.

I suppose another danger, is the adoption of future CPU extensions like AVX, that would indeed make a Q6600 obsolete, if things like web browsers required them. (For multimedia decoding, for example.)

History suggests you have about 10yrs before the ISA changes in leading edge microarchitectures begin to filter down into setting minimum hardware standards at the software level.

Naturally there is an economic mechanism at work there to keep that window at less than 15yrs, I'm talking about patent expiration.

But look at Win7, the latest OS, I bet you could install it and run just fine (slower than you may be comfortable doing, but nevertheless) on a 10 yr-old single-core processor from 2001, if not one from 1996.

If your Q6600 (released 2007) ceases to be acceptable minimum hardware before 2017 then I would solely suspect artificial market manipulations were at work (hardcoded programs designed to check CPU and refuse to operate on it for no other reason than it just did not please its creator...think Physx).

 

[LiuKangBakinPie]

The switch to multi-threaded software (including games) is inevitable:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amdahl's_law



The way I see it is within 2012-2013 we'll be seeing games take advantage of 8 cores, while 8 core gaming wont truly be "required" (Much in the same way Quad cores are just now becoming necessary for games) for another 3-5. So if your on a long upgrade cycle and looking toward a new build in the future it only makes sense to me, to go ahead and wait for the 8 core processor's which are right around the corner.

These time frames are subjective guesses on my part, a better person to ask about this would be:

A. A CPU designer
B. Game Engine Engineer

for gaming? do you think game developers got the time and money to code a game for 8 cores? who wants to write cpu bound games anyway? we got enough benches out there plus the bad ports is doing the job at the moment.

 

[Emulex]

i5 dual cores with HT feel alot faster than the q6600

 

[pitz]

Depends on what you're doing. I know with my AthlonXP 2500+, I hit the limits of the PCI, and the motherboard itself, far before I hit the limits of the CPU for fileserving. I'd still be using that machine today if not for the fact that it only had 33MHz/32-bit PCI slots, could only accomodate 2gb of RAM, and had slow onboard Ethernet.

I suspect you'll run into much of the same with the Q6600 systems, especially since they're only really economical to upgrade to 8gb at the most RAM-wise (DDR2). Add in some of the other limitations of your typical Q6600 system, ie: BIOS instead of UEFI, etc., for booting -- and yeah, the platform will find itself obsolete in a few years simply on that account.

Also, those boards have what, SATA-150 or SATA-300? Think rebuilding a RAID of 2-4 20Tb hard drives with only SATA-300 is going to be fun?? (my 2500+ board started life with a 40gb HDD and ended with 500gb HDDs -- so a scale factor of 15X isn't unrealistic!)

Similar deal with video. Embedded video is clearly the way of the future for most people. If you have some 8000x5000 display -- why buy a $70 video card to run it, when $70 is half way to a new motherboard with the video embedded?

 

[pitz]

It's been ten years since the introduction of the first dual core for quad cores to start to become mainstream and we're seeing a similar prolonged change going from 32 bit to 64 bit os. Unless somebody figures out a way to automatically multithread applications I suspect it will be awhile.

SMP has been around for a lot longer than ten years. Try closer to 15 on the PC platform, with even 486DX's in SMP configuration.

Dual core was essentially combining multiple discrete packages into a single package.

 

[dbcooper1]

We're hardly the target market for the manufacturers of most hardware or software; a large percentage of the general public is still running systems that are 5-10 years old. Many upgrade only when the system dies or a virus/malware takes over. There are likely still a large number of single and certainly dual core systems out there doing what they're asked to do just fine.