What Advantage will I have from going to Dual Core?

[n19htmare]

I currently have an Opteron 146 on a DFI board. It'd Overclocked to 2.8 at 1.40V and it's been treating me well. I initially bought it because I thought I would game a lot but I havn't touched a game in 5 months and I don't think i Will plan to any time soon. At the same time, I find my self doing lots of multitasking.

Recently I started using Avi2DVD to rip some movies to DVD and it takes about 4-5 hours on my current rig. (Foreign movies that are over 2 hours long). This also uses 100% of my CPU leaving me in the hole and I can't even use the computer.

Questions before I jump the gun and order the 165 Opty...

1) Will it help my decoding time in Avi2DVD if i dedicate both cores to encoding (is that possible)?

2) Is it a good time to buy an opteron? how are current steppings.

Last...
Today and tomorrow, Fry's has a sale for X2 3800+ with ECS board for $279 (301 after tax and I don't need the board)...should I get that...
Or get the Opty 165 from Monarch for $330...

I plan to OC as I have the board to do it.

I'd like to make a decision tonight so replies would be helpful .

oh and last thing...What would an Opteron 146 Cabye fpbw0540 be worth now? supposably one of the top steppings.

Thanks

 

[tbike06]

Supposedly the new batch of X2s are great overclockers... just a thought.

 

[Shimmishim]

Originally posted by: n19htmare
I currently have an Opteron 146 on a DFI board. It'd Overclocked to 2.8 at 1.40V and it's been treating me well. I initially bought it because I thought I would game a lot but I havn't touched a game in 5 months and I don't think i Will plan to any time soon. At the same time, I find my self doing lots of multitasking.

Recently I started using Avi2DVD to rip some movies to DVD and it takes about 4-5 hours on my current rig. (Foreign movies that are over 2 hours long). This also uses 100% of my CPU leaving me in the hole and I can't even use the computer.

Questions before I jump the gun and order the 165 Opty...

1) Will it help my decoding time in Avi2DVD if i dedicate both cores to encoding (is that possible)?

2) Is it a good time to buy an opteron? how are current steppings.

Last...
Today and tomorrow, Fry's has a sale for X2 3800+ with ECS board for $279 (301 after tax and I don't need the board)...should I get that...
Or get the Opty 165 from Monarch for $330...

I plan to OC as I have the board to do it.

I'd like to make a decision tonight so replies would be helpful .

oh and last thing...What would an Opteron 146 Cabye fpbw0540 be worth now? supposably one of the top steppings.

Thanks

dual core will help you with video encoding but you have to be sure the program you use supports dual core. i dunno about avi2dvd so i couldn't tell ya.

you should see a big improvement though in you encoding time.

i myself am a big gamer but decided once again to move to dual core (from single). i'm not a big encoder but i was able to get my hands on an almost 3.0 ghz dual core X2.

as for selling that 0540FPBW...

you should be able to get a GREAT price on it.

try ebay if you want the most possible.

or you can try the fs/ft forums and get a decent amount for it.

 

[BoboKatt]

Hi there,
I currently have an AMDX2 3800+. I use AVI2DVD all the time to convert from Xvid files to DVD ISO to burn. You will notice a bit of difference with a dual core but I can be honest that with that specific program it wont be great. In fact my dad's Barton 3200 is almost as fast with that application if overclocked.

However... with other apps like Vidomi, any sort of DivX6.xx encoding, and recently WinRAR for compression and a whole bunch of other programs that you might end up using in the everyday process of encoding/decoding/compressing/uncompressing/PARing etc you will see a retarded increase in speed since many of these have been optimized for dual core/ multithreaded CPUs. What?s more, you will be able to say unrar a movie that was split in say 100, 50 meg chucks, while running PAR to check for missing files on another set and still be downloading, reading mail and heck maybe having another instance of WinRar going and do all this without your system feeling choking. That I find is the huge advantage of having a dual core ? you can do something, albeit maybe at the same speed it was done with a single core fr now without optimization, but at the same time do 5 other things while not affecting the performance of whatever else you are doing.

Anyhow for any sort of video encoding/decoding converting there are more and more apps that are taking advantage of the dual core system. Honestly there is no reason to ever get a single core again.

I would only get the Opty over the X2 if OC'ing REALLY mattered... I am so happy with my 3800+ (stock 2000mhz and running happy at 2400 and at times 2500 with just a minor bump in vcore).

 

[n19htmare]

$275 shipped from monarch for opty 165 was too good of a deal to pass. So i ordered one will update on stepping and overclock once I get it.

 

[F1shF4t]

Originally posted by: BoboKatt
Hi there,
I currently have an AMDX2 3800+. I use AVI2DVD all the time to convert from Xvid files to DVD ISO to burn. You will notice a bit of difference with a dual core but I can be honest that with that specific program it wont be great. In fact my dad's Barton 3200 is almost as fast with that application if overclocked.

However... with other apps like Vidomi, any sort of DivX6.xx encoding, and recently WinRAR for compression and a whole bunch of other programs that you might end up using in the everyday process of encoding/decoding/compressing/uncompressing/PARing etc you will see a retarded increase in speed since many of these have been optimized for dual core/ multithreaded CPUs. What?s more, you will be able to say unrar a movie that was split in say 100, 50 meg chucks, while running PAR to check for missing files on another set and still be downloading, reading mail and heck maybe having another instance of WinRar going and do all this without your system feeling choking. That I find is the huge advantage of having a dual core ? you can do something, albeit maybe at the same speed it was done with a single core fr now without optimization, but at the same time do 5 other things while not affecting the performance of whatever else you are doing.

Anyhow for any sort of video encoding/decoding converting there are more and more apps that are taking advantage of the dual core system. Honestly there is no reason to ever get a single core again.

I would only get the Opty over the X2 if OC'ing REALLY mattered... I am so happy with my 3800+ (stock 2000mhz and running happy at 2400 and at times 2500 with just a minor bump in vcore).

QFT, except maybe the overclocking part, since my x2 gets 2.7ghz easy