What Is Hyperthreading?

[Jaymes]

My CPU has Hyperthreading also, but what is it? Can anyone explain?

 

[Shenkoa]

Pretend you have to carry 2 buckets of water to a water tower from a truck all by yourself, this is what the processor does, it does the work all by itself. Now pretend that you could have a friend help and split the work between you and your friend, if one of you decided to work on something else during the job, it would not be that hard to do both things at once = Hyper Threading. Now imagine that you yourself had to do both jobs at the same time, that would be a lot slower.

HT allows for a simulated dual processor envirement while using only one processor.

 

[Jaymes]

Thanx a lot for such a simple example in explaining what HT Technology is.

Regards

 

[Shenkoa]

Your welcome

 

[Jaymes]

Are 64 bit CPU's slower at running 32 bit applications than the 32 bit CPU's?

 

[Shenkoa]

64 Bit processors are native to 32 bit operation so no, they are just as fast as any other 32 bit only processors when it comes to the 32 bit envirement.

 

[Jaymes]

Thanx again.

The I.T. Manager in the office is adamant that I have bought this processor for no good reason. He says that I have wasted my money and should have got a 32 bit CPU as no 32 bit applications will work properly on the AMD Athlon x2 4400 64 bit CPU.

 

[Viditor]

Originally posted by: Jaymes
Thanx again.

The I.T. Manager in the office is adamant that I have bought this processor for no good reason. He says that I have wasted my money and should have got a 32 bit CPU as no 32 bit applications will work properly on the AMD Athlon x2 4400 64 bit CPU.

Kindly tell your IT manager that with his vaunted skills and knowledge, it's good to know that the counter at McDonald's will always have a ready supply of employees...

 

[Jaymes]

I have printed off every slating comment and have put it on his desk. He returns to work on Monday.

 

[RichUK]

Originally posted by: Jaymes
I have printed off every slating comment and have put it on his desk. He returns to work on Monday.

And this thread too ??

Tell him he's a dumb ass ..

 

[n7]

What an idiot :roll: (I mean your IT guy)

Recommending a P4 with HT over an X2 = absolute stupidity.

 

[Bona Fide]

Hehe...fanboyism is still prevalent at the workplace, I see.

 

[imported_Kensai]

Tell him to retire. Dual core > HT.

And AMD chips don't have HyperThreading by the way.

 

[MBrown]

LoL Funny itshay

 

[GI Ho]

Originally posted by: Jaymes
I have printed off every slating comment and have put it on his desk. He returns to work on Monday.

Just make it clear that these are the views of the AT Forum Members, not necessarily your views or the views of the company.

Who hired him as IT Manager? Is he/she afraid of getting fired if he/she mentions AMD to management above him?

 

[DrMrLordX]

Some people have AMD/"insertnameofalternatecpuhere" phobia. If it's not Intel, in their view, it's not good. I talked to some local yocal computer repair/sales guy years ago, back when K6s and Pentium IIs were still new, and he was telling me that he was getting tons of people turning in their K6 CPUs to him because they were "incompatible with everything". As I recall, K6s had problems with Dragon Dictate(or whatever it was called back then), and that was about it. He claimed to have a "whole box of them in the back". It's a shame I never asked him for the CPUs. Those would have made me quite a bit of money if he was giving them away *P

 

[Jaymes]

He has stated that he hates AMD as he says that he has problems with 2000 Server and XP when using AMD CPU's.

The management have no idea what AMD or Intel is, so it's not like he's hard pressed or anything.

 

[Viditor]

Originally posted by: Jaymes
He has stated that he hates AMD as he says that he has problems with 2000 Server and XP when using AMD CPU's.

The management have no idea what AMD or Intel is, so it's not like he's hard pressed or anything.

Unless he's running a VERY old AMD processor (pre-K6), or has a faulty motherboard, then he's just making excuses for his own incompetence.

My guess is that he can't tell you what the problems actually are...if he can, please let us know.

 

[Jaymes]

He says that 64 bit CPU's need to use an emulator so as to compute 32 bit applications. It's the emulator that slows down the CPU. That is what he says.

 

[blinky2004]

For AMD 64 bit processors have 2 modes, 32 bit and 64 bit. Which mode it is is decided when you boot your OS. If it's a 32 bit OS it goes into 32 bit mode. If it's a 64 bit OS it goes into 64 bit mode. Hence why you can't run a 64 bit OS on a VMWare virtual machine if the host OS is 32 bit (I've tried it - it doesn't work).

AMD knew that most of their 64 bit processors would be used on 32 bit OSes so they made sure the performance wasn't compromised.

The major improvement with the AMD Athlon64 is the putting the memory controller inside the CPU.

 

[RichUK]

Originally posted by: Jaymes
He says that 64 bit CPU's need to use an emulator so as to compute 32 bit applications. It's the emulator that slows down the CPU. That is what he says.

NO NO AND NO AGAIN .. read my previous post on your other thread!!!

your manager is probably talking about the Intel Itanium processors, they are 64bit native and do not support x86 code, MS develops a separate OS for that processor, and yes he is correct that an emulator is used to run 32bit apps, but this is only for this processor ONLY.

Your processor is an x86 processor, and is 32bit native with 64bit extensions, the 64bit extensions allow the processor?s execution units/registers to be able to execute/run 64bit code.

So you will have no problem running 32bit current day software, and when 64bit software becomes mainstream you will have no problems running 64bit code either.

FYI Intel Itanium processors are specifically designed for large server farms/clusters as a PDC, which has no relevance or need for client and home user use.

http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview...atid=28&threadid=1700618&enterthread=y


There is no emulation needed to be able to run 32bit sh!t on you processor, there is only emulation needed when running the Intel Itanium processors, as they are not designed on x86 marchitecture !!, The same would apply if you wanted to run windows on a MAC


Emulation is needed so it can act as a decrypter so the processor can actually process x86 code, as the design of the Itanium's architecture is not x86!

And yes it does take longer because the emulator has to decode the x86 code before threads can be sent off to be processed, so its all down to the efficiently of the emulator!

Tell you IT manager, he is a DUMB ASS !!!

 

[Parkre]

Originally posted by: RichUK

Originally posted by: Jaymes

Tell you IT manager, he is a DUMB A$$!!

Yeah, let's see that big promotion when you do that....

 

[Shenkoa]

I do think your IT manager is over over bearing in what skills he thinks he has. Here is a few facts.

1. The Pentium 4 was designed many years ago and is obsolete in technology.
2. Because Hyper Threading is a way to simulate dual processing, dual core is a real implantation of it (on a single chip) so think of dual core as real life multithreading.
3. MHz and GHz are not the only measurement of speed, AMD processors in general are much more efficient in processing, this is why they don?t have to be as fast in frequency to beat out P4's at a much higher frequency.
4. AMD processors carry the full X86 instruction set just like the Pentium 4 so as far as problems with "AMD" it must of been something else because windows handles the processors no differently.
5. AMD Athlon 64 CPU's do not have to emulate anything as they are native to 32 bit as well as 64 bit.
6. Your manager does not know jack $h1t about this subject manner.

 

[Viditor]

Originally posted by: Jaymes
He says that 64 bit CPU's need to use an emulator so as to compute 32 bit applications. It's the emulator that slows down the CPU. That is what he says.

Please explain to him that AMD64 is a superset of x86...hopefully he still remembers his high school math well enough to understand what that means!

 

[thecoolnessrune]

Originally posted by: Jaymes
He says that 64 bit CPU's need to use an emulator so as to compute 32 bit applications. It's the emulator that slows down the CPU. That is what he says.

Intel Itaniums and Intanium 2s- Slow RISC invironment processors. 64bit native and emulate 32bit. Emulates HORRIBLY!

Intel 5xx series P4- Prescott cores. Latest models have 64bit support. Run 32bit native with 64 bit registers Benchamrks show that the 64bit operations cripple the processor rather than aid it.

Intel 6xx series P4- Prescott cores. 64bit support. Run 32bit native with 64bit registers. Latest models support Virtualization technology. Benchmarks show that 64bit operations cripple the processor rather than aid it.

Intel Pentium D- Smithfield cores. 64bit support. Run 32bit native with 64 bit registers. 2 CPU cores 2 logical cores (4 on the 840EE)(Hyperthreading). Benchmarks show that 64bit operations cripple the processor rather than aid it.

AMD Athlon64- Winchester, Clawhammer, Sledgehammer, Venice, San Diego cores. Venice most powerful in the 3000+ to 3500+ category. San Diego most powerful on up. All run 32bit native with 64bit registers. 64bit operations run faster than in 32 bit mode. 32bit mode runs no differently then a normal 32bit processor.

AMD Athlon X2- Toledo and Manchester cores. Toledo being the most powerful core. 2CPU cores. 64bit operations run faster than in 32 bit mode. 32bit mode runs no differently then a normal 32bit processor.