Win2K doesn't need Dual Core Hotfix?

[aswinp]

I've been trying to find the answer to this everywhere.......is every1 using XPSP2 now? Poor old W2K......

Anyway, I have W2KSP4 and was just wondering why AMD nor MS has released drivers / hotfix for Dual Core CPUs on W2K?

Is W2K free from the problems (slowdowns, speedups, etc...) plaguing XPSP2 on a DC system?

 

[spyordie007]

There is no hotfix.

Win 2K doesnt know how to differentiate logical processors from physical processors; this would be a good reason to upgrade to XP.

 

[aswinp]

Spy, what does this mean exactly.

I always thought that W2K (Prof n Server) are both multiprocessor capable.

Correct me if i am wrong, logical vs physical processor would come into play when u have an intel HT cpu right, where its 1 physical cpu but has 2 logical units.

But with a true Dual Core cpu, you would have 2 physical cpu (with 1 logical units on each), so using X2 on 2K vs XP is no difference, correct?

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Addition:

I'll leave my post above alone, but I have found a great document by MS to explain the above. http://www.microsoft.com/windows2000/docs/hyperthreading.doc

After reading the above document, I'm more convinced that if you dont want the trouble of XPSP2's troubles with the X2, and u dont have to have XP, just use 2K, right?

I know, you can patch it, but I'm not 100% confident the hotfix might not affect something else in the system.

 

[Megatomic]

In windows XP, the hotfix isn't necessary in cases where the OS was installed with the dual core chip installed. It's when you upgrade from single to dual that problems arise.

From what I remember, XP has superior multi processor support than 2K. In this day and age, if you are shopping for an OS to support your dual core system you really should just go with XP or a linux distribution.

 

[spyordie007]

I always thought that W2K (Prof n Server) are both multiprocessor capable

You are correct, they are SMP capable OSes.

But with a true Dual Core cpu, you would have 2 physical cpu (with 1 logical units on each)

Just because you have 2 cores doesnt mean you have 2 processors; the 2 cores share several key resources such as bus out to the system and (in some cases) cache. If you're running process 1 at full speed on core a and than load up process 2 on core b than process 1 will take more time to complete.

The biggest "problem" is that the Win 2k task scheduler doesnt realize the differance between physical and logical processors.

Win 2K will run on a dual-core processor, it just wont run as well as it would on 2 seperate processors. The doc you posted goes into some great deatails in regards to hyperthreading and a lot of it holds true for dual-core systems. Problems especially arise when you have more than one physical processor in regards to licensing as well as the task scheduler not understanding the best location to stick new requests.

If you *must* run 2000 than by all means go ahead; however to get full advantage of a multi-core system you should seriously consider purchasing XP.

 

[Canterwood]

I've tested a lot of applications from video editing to games in XP and Win2K on my dual core Opteron 170, andI found very little difference in results between them.

Hyperthreading is another matter altogether, but 2K (in my testing) didn't seem to have any issues with using two physical cores on one die.

I think upgrading from 2K to XP would be a serious waste of money, and the OP should wait at least until Vista arrives.

2K should be just fine until then.

 

[spike spiegal]

From what I remember, XP has superior multi processor support than 2K

Anytime you want to benchmark your Windows XP box against my Windows 2000 Servers running on Dual core AMD's and dual Processor Xeons with HT enabled, be my guest.

The entire logical -vs- physical processor debate was the caused by Intels Hyper Threading technology, which doesn't amount to much more than a hamster running on a plastic wheel anyways.

Dual Cores and dual processors exist as the same entity to any current OS. It's hyper-threading where XP has some theoretical advantage, and 25% of 7% doesn't mean much in my book.

 

[networkman]

I still use Win2K at home for quite a few of my rigs - a complete list can be found HERE - yes, all but 4 machines are at my place. Anyway, the ones you see with Win2K and 2 CPUs are all physically 2 processors boxes; I currently do not have any boxes with two or more logical processors(that is - in one chip), but when I do, they'll be getting either XPsp2 or XP64 depending on type.

 

[Madwand1]

Hyperthreading is bad news on the W2K platform, esp. when combined with multiple physical processors. Then it can lead to a serious performance degredation. E.g. there are 2 tasks to assign, and 2 physical processors, and 2 additional logical processors from hyperthreading. The OS will sometimes assign these tasks to one physical processor and one logical processor -- this will be much slower than assigning the tasks to two physical processors would have been. This sort of behaviour will happen from time to time on any system, so in all cases disabling hyperthreading on W2K multi-processor systems is well-advised.

AMD has published audited reports of hyperthreading degrading performance in several other cases with XP.

Intel is killing hyperthreading.

Dual cores are nothing like hyperthreading; they work fine under W2K.

 

[Link19]

Originally posted by: Canterwood
I've tested a lot of applications from video editing to games in XP and Win2K on my dual core Opteron 170, andI found very little difference in results between them.

Hyperthreading is another matter altogether, but 2K (in my testing) didn't seem to have any issues with using two physical cores on one die.

I think upgrading from 2K to XP would be a serious waste of money, and the OP should wait at least until Vista arrives.

2K should be just fine until then.

Windows 2K should even be fine for a while even after Vista is released for 32-bit computing.