Windows 2000 Pro & Hyper-Threading

[johndou1]

Will Windows 2000 Pro support the 3.06 GHz CPU I just bought or do I need to upgrade to XP Pro?

 

[spyordie007]

search term "hyper":
http://forums.anandtech.com/messageview.cfm?catid=34&threadid=1143909

 

[fredtam]

From what I've seen windows 2000 will support hyperthreading. The only side effect I've seen is lower temps and that isn't a bad thing. Yes spyordie007 xp is more hyperthreding "friendly" but it will work fine on 2000. Intel however recommends turning it off in 2000 so you may want to upgrade anyway

 

[EeyoreX]

Another side-effect is the possability of lowered performance. Windows 2000 does not understand a HT enabled P4 is actually one CPU. Windows 2000 thinks it is two physical CPUs. This is okay if you are doing two different things that do not address the same CPU resources, say, encoding a video and surfing the Web. As soon as you start to perform two processes that require the same portion of the CPU your performance will drop. Since Windows 2000 thinks there are two physical CPUs, each with its own resources, it tries to send the doubled info to "both" CPUs. Of course, there is only one CPU and one virtual CPU that share the same resources. So now, Windows 2000 has just bogged down your system, by trying to do two things at once, that it can't do adequately. If you really want to take proper advantage of HT technology, get Windows XP.

\Dan

 

[johndou1]

Thanx for the info.

Anybody know the best place to get XP Pro?

 

[MedicBob]

Originally posted by: johndou1
Thanx for the info.

Anybody know the best place to get XP Pro?

John,
See this thread ---->

Where to get Windows XP

 

[fredtam]

For pro I would suggest the OEM version at Cnetpc. I've bought quite a few here and they include a free cable to satisfy MS hardware purchase requirement.
Unless you need the specific features of pro I would suggest you consider home and save some $$$.