Re: Intel-compatible 64 bits CPUs

Martin Andrews wrote:
> Hi all,
>
> I was wondering if the AMD and Intel 64 bits CPUs are really usefull
> for today's 32 applications or would I be more happy with the latest
> high-end P4 or K7?
> What is the reason to have them yet if there are no applications to be
> run in 64 bits mode?

First, unless you are doing lots of finite-element analysis, fluid-flow 
modelling or some other very heavy number crunching, the Itanium2 will 
do nothing for you.  It will run some current 32-bit Windows software, 
but at about the speed of a 1.5 GHz Pentium 4 at best.

The Opteron and Athlon64 from AMD are different.  If you use the 64-bit 
version of Windows, currently only available in beta, or Linux, these 
chips run 32-bit software faster than an Athlon XP running the same 
software.  I won't go into all the gory details of what type of software 
is clock speed limited, so a 2.2 GHz Athlon XP 3200+ is faster than a 
(to be released next month) Athlon64 3100+.  On other software the 
Athlon64 is faster and the overall average is about the same.

BUT, when you run Windows on the Opteron or Athlon64, each 32-bit 
process has its own 4-Gbyte virtual address space.  (If you have enough 
memory, you can have 4-Gbytes per process of real memory. ;-)  On 32-bit 
Windows processes are limited to 2 (or if you do the setup right 3) 
Gbytes of memory.  So applications like Word, Power Point, and video 
editing software have a lot more memory available, even if you are still 
running the 32-bit version.  For some users, especially those working 
with video, or with large documents, this is a significant advantage.

On the other hand, Pentium 4s and Xeons can do video compression faster, 
 so you have to choose the right chip for what you will be doing.

--
                                         Robert I. Eachus

"As far as I'm concerned, war always means failure." -- Jacques Chirac, 
President of France
"As far as France is concerned, you're right." -- Rush Limbaugh