AMD's 8- and 12-core CPU monsters

[joblack]

In releasing the products, AMD is touting performance increases up to two times the level of its previous generation six-core processors, including an 88% rise in integer performance and a 119% increase in floating point performance. In addition, the chips' four channels of DDR3 memory offer up to a 2.5x improvement in overall memory bandwidth, according to AMD.

http://www.informationweek.com/news/...leID=224200660

I'm serious thinking to get one of the 8 core Opteron 6128 for 250 Euro - might hit the four times as expensive Intel 980X into it's heart ... ^^.

[cheesehead]

Shall we have a poll on how long it'll be before no one calls a mere 12-CPU system a "monster", but might refer to such a teensy system as a "dwarf"?

[joblack]

Originally Posted by cheesehead

Shall we have a poll on how long it'll be before no one calls a mere 12-CPU system a "monster", but might refer to such a teensy system as a "dwarf"?

Let's hope so ... ;).

[fivemack]

The CPUs are very competitively priced, but I worry that the motherboard and memory start to add up ... four 2G DDR3 per socket is already more than the CPU, and that's only 1GB/core.

A four-socket 6128 system would potentially be a linear-algebra monster (sixteen channels of DDR3 versus three on the i7 machine that I use now, at the same price or slightly less per DDR3 channel) if the motherboard and chassis are not too expensive and (probably this is the hard part) if the software could be made to scale.

[joblack]

Originally Posted by fivemack

The CPUs are very competitively priced, but I worry that the motherboard and memory start to add up ... four 2G DDR3 per socket is already more than the CPU, and that's only 1GB/core.

A four-socket 6128 system would potentially be a linear-algebra monster (sixteen channels of DDR3 versus three on the i7 machine that I use now, at the same price or slightly less per DDR3 channel) if the motherboard and chassis are not too expensive and (probably this is the hard part) if the software could be made to scale.

The more reasonable investment would be an Intel 950 and a cheap mainboard but on the other side you would have 8 cores and 4 sleeping which perhaps can be 'unlocked' - and overclocked ^^ ...