"AMD has showcased their new 65nm Barcelona quad-core CPU. It is labeled a quad-core Opteron, but according to Infoworld's Tom Yeager, is really a redefinition of x86. Each core has a new vector math processing unit (SSE128), separate integer and floating point schedulers, and new nested paging tables (to vastly improve hardware virtualization). According to AMD, the new vector math units alone should improve floating point operation by 80%. Some analysts are skeptical, waiting for benchmarks. Will AMD dethrone Intel again? Only time will tell." Source: Slashdot.org [OT] Comments from slashdot When Intel first added SSE to the Pentium 3 chips, they did it with a 64bit setup to save die size on the then 350nm parts. Even when they moved to the newer smaller designs, they left it that way. The Core2 was the first chip to incorporate a single issue SSE engine. Therefore, with the Core2, it loads the instruction, then executes it. With the other chips, you have to load the first part(if it's a full 128bit instruction, or if it's multiple instructions added together), save, load, save, add, execute. This is where the Core2 kicks butt. I've been saying that the Barcelona would move to that design, since it's the biggest reason Intel has been beating AMD in the benchmarks. This will re-level the playing field. There have been lots of articles about this. Google it =============================== In my own benchmarks (generic C integer and floating point scientific code) I have found that the Core Duo and Core 2 Duo aren't all that quick compared with an AMD64. Clock for clock the AMD64 Opterons we have are about 50% quicker than an equivalent Core 2 Duo for integer work. I know this doesn't agree with all the usual magazine benchmarks but they are heavily biased towards using SSE instructions where possible and it is SSE where the Core 2 Duo has been a real improvement over previous Intel designs and also bests the AMD chips. Hopefully, AMD has recognised this and the new SSE implementation will bring them back on par with Intel for these benchmarks but even today an AMD64 processor is a beast and more than a match for anything Intel produces. =============================== I will not surprised if AMD dethrones Intel again. It is a classical Intel vs. AMD battle... Intel comes up with some hair-brained scheme that "More is better!". (like Viagra) They design something new and decide to make it faster (or in this case just glue more of them together). Back in the day it was the "GHz" now it's all about how many "Cores" you got. This tactic seems to suit Intel quite well and dethrones AMD for about a year and a half... During this time AMD massively redesigns there chips to integrate new, emerging technologies. The gamers and server operators of the world sit by their AMD chips knowing that they might not have the fastest chips for the time being but they are more technologically advanced. Intel keeps cranking out their "Viagra" chips that become hotter and bigger energy hogs. When they finally come to the realization that their product SUCKS (as with the P4's) AMD is already a step ahead and swiftly takes the market back with their chips, that have always be a step ahead technologically. Intel scrambles, does a redesign, fails, tries again and history repeats. Intel's "Viagra" mentality causes their chips to be more expensive while AMD's "slow and steady wins the race" mentality allows them to keep their prices down. =============================== [/OT]
80% increase in FP performance? F*cking hell. If this is true, and it turns out to be feasible to exploit in real world applications, we could see a lot of uses in universities and supercomputing centres.
Yeah. Once they start really taking advantage of multiple cores, that might help, depending on where it's applied. I know Alan Wake is set for multi-core support, not to mention Valve is working on making Source multi-core scaleable.
Quake 4 does, but only to the extent of providing grunt. I'd hope that more cores would allow for more advanced AI routines and such. Of course, we'll have to see how the GP-GPU (General Purpose GPU---ie. GF8800, possibly R600).
