new way to play with Phenom X4: 4 cores, 4 frequencies!

[cookerjc]

We know that in Nov.15 HD 3800 will begin to sell. But we still don't know that RD790 and Phenom X4 will come out earlier(than the AMD plan) or not.

Here is some news that every AMD fanboy would like:

AMD is developing a software called "AMD overdrive" .Just like nTune,it can adjust different system values. It's interesting that we find out the software can adjust multiple frequencies of different cores independently.

Personally I think that's good news for people that cares about the total power consumptions of their computers. They can just turn off some cores while they are watching DVDrips.



source(finally, the site loves FF now):http://www.expreview.com/news/hard/2...3419d6698.html

[theclash]

This will be useful when playing with core affinity.

[Brother Esau]

Not to be disrespectful but whats up with you're Avatar? Looks like you have a cap from a Salt Shaker on dudes head

[DeepThought86]

Did anybody notice the 3.3GHz overclock on core 3?

And 3.2 on core 2 as well

[[XC] DragonOrta]

That's one of the guys from Daft Punk.

This could be useful. How many of us have had a core that just won't go past a certain speed while the others will go another 100-200mhz?

[cookerjc]

Not to be disrespectful but whats up with you're Avatar? Looks like you have a cap from a Salt Shaker on dudes head

[RaZz!]

This could be useful. How many of us have had a core that just won't go past a certain speed while the others will go another 100-200mhz?

this will be a nice feature for sure. but it would be kinda annoying if your core1/2 hits significantly lower clocks than your core3/4 - and you're playing games that are only optimized for 1 or 2 cores hehe.
in this case it would be cool to change the order the cores are used =D (or is that already possible somehow?)

[zanzabar]

That's one of the guys from Daft Punk.

This could be useful. How many of us have had a core that just won't go past a certain speed while the others will go another 100-200mhz?

but what will that do to teh memory controller since its linked to frequency and not the htt and it has 2 (1 for each channel) so this looks like it could have strange consequences, and i dont see a voltage per core so that could also be a problem since if u have a high voltage at low speed its much hotter than the high voltage at what ur oc is like when u oc with c&Q

[RPGWiZaRD]

this will be a nice feature for sure. but it would be kinda annoying if your core1/2 hits significantly lower clocks than your core3/4 - and you're playing games that are only optimized for 1 or 2 cores hehe.
in this case it would be cool to change the order the cores are used =D (or is that already possible somehow?)

That's the idea of setting affinity. Of course that would be a pain in the arse to set all the time but I'm sure we'll see a nifty software that would make this much easier. But perhaps we also see some software from AMD or some1 else yet that allows you to specify in which order the cores should be utilized, then disabling cores wouldn't be required.

If core 2 and 4 for example clocks significantly higher you would use those by setting affinity to core 2 and 4 and turn of the others. This is useful though only as long as things doesn't improve over 2 cores. Well you could also of course do the same for single threaded apps, just use the core that clocks highest and for apps that would use 3 cores you could at least disable the core that clocks worst.

So yea independent core frequency adjustment is a quite nice feature. It will give you better chance of reaching better results in a non 4-core utilizing application vs a normal quad core CPU without this feature.

So except power consumption saving it should give a garantuee of slightly better performance in apps that utilizes no more than 3 cores max as long as it's not core4 that is the worst clocking core. Should also be quite interesting to see how much the max clock results varies between the cores on the same CPU.

[ziddey]

cool. it'd be nice if some of the cores suck but others overclock well

[LordEC911]

but what will that do to teh memory controller since its linked to frequency and not the htt and it has 2 (1 for each channel) so this looks like it could have strange consequences, and i dont see a voltage per core so that could also be a problem since if u have a high voltage at low speed its much hotter than the high voltage at what ur oc is like when u oc with c&Q

Independent clocks and voltages for all you mentioned, so that won't be a problem.

[FischOderAal]

Not to be disrespectful but whats up with you're Avatar? Looks like you have a cap from a Salt Shaker on dudes head

cat > new ava

on-topic: that's an interesting feature. but what is the use of it? if you got a software that uses all cores the slowest will be the one that counts.
on the other hand, maybe one core just bails out at a lower clock and then you can overclock the others higher and have an improvement in single-core applications.

we will see what this will bring. this should be the biggest advantage for energy saving though. two cores run at 100% and the other two are bored so they can clock down.

[zerazax]

Well core affinity helps make sure that certain cores aren't used if they aren't needed.

Anyways, I guess with the split power planes and all that, handling the overclocks of separate cores shouldn't be a problem.

[kl0012]

Independent clocks and voltages for all you mentioned, so that won't be a problem.

No independent voltages - only clocks.

cat > new ava

on-topic: that's an interesting feature. but what is the use of it? if you got a software that uses all cores the slowest will be the one that counts.
on the other hand, maybe one core just bails out at a lower clock and then you can overclock the others higher and have an improvement in single-core applications.

we will see what this will bring. this should be the biggest advantage for energy saving though. two cores run at 100% and the other two are bored so they can clock down.

Needs to be seen and compared to overclocked Yorkfield.

[BeardyMan]

look at the multiplier settings, and how far it still can go

locked chips when you buys tehm, but unlocked with this prog

[dinos22]

now that's VERY cool

[FischOderAal]

No independent voltages - only clocks.

and what about the "split power lines"? if you can't adjust the voltages of each core this wouldn't make any sense.

[kl0012]

and what about the "split power lines"? if you can't adjust the voltages of each core this wouldn't make any sense.

Sorry to disappoint you, but split power lines are only for HT and cores. Which mean one voltage for cores and other voltage for HT.

http://multicore.amd.com/us-en/AMD-M...fficiency.aspx

[FischOderAal]

damn it. thanks for the info though. then the energy saving effect isn't that big if two of the cores run at 100% and the others clock down...

[Shintai]

Without affirmity. Any OS will jump around on the different cores. So unless you are crunching or that style. You would end up with a changing speed in games.

Also note this could lead to severe TSC issues for those still using software. Mentalray is one of them as an example.

[duploxxx]

That's the idea of setting affinity. Of course that would be a pain in the arse to set all the time but I'm sure we'll see a nifty software that would make this much easier. But perhaps we also see some software from AMD or some1 else yet that allows you to specify in which order the cores should be utilized, then disabling cores wouldn't be required.

If core 2 and 4 for example clocks significantly higher you would use those by setting affinity to core 2 and 4 and turn of the others. This is useful though only as long as things doesn't improve over 2 cores. Well you could also of course do the same for single threaded apps, just use the core that clocks highest and for apps that would use 3 cores you could at least disable the core that clocks worst.

So yea independent core frequency adjustment is a quite nice feature. It will give you better chance of reaching better results in a non 4-core utilizing application vs a normal quad core CPU without this feature.

So except power consumption saving it should give a garantuee of slightly better performance in apps that utilizes no more than 3 cores max as long as it's not core4 that is the worst clocking core. Should also be quite interesting to see how much the max clock results varies between the cores on the same CPU.

yep, i know some folks that are working on affinity prog, would be nice if you can select a list of program 's that default run on different cpu.

[xt0m]

Mhh.. Interesting development...

[Morais]

Awesome... Me, an addicted to power consuption will love this tool

[awdrifter]

That is a nice concept, but it makes oc'ing so much more time consuming. Now we need to test each core for stability (8hr P95 x 4?), then after we found the max speed for each core we need to test all of them at their highest speed for stability (another 8 hrs).

[naokaji]

That is a nice concept, but it makes oc'ing so much more time consuming. Now we need to test each core for stability (8hr P95 x 4?), then after we found the max speed for each core we need to test all of them at their highest speed for stability (another 8 hrs).

i see it more as a nice compormise between sacrificing max clock with all 4 cores on and having to disable cores...

but maybe thats just me