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|| SportsShooter.com: Member Message Board
Dual Processors
Wade Aiken, Photographer
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Bradford | Pa | USA | Posted: 9:56 PM on 12.30.04 |
| ->> Looking to purchase a new computer sometime in April. Having used both pc's and mac's, i much prefer pc's. My question is if there really is much of an advantage in speed with dual processors over a single processor (i'm leaning toward a dual opteron). I've done a little bit of research and from what i've been able to gather, a lot of it depends on the program as to whether it can take full advantage of both processors. I'd like to get some feedback from people who have actually used both dual and single processor machines. Any help would be appreciated. |
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Brian Jackson, Photographer, Photo Editor
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South San Francisco | CA | USA | Posted: 10:48 PM on 12.30.04 |
->> Wade- You're right, it really depends on the application. With most consumer desktop applications, you're not going to really see a difference. The event photography workflow app (http://www.actionathletics.com/actionimage soon to be http://www.action-image.net) that I wrote takes advantage of dual procs, but there aren't too many people using it right now :)
Now, if you're setting up a server and running web servers, app servers, databases and whatnot...yea, dual procs are going to work out great.
If you like to do lots of things at the same time, then multi procs can help out as well. Fire off a batch conversion job, then edit some images, watch a movie or copy files...won't even notice that the other app is doing anything.
Personally, a dual opteron system, while nice, is overkill unless you know you need dual procs. You're better off getting 10000 rpm SATA drives and gigs and gigs of memory.
Having dual processors doesn't mean your processing power is twice that of a uni-processor, it means you can do more things at the SAME time much faster. |
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Larry Vaughn, Photographer
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Gainesville | FL | usa | Posted: 11:22 PM on 12.30.04 |
->> In most cases, unless the software is written for 2 processors, performance will be slower with 2 instead on one.
Even the two in one Intel hyperthreading processors aren't always faster, but you can turn off the feature in the bios and try it both ways.
One of my former coworkers had two processors in her computer and one of the network managers borrowed one for something without telling her.
She never noticed. |
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Henry Hsu, Student/Intern, Photographer
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Los Angeles | CA | USA | Posted: 12:24 AM on 12.31.04 |
->> Yeah,
I don't know how much the two opteron is going to run you over a pentium with HT, so HT might be the better cost effective move. But programs like photoshop, I believe, do not take advantage of two processors. (Someone please correct me if I am wrong). I agree with Brian about getting the faster drive and more memory over another processor. |
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Larry Vaughn, Photographer
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Gainesville | FL | usa | Posted: 12:58 AM on 12.31.04 |
->> I bought 2 gigs of memory and a P4 2400 hyper 800mhz bus processor and it tests quite high on www.pcpitstop.com
Recently 80 gig drives went for $25.00 so I bought a couple more and now have a raid 0+1 system, meaning that it writes faster and has data redundancy.
All the memory and the new drives came in at under $275, a lot less than a 2 processor board and processors with no memory or hard drives. |
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Michael Stevens, Photographer
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Phoenix | AZ | USA | Posted: 4:22 AM on 01.02.05 |
->> Brian is correct: "Having dual processors doesn't mean your processing power is twice that of a uni-processor, it means you can do more things at the SAME time much faster."
I had a dual PIII forever at work and my new machine is a single P4 2.8. While MOST tasks are quicker it depends on what tasks you are attempting.
With ONE processor:
-If you are burning a CD/DVD that is effectively ALL you will be able to do while it burns.
-While you are scanning your machine will be hijacked until the scanner module is finished.
-Printing, especially from InDesign, will substantially slow the rest of the OS & programs running.
Last I heard, and I haven't checked lately but would find it hard to believe they altered the program, PhotoShop was a multi-threaded application. Considering how intensive many, if not most, of PhotoShop's operations are I couldn't imagine them rewriting it for single processor use only.
Mike |
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Billy Suratt, Photographer, Photo Editor
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Russell Springs | KY | USA | Posted: 8:15 AM on 01.02.05 |
| ->> Photo Mechanic is also written to take advantage of dual processing horsepower. Since practically everything revolves around Photo Mechanic and/or Photoshop, a dual processor PC running XP Pro is a wonderful thing indeed. |
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Robert Meyer, Student/Intern
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Lincoln | NE | United States | Posted: 11:00 PM on 01.04.05 |
| ->> Power Mac G5 Dual 2.5 Ghz...enough said! |
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Ryan Van Scotter, Photographer
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Laguna Beach | CA | United States | Posted: 4:59 AM on 01.05.05 |
| ->> Like Rob I got a Pwer Mac Dual 2.5 I'll never go back... It chomps through huge 100mb plus size Photoshop files with blazing speed. The only weak link for me is my external hard drive. I think I would be better off getting an internal high speed high rpm drive. Other than that, go dual if you can. |
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