Multicore Processors

[Decadent_Spectre]

Okay, to elaborate a little on this…
When one can design a cpu to be extremely efficient in terms of power consumption but it won’t be as much performant. So ARM came up with big.LITTLE architecture. Where there would be few performance cores and few efficiency cores to do the tasks. Games will kick in performance cores where as regular tasks such as browsing use efficiency cores only.

Having more cores will always result in high power usage. So one has to decide what is the general use case before investing in high core cpus. Like me when I bought thread ripper with 32 cores.

If you just wanna run nas or plex server pi is a better solution.

My question isn't really related to efficiency or general design, only what is the practical use case for modern CPUs with so many cores for the average user. I understand a bit from the responses here but I also feel that perhaps normal users won't use so many cores, so I agree with jinx's last post but of course this is just my view and I posted here to learn and see if perhaps there is a use case for so many cores for the average user. Either way is fine to me, I am simply curious.

 

[n1r0]

No, I wasn't asking about multi tasking

Multi tasking need not mean it's the user running multiple programs at once. The OS is doing a lot of things in the background even when idle. Indexing files for faster search results, scanning them for viruses, are only 2 examples that. There was a time when it was common practise to kill all background processes and stop virus scan when gaming, just to get that extra bit of performance.

If you're gaming on a single core, you would notice a lot of perfomance dips when other programs fight for CPU time.

You will mostly notice the greatest difference going from single to dual core. There after its likely a case of diminishing return for the "average" user. Are there even any single core CPUs available any more?

 

[Fenix]

How do you define average user?
For the guy watching movies, a video encoded in h265 certainly uses multiple cores and is better for it.
For the average office computer, Excel can bring an i9 to its knees depending on the amount and structure of data and the functions etc applied. A single core in those instances would certainly lock up for hours and hours.
If you compress/decompress something on your pc, you're using multiple cores to cut down the time by a huge margin.
All of these are average tasks for certain groups of people.

Moreover, multiple cores don't really exist in a vacuum that you can draw a hard line somewhere and point to it that on this side is multi core usage and on the other is single core usage. It's evolved and matured alongside other stuff like processing architectures to improve efficiency, increased clocks and the thermal limits reached by those clocks, scheduling on both the processor and OS levels, etc. Overall, it's the complexity of modern computers that necessitates using a combination of tools and technologies to provide the best computing experience, and one of those is multiple cores.

That is what I was also going to ask. What is the definition of an average user in 2023?

 

[booo]

I also feel that perhaps normal users won't use so many cores

how did you come to that conclusion that normal people wont use 8 or 16 cores?

Your smartphone is millions of times more powerful that all of NASA's combined computing in 1969

You would be wrong in saying an iPhone could be used to guide 120,000,000 Apollo era spacecraft to the moon, all the same time.

www.zmescience.com

 

[Fenix]

how did you come to that conclusion that normal people wont use 8 or 16 cores?

Exactly.

 

[Decadent_Spectre]

how did you come to that conclusion that normal people wont use 8 or 16 cores?

Your smartphone is millions of times more powerful that all of NASA's combined computing in 1969

You would be wrong in saying an iPhone could be used to guide 120,000,000 Apollo era spacecraft to the moon, all the same time.

www.zmescience.com

If it was a conclusion I wouldn't have posted a thread.

 

[Fenix]

If it was a conclusion I wouldn't have posted a thread.

This can't be the base of this thread. This is what the article says.

The computer's performance was comparable to the first generation of home computers from the late 1970s, such as the Apple II, TRS-80, and Commodore PET.[4]

 

[BullettuPaandi]

Apart from web browsers ( and multiple tabs) and the necessary OS needs, is there any other particular program(s) that the average user would benefit from multiple cores?

This is a seemingly simple question with a hardly simple answer. I'm not knowledgeable enough to point out some specific programs.

But I'd venture to say that almost any program could benefit from multiple cores, but for most programs that an "average user", however you may define it, would use, there's a lack of incentive for fullest utilisation of multiple cores from the user, and by extension CPU manufacturers & developers. However, as parallel computing gets developed further to supply for the demand from "power users", developers come up with something - tools, frameworks, architectures, etc. - that makes developing parallelized software easier. So, then programs that the average user would use, would have considerable benefit from multiple cores. This cycle continues regardless of the number of cores, unless there's a new technique to improve performance or efficiency or whatever the market is looking for, without increasing number of cores.

I know this doesn't answer the question and I do feel like I'm reiterating my previous post. But, I don't think it's easy to find exactly what you're looking for. Maybe, if you ask developers of a specific application, they'll be able to tell you exactly where they absolutely need multiple cores. But, this'd be about the gist of it.

 

[rsaeon]

Apart from web browsers ( and multiple tabs) and the necessary OS needs, is there any other particular program(s) that the average user would benefit from multiple cores?

For regular users, most photo or gallery apps use multiple cores to render thumbnails when you're importing/scrolling through them:



But I don't think people these days are transferring photos from their phones to computers anymore, everything lives on their phones.

Apart from the operating system (windows update can be CPU intensive when unpacking larger updates), browsers and browser-based apps, and photo galleries, there really aren't many use cases for more than 4 or 6 cores in an average user's system — but this changes quickly if they're gaming.

Most people who use computers and know what cores are, those kind of users are usually producing some kind of content (photos, videos, streaming, recording, audio, spreadsheets) that would require extra cores.

 

[OMEGA44-XT]

For regular users, most photo or gallery apps use multiple cores to render thumbnails when you're importing/scrolling through them:

View attachment 180798

But I don't think people these days are transferring photos from their phones to computers anymore, everything lives on their phones.

Apart from the operating system (windows update can be CPU intensive when unpacking larger updates), browsers and browser-based apps, and photo galleries, there really aren't many use cases for more than 4 or 6 cores in an average user's system — but this changes quickly if they're gaming.

Most people who use computers and know what cores are, those kind of users are usually producing some kind of content (photos, videos, streaming, recording, audio, spreadsheets) that would require extra cores.

Off topic, but you should get an SSD for OS + apps. It made my parent's PC with i3 530 faster, will surely help your PC as well. Cheap BX500 or even better SP A55 will be enough.

 

[rsaeon]

That's actually a VM on a Samsung PM991 nvme ssd, the disk usage is elevated is because I duplicated the files in the pictures folder and the default windows photos app is scanning/indexing/generating thumbnails of a few thousand "newly found/added/imported" photos.

But yes, I have used both the BX500's and A55's and they're surprisingly very good for the price, especially the A55's.

 

[Emperor]

Off topic, but you should get an SSD for OS + apps. It made my parent's PC with i3 530 faster, will surely help your PC as well. Cheap BX500 or even better SP A55 will be enough.

I'm too planning to move OS+apps on SSD from currently using HDD from last 2 Years, but the headache of Transfer or fresh installation pulls me back every time on last moment.

 

[calvin1719]

I'm too planning to move OS+apps on SSD from currently using HDD from last 2 Years, but the headache of Transfer or fresh installation pulls me back every time on last moment.

Getting off topic a bit, but cloning the os partition is straight forward and works pretty well. Can start a thread if you have any questions about it.

 

[Tobikage]

Try disabling all but one of the cores in the BIOS and run your day to day tasks...

Goodluck !

 

[Decadent_Spectre]

This is a seemingly simple question with a hardly simple answer. I'm not knowledgeable enough to point out some specific programs.

But I'd venture to say that almost any program could benefit from multiple cores, but for most programs that an "average user", however you may define it, would use, there's a lack of incentive for fullest utilisation of multiple cores from the user, and by extension CPU manufacturers & developers. However, as parallel computing gets developed further to supply for the demand from "power users", developers come up with something - tools, frameworks, architectures, etc. - that makes developing parallelized software easier. So, then programs that the average user would use, would have considerable benefit from multiple cores. This cycle continues regardless of the number of cores, unless there's a new technique to improve performance or efficiency or whatever the market is looking for, without increasing number of cores.

I know this doesn't answer the question and I do feel like I'm reiterating my previous post. But, I don't think it's easy to find exactly what you're looking for. Maybe, if you ask developers of a specific application, they'll be able to tell you exactly where they absolutely need multiple cores. But, this'd be about the gist of it.

For regular users, most photo or gallery apps use multiple cores to render thumbnails when you're importing/scrolling through them:

View attachment 180798

But I don't think people these days are transferring photos from their phones to computers anymore, everything lives on their phones.

Apart from the operating system (windows update can be CPU intensive when unpacking larger updates), browsers and browser-based apps, and photo galleries, there really aren't many use cases for more than 4 or 6 cores in an average user's system — but this changes quickly if they're gaming.

Most people who use computers and know what cores are, those kind of users are usually producing some kind of content (photos, videos, streaming, recording, audio, spreadsheets) that would require extra cores.

Thank you both for your helpful posts. I appreciate your post and efforts to answer my question. I also believe I now have the gist of it and a basic answer. It is an interesting topic.

 

[LinkdJay]

Try disabling all but one of the cores in the BIOS and run your day to day tasks...

Goodluck !

Check if your BIOS allows you to disable cores, and disable all except one core. See how that feels

You can also do the same by going to msconfig -> Go to Boot tab -> Advanced Options. Here you can select number of cores and max memory.

 

[guest_999]

I'm too planning to move OS+apps on SSD from currently using HDD from last 2 Years, but the headache of Transfer or fresh installation pulls me back every time on last moment.

All you need is a disk cloning/imaging software like macrium reflect free or aomei backupper free. Just clone the hdd to ssd then replace hdd by ssd.

 

[Tracer_Bullet]

All you need is a disk cloning/imaging software like macrium reflect free or aomei backupper free. Just clone the hdd to ssd then replace hdd by ssd.

Just did this via reflect. Cloned the whole disk with multiple os partitions. All went well, just make sure to remove old disk or erase once tested, else you will have duplicate partitions with same id.

 

[Emperor]

Just did this via reflect. Cloned the whole disk with multiple os partitions. All went well, just make sure to remove old disk or erase once tested, else you will have duplicate partitions with same id.

what brand/capacity Sata SSD you bought & at what price?

 

[Tracer_Bullet]

what brand/capacity Sata SSD you bought & at what price?

Corsair MP600 PRO NH at 10298 + amazon ICICI CC discounts.

Does not have many reviews and some reviews might say its top tier ( and competing with KC3000) but its not exactly that as they switched to slower flash. But has TLC + DRAM + PCIE4 and should be faster/competitive with SN580/SN770 (as per @guest_999) and with higher sequential speeds.

Good enough for me and faster than other options at this price. We never got usa type deals here.