On Mon, 12 Sep 2005, Denis wrote: > So basically... I would pretty much be buying an already outdated > technology if I were to purchase a dual Xeon or a dual Opteron system > now?
One could say that about any technology you buy ;-) > I guess the other advantage is that a good dual Xeon system with 4GB > RAM will run me around $3000, whereas a dual Opteron (with dual core) > system with 4GB RAM will run me more like $4300. If the Opterons are > currently at their memory bandwidth limit, I will have spent the $4300 > for nothing, especially since I need the fastest memory integration I > can get for my codes. > > Would I be better buying a dual Xeon system if I needed to buy right > now instead of waiting for the bandwidth issue to be resolved? It has to be said: Intel have been completely outmaneuvered by AMD with respect to multicore chips. Intel have been chasing faster clock speeds with larger transister counts while AMD have been pursuing a smarter solution IMHO. I think it will be awhile before Intel starting cranking out decent dual-core chips. Dont forget AMD have quad-core chips in the pipeline too so they will be maintaining their lead for awhile. As far as multicore support in boards go, last time I looked, Tyan seemed to be in the lead with this. They have a quad-cpu board (effectively 8 cores when using dual-core chips - each chip has its own memory slots with up to 4 or 8Gb per CPU). Tyan also now have a way of connecting two quad-cpu boards together allowing you to build a 16-core Opteron system. You could always buy a quad-core board and just keep adding CPU's to upgrade and eventually add the second board when you need more CPU ;-) -- -- gentoo-user@gentoo.org mailing list
