[mythtv-users] What is a "dual core processor"?

David Brodbeck gull at gull.us
Thu Dec 4 21:08:22 UTC 2008


ryan patterson wrote:
> Furthermore hyperthreading is not a gimmick like you are saying.
> Hyperthreading is very useful in systems that spend a lot of time near
> 100% CPU usage.

That isn't my experience.

For example, on a Pentium 4 system I was using as a VPN endpoint, I
benchmarked the transfer rate both with and without hyperthreading.  The
limiting factor on this machine was the CPU power needed to encrypt the
data.  I found openvpn could achieve higher transfer rates without
hyperthreading than with.  It wasn't a small difference, either, on the
order of 10-15%.

I'm sure there are situations where hyperthreading works, or Intel
wouldn't have released it, but they seem to be rare in the Linux world.
 Maybe it's different if you use Intel's optimizing compiler instead of gcc.



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