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The Santa Fe 400th Anniversary website confirms that the kickoff event to its 16-month-long commem-oration was a resounding success. In fact, pictures of the more than 20,000 visitors will be posted shortly! Problem is, the kickoff event was the first weekend in September. Not only are there still no pictures on the website, but there's no money in the coffers.
Viva! Santa Fe, the September kickoff event, cost $287,000 to produce and was expected to generate revenue for 400th Anniversary, Inc., the nonprofit that contracted with the city to facilitate Santa Fe's weighty birthday. The event was good old-fashioned family fun for lots of locals but, in the end, it lost approximately $42,000. The loss left the nonprofit struggling for liquidity—understandable, given the state of the economy. But less understandable, given the $1.5 million in lodgers tax revenue and state funding with which it had started.
It turns out one of 400th's ways to honor the traditional practices of northern New Mexico was through gross mismanagement of public funds. Executive Director Libby Dover was being paid $10,000 a month. Five other employees also pulled above-average salaries. In addition, huge contracts with marketing and fundraising companies apparently failed to pay off.
Unable to address the budgetary shortfall with a slate of commemorative products, the nonprofit responded by axing its overpriced executive director, cancelling several contracts and trimming its workforce. 400th Anniversary Committee Chairman Maurice Bonal tells SFR the group will request a $750,000 infusion from the likewise cash-strapped City of Santa Fe, after revising its "total finance package" for 2010. The total planned 400th anniversary budget was originally said to be $11 million before being trimmed to $7 million and, more recently, $3 million.
Even if city councilors find a bag of money buried under City Hall, however, there are reservations about further funding the troubled nonprofit. The City Council tabled proposals to grant additional funds in both October and December.
Santa Fe Mayor David Coss remains hopeful that the event will finish as a success.
"2009 was a hard year for the US economy and the Santa Fe economy, yet the 400th committee and this community put together a meaningful and beautiful event, Viva! Santa Fe, that made us all proud," Coss says. "I am looking forward to more special commemorative events in 2010." He adds that the city was honored by a visit from Spain's royal family as part of the commemoration.
Bonal is well-aware that some of the 400th committee's big plans haven't exactly panned out and says a new game plan is unfolding for 2010.
"We hope to collaborate with a lot of Santa Fe's existing organizations and have their signature events also be 400th anniversary events," Bonal says. He cites Indian Market, the International Folk Art Market, Fiesta, 4th of July and events at the Georgia O'Keeffe Museum as ripe for possible collaborations. "They're looking for help; we're looking for help," Bonal says. "It's a tough economy and it's going to be a time for collaboration."
Some might call it branding on the backs of others, but it also might be a better way to celebrate Santa Fe: by honoring the hard work of the city's existing organizations.
Such a move may motivate citizens who are coming out of the woodwork wanting to help turn mud into adobe. Scott Hutton, owner of Hutton Broadcasting, LLC and local radio magnate isn't happy with what's happened so far, but thinks the event might still be turned around. "I wish things had gone better and I want to help make the 400th celebration a worthwhile anniversary," Hutton says.

subset: commoncrawl


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Promise Pegasus R6 & Mac Thunderbolt Reviewby Anand Lal Shimpi on 7/8/2011 2:01 AM EST
89 Comments
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Spazweasel - Friday, July 08, 2011 - link$50 too much for a cable? Psshh. Children these days don't remember $75-100 SCSI-3 and UltraSCSI cables. These things are expensive for good reason.
You want the highest performance, you pay to play. That's always been the case. Reply
tzhu07 - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkThe phrase, "you get what you pay for" is generally true as a rule of thumb, but in the computer and consumer electronics industry, that has for the most part been untrue.
Case in point: The high price of Monster cables having no performance advantage over the same type of cables one can find on newegg at a much lower price.
Apple just has this technology cornered....for now. Reply
tzhu07 - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkWell, I should say untrue in the computer and consumer electronics cable market. Reply
darwinosx - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkThe technology is Intel's not Apples. Intel determines the licensing fees. Reply
Samus - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkYes, but like SCSI, Apple was its only mainstream delivery vehicle. Back in the 80's and 90's, SCSI interfaces were reserved for servers, ultra high end workstations, and Apple computers. They always push the bleeding edge, which is possibly the only thing I respect about Apple. Reply
Justin Case - Saturday, July 09, 2011 - linkThis has nothing to do with "pushing the bleeding edge". This has to do with giving Apple an "excuse" to remove USB ports from their iToys, thus locking out 3rd party accessory manufacturers (Thunderbolt is far too expensive to be competitive, unless you have a special deal like Apple has with Intel).
The Mac hasn't been Apple's main focus for a long time; it's all about iOS and its ecosystem, now. Reply
haley2011 - Sunday, July 10, 2011 - linkok Reply
MySchizoBuddy - Sunday, July 10, 2011 - linkdoesn't the article specifically say that thunderbolt is free to license.
Isn't Promise Pegasus a 3rd part manufacturer. Do you have any source claiming that Promise has a special deal with Apple.
Sony has thunderbolt ports in it's laptop as well. Reply
Focher - Sunday, July 10, 2011 - linkBesides that you give away your bias of anything from Apple, TB isn't an Apple technology. It's an Intel one. What I find ironic is the USB versus TB arguments. First, it's a false choice. Even Apple has offered both FireWire and USB ports for years on their machines. It's only recently that FireWire has started to be removed from models. There's no current indication that USB will be dropped by Apple. Second, in specific regards to USB 3.0 I don't see the argument versus TB device availability. Neither have much market penetration yet, so only time will tell how each of them will do - and both could do fine or both could fail. Reply
MobiusStrip - Tuesday, July 12, 2011 - linkiOS devices are toys, but they already lack USB ports. They don't have any proper developer- or user-accessible I/O, so you think Apple's going to put Thunderbolt ports on them?
NO. Apple has created a whole line of mobile devices that are ironically isolated from the world around them. Reply
enthios - Thursday, July 28, 2011 - link"Ironically isolated from the world around them?" How about wifi and iCloud? With limited storage capacity, there's no need for anything more. iOS devices are simply thin clients - and they work wonderfully as such. Reply
NirXY - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkWhich is 0$ Reply
Exelius - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkYes, but in this instance, it's not just a dumb wire; there is an IC at each end of the cable. So theoretically, if Intel comes up with an upgraded Light Peak spec, there may well be cables that are capable of faster speeds. I also imagine longer cables become more difficult, and may in fact require fiber optic transceivers built into the cable. This cable also likely costs significantly more to manufacture than a crimped cable, since there's a tiny IC and micro soldering that needs to be done on each cable.
But yes, in one sense you are right that in a digital bus, higher quality cables do not provide better performance (though I have run into very low-quality HDMI cables that work fine at 720p but refuse to carry a 1080p signal.) Reply
repoman27 - Sunday, July 10, 2011 - linkAt the moment, i'm not sure the Thunderbolt host controller has any real legs on the cable. That host controller is already pumping data to each port at the same speeds as the DMI link between the CPU and PCH. Everything in the chain that is connected to it needs to get faster for Thunderbolt to get faster, i.e. PCIe 3.0, DMI 3.0, DP 1.2.
Also, I'm pretty sure it's not those little ICs that are making Apple's Thunderbolt cables cost $49. Like many retailers, Apple knows that cables and accessories (and RAM upgrades) are a great place to stretch profit margins. A quick search of the Apple store for cables and adapters will turn up dozens of genuine Apple offerings ranging in price from $19 on up to $99. So, taken in context, the Thunderbolt cable is actually a mid-priced cable from Apple, not an expensive one. It also means that cheap unbranded alternatives could quite realistically be sold for around $15, ICs and all.
Regarding your HDMI cable experience, Category 1 or "Standard" HDMI cables are only rated for 1080i60, whereas Category 2 or "High Speed" cables will do 1080p60, 4K, 3D, Deep Color, etc. Older cables weren't marked as such, and thus YMMV. Reply
snakeInTheGrass - Friday, July 15, 2011 - linkYeah, the SCSI cables were $75+ easily, you needed terminators, and do you remember the fine SCSI1/2/3 connector differences so you needed adapters or cables with different ends depending on the devices. I still have probably what WAS $500 of cables in my closed.
Inflation adjusted, these $50 cables are about the equivalent of $15 cables back in those days, so frankly they don't sound too bad, especially considering the fact that it's industry leading performance right now.
As for comparing to Monster cables, these Thunderbolt cables have controllers built into them and presumably do have to meet tighter tolerances than USB, particularly as they carry 2 x 10Gbps data streams. But you're right that Monster cables are a rip off. Reply
flowynn - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkI remember those days well. My need for speed SCSI habit was insanely expensive. Reply
MonkeyPaw - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkIt reminds me of FB-DIMMs, an expensive solution that uses additional energy, and the components cost more than devices it replaces. Controllers in the cables AND on the motherboard and peripherals? Maybe the optical solution will make more sense. Reply
CrimsonFury - Monday, July 11, 2011 - linkI thought the initial copper cables didn't need any controllers in them? The impression I got from earlier articles was that Intel said their Thunderbolt implementation could scale to optical in future for greater speeds by releasing optical cables with a copper to optical controller in each end of the cable once controller costs had come down from mass production. Reply
MobiusStrip - Tuesday, July 12, 2011 - linkNo, they need optical in the ports and wires.
By reneging on the light in "Light Peak", Intel effectively killed it. Who knows why they're playing dumb in pretending that they're going to get the industry to adopt Thunderbolt and then turn around and adopt an optical solution right afterward. Just idiotic. Reply
André - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkI find it especially funny considering that all current Thunderbolt solutions (A/V equipment or storage enclosures) are all in excess of $999 to begin with. Reply
darwinosx - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkAll two or three devices? By end of year there will be a flood of consumer devices with Thunderbolt ports. Reply
epobirs - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkNot if apple remains the sole platform including it. Niche markets can be expensive. Until Thunderbolt is an option in Windows systems the numbers just won't be there for the consumer market. The devices will continue to be expensive for most non-professional Apple users as well, making this a very expensive product category.
Consider the premium USB 3.0 is still carrying almost a year after it started being included in shipping systems and widely available as an upgrade via PCI-e board. This past week was the first time I saw a USB 3.0 flash drive priced low enough to be worthwhile. Frys had a 16 GB Corsair unit for $20 after rebate. Note that this unit is almost 50% larger than the USB 2.0 version and so may not be acceptable to all.
Next year, as motherboard chip sets with native USB 3.0 support enter the mainstream the transition should pick up steam. It's taken more than three years since the first controllers became widely available. So try toimagine the glacial growth rate for Thunderbolt outside professional applications if it doesn't get a decent footprint beyond the Mac. Reply
iwod - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkAOC recently announce a Monitor that can be powered by 2 USB, roughly 9W. Which means it it really did worked out. A Thunderblot version could be possible, having an external monitor with just 1 cable!!!. Reply
MobiusStrip - Tuesday, July 12, 2011 - linkAnd at least Thunderbolt is an appropriate conduit for video, which USB is not. Reply
cactusdog - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkHaha the motherboard makers are gonna run out of space putting all these different connections. Maybe they can retire some like firewire....
Anyway, any chance of a review of the Samsung S27A950D 120Hz monitor? Alotta people are interested. Thanks. Reply
xype - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkRetire FireWire, but leave the VGA, Serial, Parallel ports. That would totally make sense. Reply
Exodite - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkVGA still makes sense, on account to the large numbers of projectors in circulation making use of it.
As for the others, not so much. Reply
Anato - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkY, but it still could be substituted with Displayport/Thunderbolt and make an adapter for VGA/DVI/HDMI.
I hate to see VGA as only option in computers costing 2000€ :( Reply
Exodite - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkYou can already do that.
All you have to do is pay through the nose for three adapters (VGA, DVI and HDMI) and carry them with you at all times.
Personally I wouldn't buy a notebook without native VGA output, preferably coupled with HDMI. Reply
repoman27 - Saturday, July 09, 2011 - linkOK, I recognize that most A/V equipment isn't refreshed as often as PCs are, but the industry started the switch to digital display interfaces 12 years ago. If you really can't part with your equipment that predates DVI, you can pick up an Apple mini DisplayPort to VGA adapter for $29, or a generic one for $5. It'll fit in your pocket, and yes it will work with the Thunderbolt equipped Macs. And hey, now that you've got an analog signal, it's no problem to use a passive adapter to convert to s-video or composite video, and then you can attach it right to your RF modulator and drive any TV made since 1941. Complete backwards compatibility for under $15 that will fit in your pocket (although you'll probably need cargo pants for the RF modulator.)
If you can confine yourself to connecting to displays manufactured in the last 10 years or so, you can get an Apple DisplayPort to DVI adapter for $29, or a generic one for $5. It'll fit in your pocket, and yes it will work with the Thunderbolt equipped Macs. Combine that with a DVI to HDMI cable for an additional $2, and now you can connect to any display with a digital interface except those requiring dual-link DVI. If you want audio as well as video over HDMI, you can get a mini DP to HDMI adapter such as the super slick Griffin GC17096 with Audio and DVI for $27, or go generic for far less.
The only cumbersome and expensive conversion on the newer Macs is when you absolutely have to go the dual-link DVI route. This requires an active adapter that has to regenerate the video signal. The apple version will run you $99 (see, those TB cables aren't so expensive after all). However, Thunderbolt may actually allow for cheaper and more elegant solutions due to sufficient power being available on the port. Then again, dual-link DVI only displays are cumbersome and expensive in and of themselves, so it shouldn't matter too much to those who actually own one.
The whole point of Thunderbolt is that it's NOT yet another connection, it's a radical extension of the capabilities of one you already have—the video out port. The only digital display interfaces that are even remotely as versatile, capable or compact as mini DP are mini/micro HDMI, but their consumer electronics heritage presents some drawbacks for PC applications. Not to mention that it is the packetized nature of the DisplayPort protocol itself that allows it to be combined with PCIe on a single link to create Thunderbolt. VGA ports are literally 8 times the size of mini DP ports and DVI are larger still. By forcing those who need to connect to 10 year old equipment to carry a $5 adapter in their pockets when they might need to do so, manufacturers are able to give everyone an additional 15 minutes of power when running on battery. Reply
darwinosx - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkHardly anyone uses projectors so VGA ports should only be on business class laptops. Reply
Zok - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkCan't say I agree with you there. Despite being issued a corporate laptop, I use my personal one for most of my work, including (VGA-requisite) projector presenting. Reply
cacca - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linksome questions:
Does USB 3 port do the same?
Does the PCI-E external do the same?
Does External SATA do the same?
Thunderbolt is just another PROPRIETARY standard that competes with others.
It reminds me RAMBUS.
were cost and compatibility matters. Is faster but....
We will ever seen a review of something from Intel that points out the shortcomings?
or this place is ADDtech instead of anandtech? Reply
André - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkRest assured that USB 3.0 does NOT in any way or form do the same as Thunderbolt.
The protocols are very different, as in, USB 3.0 nearly doesn't support any and Thunderbolt being an extension of a 4 x PCI-Express slot does support heaps of features, like Target Disk Mode, S.M.A.R.T.-status, Native Command Queuing, daisy-chaining (with very low latency) making it ideal for many professional applications (Audio/Visual devices), bi-directional bandwidth, DisplayPort, 10 Watt of power and native software driver support.
Just to name a few.
External SATA doesn't do the same either.
Thunderbolt is a multi-purpose connector, not limited to only storage or transfer of files.
If you for a minute think that USB or E-SATA does the same as Thunderbolt, then you need to educate yourself.
It has the potential to replace all other external connectors. One cable to rule them all, instead of legacy cables that clutter up the backside of your computer and collect dust. Reply
Anato - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkAnd one controller (maker) to rule us all. Thats a big problem in PC, but not necessarily in Mac. Reply
Jaybus - Sunday, July 10, 2011 - linkNot really. Light Peak is essentially protocol agnostic. It tunnels PCI-E. The PCI-E-to-whatever bridge is built into the cable and/or dongle. In other words, a USB 3.0 adapter/hub that plugs into a Light Peak port is possible and even likely.While Intel may control the Light Peak controller, which will no doubt be integrated into motherboard chipsets, I don't think that will give them a monopoly on the bridge chips that make LP actually useful. Reply
Exodite - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkCue 'potential'.
It's not hard to foresee another Firewire or mini-DP in the making, or a Beta if you prefer going old-school.
Coupling Light Peak technology with mini-DP was a mistake. The technology is new, unproven and offers precious few usage scenarios with non-existent device support. Piggy-backing it on mini-DP, which suffer from pretty much exactly the same issues, won't help adoption rates.
Choosing USB over mini-DP as the 'legacy' interface would have been a much better choice. Reply
André - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkExcept that the USB connector is only allowed to be used as an USB connector.
DisplayPort is also vastly superior to any other display cable standard, so I cannot see the problem in that regard. Mini-Display is already shipping in millions and millions of computers, as well as Mini-DisplayPort. The same can be said by Thunderbolt, even though it is only Apple who have fully embraced the technology.
As a professional in the audio/visual segment I can hardly see the problem with it being a repeat of FireWire, because my market usually adopts the better technology despite of a small price increase. Of course, it helps that we only use Apple computers to begin with and have already ditched all the back-alley, legacy connectors. Reply
Uritziel - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkHeh, yet another continuation of the myth that media professionals only use macs... Reply
André - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkKindly don't put words in my mouth ;)
I didn't say media professionals only use Apple computers, I said my company only use them.
As for now it only makes sense to discuss Thunderbolt and Apple computers as Apple are the only ones who has it currently.
But you just have to look at the companies that are releasing Thunderbolt enabled devices to understand that this connector is really something professionals are going to use. Next year the market will open up when PC vendors finally, if they so choose, to embrace the technology. Reply
Exodite - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkPoint being, they have no reason to do so.
What possible use is Thunderbolt to consumers?
Had LP been piggybacked upon USB instead it would have allowed for both back- and forwards-compatibility with a huge market of devices and could have slowly permeated said market until it had become a de-facto standard.
The choice of using mini-DP may well have condemned it to being yet another Firewire. Reply
Exodite - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkMini-DP isn't vastly superior to any other display interface.
The differences between DP 1.2 and HDMI 1.4a are at best a trade-off, with the latter being the better choice for consumers - even disregarding the huge difference in market penetration.
Computers currently shipping with mini-DP - Apple Macs and those equipped with discrete AMD 5- and 6-series graphics cards.
Unfortunately that's not the main issue, which is the distinct lack of /displays/ using the standard.
Displays shipping with mini-DP - Apple Cinema displays. The end. A few other high-end professional displays ship with full-sized DP but you can't argue it's got any significant market penetration.
Then there's HDMI, which is pretty much ubiquitous in the consumer electronics world, seeing rapid adoption for computer displays and is also used in modern projectors.
Anyway, that's pretty much an aside - the real gist of it is what I already mentioned regarding USB/LP being the vastly superior choice.
As for USB connectors only being allowed to be USB connector, that's not a physical limitation - it's a matter of licensing and what they choose to name the standard. A theoretical USB/LP standard could just as well have been named 'USB 4.0' or whatever. Reply
Focher - Saturday, July 09, 2011 - linkNot sure what your point is here. Is it just about the connector type? USB and Thunderbolt are different technologies. TB needed a display standard. DP was chosen because 1) Apple participated in its creation and 2) it isn't saddled with the restrictions and costs that HDMI licensing does. Reply
repoman27 - Sunday, July 10, 2011 - linkMini DisplayPort IS DisplayPort, just using a smaller connector. The size of the connector is irrelevant to the interoperability of the devices, you simply connect them using an appropriate cable.
A quick search of Newegg shows displays available from Asus, BenQ, Compaq, Dell, HP, Lenovo, NEC, and Samsung all with DisplayPort connectors.
ATI/AMD has been shipping cards with DisplayPort connections since early 2008, and DP is native to the GPUs used for every 5 and 6 series device. Intel began including DisplayPort capability with GMA 4500 in 2008 and currently ships it to you in every CPU with integrated HD graphics. NVIDIA is the only major player who seems to be lagging on DP adoption, but there are still plenty of Fermi based cards on the market rocking DisplayPort.
HDMI was developed for consumer electronics, i.e. televisions and home theaters. DisplayPort was developed for PCs. The lineage is distinct and continues to this day as the two evolve. DP is packet based so that multiple displays can be daisy chained off of one port, which is not a common usage model for TVs. Newer HDMI specs include such home theater relevant features as support for 3D formats, 100 Mbps Ethernet and an audio return path—something that makes no goddamned sense in the PC context. DP originally supported high-resolution displays but not audio, whereas HDMI included audio from the outset but could only drive a 1920x1080 display because that's all that HDTV required. DP 1.2 has an AUX channel that can be used to provide a USB 2.0 connection to the display over the same cable as video and audio, as well as offering more than twice the total bandwidth of HDMI 1.4.
USB is a shared serial bus based on a tiered-star topology. It's great for connecting lots of relatively slow devices that don't require much bus power or tight timing. When you try to use it for devices that require lots of bandwidth, like high speed external storage, things go downhill fast. Even with a single device connected to a USB host controller, you're lucky to get throughput equal to 60% of the oft touted "480 Mbps" or "5 Gbps" due to insanely high protocol overhead. Although it's finally moved beyond half-duplex and added better support for bulk data transfers, the cluster that is USB 3.0 tops out at around 385 MBps in best case scenarios. To create backwards compatibility with 2.0, they merely created Siamese Frankenconnectors, doubling the dimensions of the B connectors in the process, and added more conductors to the cable. How would bastardizing this poor port any further be a good idea? The differences between Thunderbolt and USB in architecture, implementation, and intended use are vast. How would the average user make this distinction if they were somehow cobbled onto the same port? Reply
taltamir - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkit doesn't have such potential, because it is an active cable that costs 50$ per cable.
Daisychaining doesn't help reduce the amount of CABLES you need, you still need one cable per device. It just reduces the amount of ports you need.
So I will stick with my 5 cables for 2$ each instead of 5 cables for 50$ each.
Now, if they made a thunderbold cable that is passive and cheap as hell, and integrated the controller into southbridge, then it will have the potential to replace all other cables.
Not having royalties and being an extension of PCIe are very powerful features as you said yourself. Reply
HW_mee - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkI though the unofficial Apple slogan was "It just works", but after reading the description for using an Imac as secondary display, that slogan seems like a joke. You have to boot up the Imac, own a recent keyboard and press a slightly odd key combination, that does not fit my impression of something that "just works".
You use the Imac as a screen and Displayport is part of the cable, why could they not just have a on/off switch for the screen and one for the complete Imac, the screen switch can only control the screen and the Imac switch starts screen and computer, if the Imac is on, the screen switch is deactivated, not exactly advanced science.
Reading the review I also got the impression that Apple have given up on security, is there no password protection or something similar in "Target disc mode"? Can you just buy a Thunderbolt cable for a new Macbook pro and start stealing data from other Thunderbolt equipped Apple computers, just by connecting the cable and holding down t when the "victim" is started? Reply
HW_mee - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkReplying to myself :-/
Target disk mode is seriously a horrible feature, from a security view, it even works with FireWire and I can not find any references to any security.
Remember kids, a login password protects you data, unless the bad guy remembers a 4$ cable. Reply
xype - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkUhm, as soon as someone has physical access to your computer (which Target Disk Mode implies), short of encrypting your whole disk (with, say, http://www.apple.com/macosx/whats-new/features.htm... or any other encrypting software), you can kiss your data goodbye.
Also, how's Target Disk Mode any different than an USB key? If anything, the latter is easier to deal with, since you can just plug it into a running machine and off you go. Target Disk Mode might annoy you with stupid things like a Login and whatnot. Reply
Penti - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkPhysical access is physical access. Just set up a EFI/BIOS password if you want false security. If your concerned about your noisy friend with another mac and firewire/thunderbolt-cable. Or whatever. If you like to protect your data, then encryption is not really enough either, but it helps. It does protect against someone stealing your shut down computer. If you have it on, they encryption key is in memory however. When you have physical access it doesn't really matter what the firmware tries to do, passwords and lojack can all be circumvented, and of course you could just remove the drive from the computer when it's not encrypted any way. Computers don't have protection from and are never protect from physical access. You need physical security for that. Reply
HW_mee - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkIt is one thing if the thief steals the HDD/computer, learns a password or hacks the computer using some piece of software, as this often takes time, requires a lucky break or leaves obvious traces.
Another thing is if someone can just hook up a cable turn the computer on and press T to access everything. Reply
takumsawsherman - Saturday, July 09, 2011 - linkYou mean like booting from a CD or USB flash drive and copying files to a very small, hideable storage container?
Perfectly possible, and in fact I find myself doing this frequently (though copying the data in the other direction typically) when disinfecting PCs. I do this multiple times per week, removing data stealing trojans and rootkits.
Compare with Thunderbolt, where you will "sneak in with only a laptop and a cable and reboot and press T, and ZOMG yor datas are hax0red! Ha HA ha stupid Apple!!!111oneonewonwon"
Leaves obvious traces? Exactly what traces did the Boot CD leave? Reply
Penti - Wednesday, July 13, 2011 - linkAs you can password protect (which can be bypassed with physical access any way) the firmware it doesn't matter if it is Firewire/Thunderbolt-target or USB-stick/HDD that access and or copies the files or simply a CD that changes your password so you can just log in an access everything without any effort at all. If you don't have limits on the firmware/bios any way you can just set up whatever, and access anything without any effort, less so then using slow target disk mode, even through network boot is possible which might be on in a corporate/university environment any way.
Just disable the good damn features you don't like, it don't make your computer safe but I'm sure it will quit you whining for nothing.
You will just access everything by running the system rescue tools on the install CD for OS X any how. Windows computers are essentially unprotected any way. So I really don't see how it's any worse then plugging in a USB stick to access everything or change the password (SAM) to blank/whateveryoulike. Screaming about a ten year old feature is just dumb. Just set up a firmware password and it stops people from simply booting a CD, USB-drive, HDD-drive, using target disk mode and network boot any way. It's simply not more vulnerable then PCs any way. It's quite easy to restore the firmware-password thus bypassing it on say an iMac any way, I could easily do it on older macs without taking the entire computer apart. And on a PC of course resetting CMOS password is often troubleless and manufacturers often has master passwords you get by calling the support any way. Later macs has got better protection from resetting the firmware password though. So just set the damn password. Reply
Penti - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkThey are not driving the screen with a separate control-board. That's why target display is so awkward. You can expect third party stuff (and older macs) will work when Atlona has designed and released an Thunderbolt-compatible adapter/switch/converter/scaler though. It a integrated solution not a screen and a computer separate. The screen is when used normally connected directly to the ATi/AMD 6000M GPU. That's why you can't adjust the screen in Bootcamp/Windows without their software tool too. Reply
HW_mee - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkThat makes sense, not much you can do to separate the two things if the screen is "merged" with the computer. I expected the computer part and screen part was seperate and the display input could be used in the same way as with most multiple input screens.
If that was the case, a simple power circuit could control the screen and computer separately. Reply
youngjimmy - Friday, July 08, 2011 - link'Failing to do so will give you this all-*to*-familiar error' (bottom, The Pegasus: Software) Reply
Kimbie - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkYou made mention about connecting up a monitor to the last port on the chain, by plugging in a thunderbolt cable into the imac and used it as a second screen.
Does this still work if you use a mini-display port to DVI adaptor and into a bog standard DVI monitor?
Kimbie Reply
Focher - Saturday, July 09, 2011 - linkJust to clarify, the last connection in the chain to a mini DisplayPort monitor does not require a Thunderbolt cable. You would just use a mini DP cable. Reply
André - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkDoes it support JBOD?
Would be really great for us using ZFS+ arrays, although I would have preferred at least 8 bays. Reply
Exodite - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkThe performance is impressive, though nothing like what you'd get transfering a large number of smaller files obviously.
That said, for 2000 USD why wouldn't I simply build a high-end desktop /with/ 12TB of storage?
It'd still be cheaper and I could put the remainder towards a gilded sticker for the case saying 'cheap-ass NAS'. Reply
André - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkIt would appear that is the solution for you, building your own NAS.
This enclosure is, however, not a NAS.
It enable users that need high disk performance to get easy access to precisely that in a mobile package you can take on the road with you and edit in the field.
Think large Final Cut Pro (or any other NLE), Logic Studio and Photoshop projects. Reply
Conner_36 - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkOr even in the office, to able to take your entire project and move between the rooms carrying ALL of the data? That's unheard of!
From what I understand with HD movie editing I/O is the bottleneck.
All we need now is an SVN hardware device with thunderbolt to sync across multiple thunderbolt RAIDs. Once thats out you could have a production studio with some real mobile capabilities. Reply
Exodite - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkI wager pretty much any usage scenario can come up with a high-performance 12TB storage solution for significantly less than 2000 USD.
You're right though, it's definitely not the solution for me.
Or anyone I know, or am likely to ever know. *shrug* Reply
Zandros - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkWhat happens if you try the Macbook Pro -> Pegasus -> iMac in Target Display Mode -> Cinema Display connection chain? Reply
Focher - Saturday, July 09, 2011 - linkPretty sure the DP monitor has to be the last device in the chain. Maybe that is just a current limitation because there are no Thunderbolt displays. Reply
Zandros - Monday, July 11, 2011 - linkAFAICT, the iMac is a Thunderbolt display, since it does not support Target Display Mode from Display Port sources with Display Port cables. Reply
tipoo - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkIs there a way to make it shut off the drives after idling for a while? Reply
piroroadkill - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkBut when you saw the file creation maxed out at 9TB, on 10TB array..
Since.. uh, Snow Leopard, Apple changed file and drive sizes to display decimal bytes as used by the manufacturers, which is the same as the 10TB array.
However every other thing ever reports in binary bytes, such as windows describing "gigabytes" even though it means gibibytes in reality.
Ugh, anyway, what I'm trying to get at is that maybe you did infact fill the array. That said, the thing shouldn't have fucked up.. Reply
CharonPDX - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkIf I had way too much money, my usage model for Target Display Mode would be to use the iMac as a Virtual Machine host/server, connected to either a second iMac or a MacBook Pro as a dual-screen workstation.
With the minimum 27" iMac, you're basically buying a 27" Cinema Display plus a $700 Mac mini-on-steroids. If you want a second Apple display for your iMac or MacBook Pro, and want a Mac Mini to use as a server, that is an excellent value to instead just get a second iMac. (That value may drop depending on the next Mac Mini update, of course.) Reply
etamin - Friday, July 08, 2011 - linkin the block diagram on the first page, why is the Thunderbolt Controller connected to the PCH thru PCIe rather than to the processor? I thought PCIe connections came off the processor/NB? Reply
repoman27 - Sunday, July 10, 2011 - linkThe lanes that come off the processor/NB are usually used for dGPU. On the new MacBook Pros, Apple borrowed four of them for the Thunderbolt controller. Apparently on the new iMacs, however, they decided to give all 16 lanes from the CPU to the graphics card and pulled four from the PCH instead. Reply
etamin - Sunday, July 10, 2011 - linkhmm, I think I'm missing something here. Are you saying that the new MBPs have 12 lanes to the dGPU because 4 have been borrowed (on demand?) by the TB controller? or does the PCH has its PCI lanes? if so, how many? Thanks for the reply. Reply
repoman27 - Sunday, July 10, 2011 - linkAnand explained it in his review of the mid 2011 iMac, here: http://www.anandtech.com/show/4340/27inch-apple-im... Reply
etamin - Monday, July 11, 2011 - linkI see...I never noticed the PCH/SB always had PCI lanes of its own Reply
repoman27 - Saturday, July 09, 2011 - link"At the end of a Thunderbolt chain you can insert a miniDP display, currently the only option is the 27-inch LED Cinema Display but in theory other panels that accept a miniDP input could work as well."
Any DisplayPort enabled display will work, and there's plenty of those. You just need to use an asymmetrical cable. Just like you don't need a display with a mini/micro HDMI port to use the mini/micro HDMI out on the devices that have those. Or a PC with mini/micro USB ports. Reply
mAxius - Sunday, July 10, 2011 - linkintel and apple will have thunderbolt the rest of the planet will have external pci express and usb who will win
http://www.eetimes.com/electronics-news/4217190/PC... Reply
Focher - Sunday, July 10, 2011 - linkAccording to that article, their standard is due for mid 2013. It's slower than TB and it's not even real. They've just announced plans to make something. Reply
repoman27 - Sunday, July 10, 2011 - link"I'm not entirely convinced that we're limited by Thunderbolt here either - it could very well be the Pegasus' internal controller that's limiting performance."
I'm pretty sure what you've gone and done here is bumped into the ceiling imposed by the CPUs in those Macs only supporting a PCIe maximum TLP payload size of 128 bytes. You achieved a little better than 80% of the total 10 Gbps bandwidth available on one Thunderbolt channel in actual data throughput, which is surprisingly good. Even though that bandwidth is exclusive of PCIe's normal 8b/10b encoding overhead, there's no getting around the additional overhead inherent to any packetized protocol. A Thunderbolt controller paired with a northbridge that supports 4096 byte payload sizes could theoretically achieve around 99% of the full 10 Gbps.
You've also shown that one device using a single Thunderbolt channel can use > 50% of the bandwidth of the 4 PCIe 2.0 lanes connected to the Thunderbolt controller. Thus if you connected one 4-drive SF-2281 Pegasus R6 RAID-0 to each of the Thunderbolt ports on the 2011 iMac, you still shouldn't expect more than 12,833 Mbps combined throughput.
The Target Disk Mode results are disappointing, although you're always limited to the speed of the slowest drive that you're transferring to/from. You didn't mention what the iMac was packing, but if it's still just the 1 TB 7200 RPM Seagate that was in the model you reviewed earlier, that would be the limiting factor. Did you check to see what you could pull using FireWire Target Mode between the two?
"simply displaying an image at 60Hz on the 27-inch Cinema Display requires over 6.75Gbps of bandwidth (because of 8b/10b encoding)"
I'm guessing that the 8b/10b encoding overhead is once again not present in the 10 Gbps per channel Thunderbolt bandwidth figure, just as for PCIe packets. Otherwise Thunderbolt would not be able to fully support the DisplayPort 1.1a spec which calls for 10.8 Gbps when including the 8b/10b padding.
"Apple claims that one of the channels is used for DisplayPort while the other is used for PCIe."
This still flummoxes me. Does that mean that if you daisy chained 2 4-drive SF-2281 Pegasus R6's to the Thunderbolt port on the MacBook Pro that you would achieve no better than 8021Mbps combined? That neither device could use the bandwidth of the second Thunderbolt channel even with no DisplayPort device present? Also, although Thunderbolt ports only support DisplayPort 1.1a resolutions, might they still support DP 1.2 features such as MST and daisy chainable displays? Or is the only way to connect multiple displays to one Thunderbolt port by using a DP 1.1a multi-display hub and thereby limiting the resolution of at least one of them to less than 2560x1440? Reply
LedHed - Sunday, July 10, 2011 - linkBy the time we have a decent amount of devices starting to use the Thunderbolt interface this will be outdated with the 2nd revision. Once again Apple is raising the price for no gain in anyway. Reply
LedHed - Sunday, July 10, 2011 - linkAlso calling that huge array box mobile is hilarious in itself. Reply
xrror - Sunday, July 10, 2011 - linkSo Apple will fix all the nagging issues with Thunderbolt connectivity when... they transition to ARM. Begone evil PC people, I'm sure Apple hates it thoroughly that iMacs and MBP can be "perverted" to x86's domain of Windows.
So when MacOS basically is superseded by iOS for their "non-handheld mobile devices" and they finally eliminate iMac and MBP since "people who didn't transition to our new taint-ARM/Apple specific processor" line of devices are obviously just lame, as proven by the poor saps holding on to their PowerPC macs. Yea it's coming full circle.
Ugh... I really hope I'm just being paranoid/joking. But... Reply
PrincessNybor - Tuesday, July 12, 2011 - linkI'm actually looking forward to using Target Display Mode when I pick up my new 27" iMac this month (just holding out for Lion). My work computer is a 15" MacBook Pro with Thunderbolt, and while the display is good for a portable, I'd love access to a 27" display! Some of the applications I work with won't be installed on the iMac, since that will be a personal desktop and not a work machine. This is a good solution for others in my situation. Reply
osteopathic1 - Thursday, July 14, 2011 - linkI just plugged in my old 23" Cinema Display DVI into a $6 minidisplay port/DVI adapter and it worked like a charm. Reply
wanlewanle - Tuesday, July 19, 2011 - linkCome go and see, will not regret it Oh look
http://www.ifancyshop.com Reply
onebear - Saturday, September 24, 2011 - linkPlease see this discussions from Apple Support forum.
It is not working with iMac 2011. And having many unsolve issues. Reply
nanofunk.net - Saturday, January 07, 2012 - linkthere are lots of known problems and promise won't answer or react on any of them.
see a roundup of problems here:
also there are other issues as reported in the apple forums:
the only thing we can currently do is to boycott promise until the give an official statement and release a bugfix to support larger HDDs and address the issues/bugs (drive-ejecting bugs, etc.) Reply
Rdubs - Friday, April 20, 2012 - linkAnyone know if I can throw in 4x 4tb 3rd party drives into a R4?
What's the limit? Can't find a list of what mfg' s hard drives play well
with R4.
Many thanks Reply
frabber - Thursday, October 25, 2012 - linkanybody know whether this is possible? with some kind of thunderbolt enabled motherboard? Reply
odedia - Monday, April 14, 2014 - linkWD RED 4TB drives are pretty affordable now, for the price of the 8Tb R4, I can get a diskless R4 and 4 red drives, resulting in 16tb total. They question is, would the RED drives match the performance of the R4? They are 5400 rpm drives, though quite reliable (much better than a green drive). Reply
badex - Thursday, December 31, 2015 - linkHi,
Have had my pegasus R4 for a couple of years. its been effective but i think i'd like to take a step up to using SSD drives. what SSD drives would you recommend for the pegasus R4?
thanks Reply


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text:
Driskel shows skills at Manning camp
Published: Saturday, July 13, 2013 at 11:12 p.m.
Last Modified: Saturday, July 13, 2013 at 11:12 p.m.
Florida quarterback Jeff Driskel was part of the Air-It-Out competition Saturday at the Manning Passing Academy at Nicholls State University in Thibodaux, La.
Driskel finished second to Miami's Stephen Morris.
The four-day camp, which ends Sunday, is run by NFL quarterbacks Peyton and Eli Manning, as well as their father, Archie.
Besides working with the Mannings, campers also get instruction from high-profile college quarterbacks who work as counselors, highlighted by Heisman Trophy winner Johnny Manziel of Texas A&M and Alabama's two-time national champion quarterback AJ McCarron.
Reader comments posted to this article may be published in our print edition. All rights reserved. This copyrighted material may not be re-published without permission. Links are encouraged.


text:
Notebook: Softball wins third SEC title under Walton
Published: Monday, May 6, 2013 at 7:49 p.m.
Last Modified: Monday, May 6, 2013 at 7:49 p.m.
It took a great effort and some help from SEC newcomer Missouri, but when the dust finally had settled from the last regular-season league game Sunday, the Florida Gators were conference champions for the first time since 2009.
The title is just the fourth in history for the Gators and the third under coach Tim Walton.
"Anytime you go into a final weekend series with an opportunity to win a championship, it's good," Walton said. "It's not only good for our team, but it's good for the sport and good for our league. We're excited about representing the SEC with the championship and representing the University of Florida as well. We went to South Carolina with high hopes, and we played well."
Florida took two of three games from the Gamecocks to win the series, making the Gators the only league team to win all eight of their conference series this season.
No. 2 UF (49-7, 18-6) began the final weekend trailing league-leader Tennessee by mere percentage points for both the SEC East and overall titles, but by winning their series with South Carolina, combined with No. 11 Missouri (33-10, 15-8) taking two of three from the No. 3 Vols (43-9, 16-6), claimed the overall crown as well as their sixth SEC East title – five coming in the last six seasons under Walton.
The fact UF did it with one of its youngest teams simply made it all the more sweeter.
"We've lost this conference before by less than a game, and we've lost by percentage points," Walton said. "Last year, it came down to the last day and if you win, you win the championship, but we lost and we came in third. For this young team with so many freshmen playing, this is a big deal, and we're going to make it a big deal to win an SEC championship."
UF will be the No. 1 seed for this week's SEC Tournament that starts Wednesday in Lexington, Ky.
The second-ranked Gators were unable to defend their American Lacrosse Conference Tournament title, falling to defending NCAA champion Northwestern 8-3 in the tourney final Sunday in Baltimore, Md.
UF downed Ohio State, 17-3, in the ALC Tournament semifinals before falling to the Wildcats, a team the Gators throttled 22-4 in their regular-season finale.
Despite the loss, UF (17-2), which last year advanced to its first NCAA semifinal, earned the No. 5 seed for this year's tourney and will host first- and second-round action at Dizney Stadium this weekend.
"We had a really nice win over Ohio State Friday," coach Amanda O'Leary said. "I think the thing with Northwestern that we always talk about is draw controls, and in the first game against them, we dominated draw controls. This game, unfortunately, they dominated us, so we spent a lot of time on the defensive end. Ultimately, the better team was Northwestern, that's for sure."
As one of the top six overall seeds, UF received a first-round bye and will take on the winner of Friday's opening match at 4 p.m. between No. 11 Denver and Jacksonville in second-round action Sunday at noon.
The Pioneers (17-2) and Dolphins (13-5) are making their first NCAA Tournament appearances, while this is the third NCAA postseason venture for the Gators.
The top-ranked Florida men and third-ranked women are headed to Columbia, Mo., for the SEC Outdoor Championships on Thursday through Sunday.
Last year, the UF men, who went on to win the program's first NCAA Outdoors title, recorded their fifth straight top-four league finish, while the women claimed runner-up honors.
Both are among the favorites for this year's SEC titles, with the Gator men expected to battle No. 2 Texas A&M and No. 4 Arkansas for the crown, while the UF women will get a stiff test from top-ranked Texas A&M, No. 4 LSU and No. 6 Arkansas.
"Obviously this is a very exciting time of the year for us," coach Mike Holloway said. "As I've said on many occasions, I think this meet is the most exciting competition I have ever attended.
"We seem to embrace the excitement and the competitiveness of the competition, and I think we'll be fine. We're as healthy as we've been all year going into a championship situation, and I'm excited to see what happens."
Reader comments posted to this article may be published in our print edition. All rights reserved. This copyrighted material may not be re-published without permission. Links are encouraged.


text:
Linux Database Server CPU Comparisonby Johan De Gelas on 6/17/2005 12:05 AM EST
- Posted in
- IT Computing
45 Comments
Back to Article
linuxnizer - Tuesday, July 19, 2005 - linkLate contribution...
The article mentions that Linux didn't work well with AMD Dual Core. The reason could be this:
it says:
NVIDIA CK804 does not support dual core under Linux yet, only under Microsoft Windows. Reply
Illissius - Saturday, June 18, 2005 - linkNice article. I'd also be interested in PostgreSQL, being the "other" major open source database... specifically, whether it's any better at scaling with multiple CPUs. (Not that I have any practical use for this information, I'm just curious.) Reply
Viditor - Saturday, June 18, 2005 - linkSeriously, mickyb and elmo may be correct about the Intel compilers (I frankly don't have a clue what's used in most shops)...
The real problem is that it's a virtual impossibilty to create a "level playing field", but I have to say to the critiques of the article that Johan has done a stellar job of coming as close as possible! Reply
Viditor - Saturday, June 18, 2005 - link"They aren't testing compilers"
Oh sure...just throw REALITY into the mix why don't you...!
;-) Reply
Icehawk - Saturday, June 18, 2005 - linkThey aren't testing compilers. Reply
Viditor - Saturday, June 18, 2005 - linkmickyb - Thanks for the input! Fair enough...maybe Johan could use both the Pathscale compiler (which is optimized highly for Opteron) and the Intel optimized compiler on his next series of tests? Reply
mickyb - Saturday, June 18, 2005 - linkI dissagree with the comment that a large number of people don't use the Intel compiler. I (other developers and IT shops) only use Intel compiler's for Linux. It is the fastest one out there for x86 and Itanium.
If you are running a large database that requires a large server (compared with a desktop loaded with RAM to run a personal blog site) like this article is testing, you will be setting up the environment with a trained IT professional that will use the compiler that is fast and stable.
When we build our product for all the UNIX platforms, we always use the vendor compiler instead of gnu. gnu works great and is free, but it is not optimized nearly as much.
This is like saying the same audience won't recompile Linux on the platform they are going to install it on. This is the first thing you should do....and with an Intel compiler. There should be no real reason why one vendor Linux is faster than the others except for compile options and loaded modules. You cannot run Linux out of the box, it doesn't come in a box where I get it. :) Reply
DonPMitchell - Saturday, June 18, 2005 - linkWe need to see TPC-C benchmark results for MySQL and other new database systems. Why won't they step up and allow themselves to be compared to the major commercial systems?
Viditor - Saturday, June 18, 2005 - linkElMoIsEviL - "as much as I am un-biased"
C'mon mate...anybody who has read your posts knows you're heavily biased towards Intel, just as people who have read mine know that I am biased towards AMD. The important thing is to try and set aside the bias to look at things from both sides...I do try, but admittedly don't ALWAYS succeed. :-)
I imagine you probably posted before you read the explanation of what a query cache is...understandable.
As to not using an Intel specific compiler, I suppose that if it HAD been used I would be complaining as well. We have to rely on Johan and Anand (who frankly know a Hell of a lot more about this than either of us) to choose based on what the market actually uses...if you can site impartial industry sources that show otherwise, I'm sure we would all (especially the AT staff) would love to see them.
I do know that over the years, Johan and Anand have shown themselves to be quite unbiased in their articles (you should go read some of them on Aces as well)!
There are certainly things that I could pick apart as well..e.g. when he states
"In the second half of 2004, already one million EM64T Xeons were shipped"
Yes they were shipped, but that doesn't mean they were sold. The majority of those shipments were probably to OEMs for inventory buildup. Remember that Intel had a huge inventory write-off at the same time, and this was most likely a shift in inventory.
Regardless, none of this has to do with the validity of the article which is excellent and makes sense. If you think about it, it should have been expected...the only for AMD to have increased their marketshare in servers is by performance. They certainly don't have the budget or marketing clout that Intel has! Reply
S390 guy - Saturday, June 18, 2005 - linkAbout ISAM and DB/2... ISAM (Indexed Sequential Access Method) is NOT a database! It has no referential integrity nor rollback/commit features (although those can be activated on mainframe). ISAM was popular on mainframe when there wasn't any database (or rather when database was a too massive application to run!) and even there they were superseeded by VSAM. They're not much different from DOS random access files (an index file pointing to the relative record number on the main file).
And it's no suprise that DB/2 scales well: mainframes rarely feature a single CPU, at least as far as I know.... IBM have had some 20 years to practice on multi-cpu machines!
JohanAnandtech - Saturday, June 18, 2005 - linkMino, thanks for pointing that out. Query cache enabling has nothing to do with "stressful". It has to do with accelarting a few queries that are run over and over again. Which is very interesting for reducing the response time of a website serving up the last article, but which is not limited by CPU power at all.
JohanAnandtech - Saturday, June 18, 2005 - linkTo the people who make a fuss about disabling the query cache: this has nothing to with the Opteron not performing well in that situation. Single Xeon: 980 queries/s. Dual xeon: 985 queries/s Opteron 250: 1020 queries/s . Get it now why I say "other bottlenecks started to kick in"?
It impossible that a dual xeon can't outperform a single one in these tests. We tried to find the bottleneck and even used a quad opteron 850 as client. The client was not the problem. My bet is on the network latency, but I have no knowledge of tools to profile the complete machine. The disk was not the problem, we tested that. Network bandwidth neither. My bet is on the network latency, or even the OS as the bottleneck kicked in a lot sooner w kernel 2.4
mino - Friday, June 17, 2005 - link#32 try to think for a moment
"Because the Opteron can't perform that well in stressful situations you won't post the scores?"
If the CPU is not the bottleneck in the query cache scenario then why test the effect of CPU at all !!!
You reminded me friend of mine who "tested" effect the "FSB" has on A64 system NOT having an FSB at all !!! ;-)
Funny guy indeed.
And about an intel compiler not beeing used.
Like it or not, It IS a fact that it is not widely adopted especially among the target audience of this site an article.
BTW given the past experience intel compiler would produce better code even on AMD systems so don't be so sure! Best code for K7 is made by intelcc set to PIII config. Albeit it does not use 3DNow! functionality at all. Reply
ElMoIsEviL - Friday, June 17, 2005 - linkI think I have to agree with #20, as much as I am un-biased I feel this test was doctored by AMD... it ressembles the tests we see released by Apple often...
"We didn't use the Intel compiler version as we have reason to believe that this version is not used a lot in the real world. We might try it out in a future article."
Translation, "with the intel compiler AMD lost so being a marketing force for AMD we opted not to post those scores".
and also as was mentioned before...
""The " query cache" was off, as we wanted to test worst case performance. In some cases, the query cache was able to push a single Xeon to 1000 queries per second, and the CPU was still capable of doing more, as the CPU load was at 50% - 70%."
Why not?
Because the Opteron can't perform that well in stressful situations you won't post the scores?
Seriously.. this test is the biggest load of BS I have ever read... and I'm a current AMD adopter. Reply
JohanAnandtech - Friday, June 17, 2005 - linkViditor, it is possible that the IOMMU might have to do something with it.
The IOMMU is a memory mapping unit sitting between the I/O bus and physical memory.
Memory mapping is AFAIK only necessary if a certain device (PCI devices come to mind) can not do a 64 bit DMA. Now it seems that almost everything inside the newest Intel southbridges can do 64 bit DMA.
So the IOMMU can only play a role when the driver is a 32 bit only, and the memory mapping has to happen. Now I would think that Intel would have an advantage here with their ultra modern southbridges. There might be a device that I am overlooking of course. Maybe our SCSI controller... But I don't think so. Reply
Viditor - Friday, June 17, 2005 - linkJohan, if you're still reading (great article BTW)...
A question I have had for quite awhile now is what effect the IOMMU has on these tests.
The reasons I'm asking are
1. I noticed that there was quite a disparity between the AMD and Intel 64bit performance (which you mentioned).
2. I know that one difference between the 2 platforms is that AMD has a hardware IOMMU (of sorts) and Intel (at present) does not.
3. I saw a thread last year with Linus T mentioning this quite a bit. He seemed to think that this would impair the EM64T substantially...
Your thoughts? Reply
JohanAnandtech - Friday, June 17, 2005 - linkIf your database is running many "identical databases".... I meant "queries"
JohanAnandtech - Friday, June 17, 2005 - linkJuhl: It was 2.6.12rc5.
Viditor: thanks for the helpful comment. Indeed, if you turn on the query cache, your CPU is doing very little.
Everybody else: note the "identical" word in viditor's quote. If your database is running many identical databases, than you are not going to spend time reading this kind of article: you simply buy the cheapest decent server. Any CPU today can run 1000s of querries if everything comes out the query cache.
Running benchmarks with the query cache on is simply not interesting. The query cache is all about accelerating the IDENTICAL queries that are run from time to time. You might reserve a bit of RAM to make sure that the most common queries (getting the latest article of a website for example) are run faster.
But those numbers don't tell you anything about the load that your server is going to be able to take. You want worst case performance numbers! Reply
Viditor - Friday, June 17, 2005 - linkQuestar - the reason the query cache was turned off (guessing here) is to more reasonably simulate a real-world test. Obviously in this test, the same queries are repeated quite often. But that is not usually the case in the real world...
For those who don't know what the heck a "query cache" is:
"the query cache stores the text of a SELECT query together with the corresponding result that was sent to the client. If the identical query is received later, the server retrieves the results from the query cache rather than parsing and executing the query again" Reply
Questar - Friday, June 17, 2005 - link#23,
We don't know, it specifically says Xeon. We don't have any idea what happens on an Opteron. Reply
Guspaz - Friday, June 17, 2005 - linkWhy are there no graphs like other Anandtech articles? Why is everything in hard to read tables with broken formatting? This one seems a bit rough around the edges compared to the usual Anandtech quality. Reply
juhl - Friday, June 17, 2005 - linkI find it quite odd that you claim to be testing with a 2.6.12 Linux kernel despite the fact that that kernel has not yet been released in a final version.
If you are using one of the pre-release kernels you should explicitly say so, and tell us which one.
The latest stable kernel at the time I write this is 126.96.36.199, the latest development kernels are 2.6.12-rc6, 2.6.12-rc6-git8 & 2.6.12-rc6-mm1 . There's also the question of wether or not you used a stock kernel.org kernel or a "patched to hell-and-back with crap" gentoo kernel...
So, what were you really using?
sinisterDei - Friday, June 17, 2005 - link#20
Correct me if I'm wrong, but would not the query cache positively affect the scores of both vendor's chips?
I suppose I don't have a pair of database machines just sitting around to test it out, but I'd imagine that if query cache was enabled the Opteron would experience similar performance boosts to the Xeon- if not more of a boost thanks to the higher-performing memory subsystem.
Just my $.02 to counteract the fear-monger :) Reply
Viditor - Friday, June 17, 2005 - link"Translation: We didn't want our beloved AMD to lose, so we doctored the test"
Translation of the translation...
Shoot the messenger! :-) Reply
michaelpatrick33 - Friday, June 17, 2005 - link#20 Ah yes the conspiracy theories begin. Just like AMD with Tomshardware. The server results here appear pretty consistent with every other server test I have seen on review sites but who knows.
# 19. Intel is only at 90nm but do have 300mm wafers. That is why Fab36 is so important for AMD. 300mm wafers and 65nm by Q2 of 2006 should put them pretty equal with Intel's fabrication level. Production level is still way, way in favor of Intel though.
Pricing, as I said before the Opteron dualcore chips are way cheaper than Intel dualcore server chips because Intel doesn't have any. Reply
Questar - Friday, June 17, 2005 - link"The " query cache" was off, as we wanted to test worst case performance. In some cases, the query cache was able to push a single Xeon to 1000 queries per second, and the CPU was still capable of doing more, as the CPU load was at 50% - 70%. "
Translation: We didn't want our beloved AMD to lose, so we doctored the test. Reply
thegagman - Friday, June 17, 2005 - linkBTW guys, one reason why AMD may be pricing its chips mihc higher is the MFG process. Unless I am mistaken (and someone correct me if I am wrong), they are still using 200mm wafers on a 90 or 110 process. Intel is using 300mm at 65 nm...this results in a huge difference in throuhput. Since AMD is already pricing its CPUs very agressively to gain market share, and the die of those dual-cores is much bigger (anybody know the real %?) then it is to be anticipated that their dual-cores are much more exspensive. They are probably gambling on selling dual-core Opterons at high-margins via Sun and other OEMs first,which will probably take most of their wafers. This is why their Desktop parts are coming later I would bet...
thegagman Reply
nserra - Friday, June 17, 2005 - link#17 Good answers but, "Depends on the applications you run. On single threaded code, the faster single core will run your code faster."
Doesn't explain what I was meaning, so for you is OK to pay more for a single core processor, because runs faster some times (may run slower other times), how will you know what it will happen? (Supposing that you don't know shit about your software requirements).
. AMD don't have this problem so why would amd for example release an 4200+ processor at the same price of the 3500+ ? If the performance is equal or superior?
I think amd have made they right decisions, like intel have made his.
They all play with what they have, and not with they haven't.
fitten - Friday, June 17, 2005 - link"Explain me something:
- how do you explain or how Intel will explain that their single core processor cost more than the dual core ones? "
Because Intel sets the prices of their chips. They want to push dual-core to the masses so they price them accordingly.
"- Why should you buy a single core over a dual core if it cost more? "
Depends on the applications you run. On single threaded code, the faster single core will run your code faster.
"- How good is this Intel market decision (marketing). "
Probably pretty good. Considering you have to buy a new motherboard to use the dual-core Intel parts, they dropped the price so that the CPU + motherboard cost is about the same (or less than still) the cost of just the dual-core CPU from AMD. Sounds like a good strategy to me.
michaelpatrick33 - Friday, June 17, 2005 - linkI also think it is safe to say that Amd's dualcore Opterons will be cheaper than any Intel dualcore server chip for the next six to eight months since there aren't any Intel dualcore server chips. IDC just released market research that showed AMD with 30% of the 4way server sales in Q1 '05. That is what AMD is after. The 64bit performance difference is surprising to say the least. Reply
erwos - Friday, June 17, 2005 - linkIf they used RHEL4, this would be far more useful. SuSE's not quite a bit player, but let's face it: Red Hat is dominating the commercial space.
-Erwos Reply
SunLord - Friday, June 17, 2005 - linkInteresting benchmark though i would of prefered you used a postgresql instead of DB2 since it's also open source and is the most likely alternnative to mysql... a DB2/Oracle bench would be kinda cool... Reply
Son of a N00b - Friday, June 17, 2005 - linknice work guys! Reply
nserra - Friday, June 17, 2005 - link#6 "but very important: AMD, OPEN YOUR EYES AND SEE WHAT INTEL IS DOING WITH PRICING ON DUAL CORES! don't get cought with pants down."
Explain me something:
- how do you explain or how Intel will explain that their single core processor cost more than the dual core ones?
- Why should you buy a single core over a dual core if it cost more?
- How good is this Intel market decision (marketing).
I think is pretty logical to me that a dual core cost more than a single core processor so 4800+ more expansive than a 4000+ so it's OK! Stop blaming AMD, and their marketing team! Reply
Viditor - Friday, June 17, 2005 - linkCalin - "Unfortunately, it seems that their dual core processors will be more expensive than Intel's"
Actually, that's not true at all!
The fact is that AMD haven't released a "Value Line" of dual core yet because they don't see a large enough market for it.
By comparing the 2 companies offerings, it's apparent that the 820D should match up equvalently to a dual core Sempron when it's released, and the ($1000) 840EE matches up to the ($500) 4200+ rather nicely.
The 4400+ and the 4800+ are in a class by themselves without competition at the moment, hence the prices are high.
AlexWade - Friday, June 17, 2005 - linkI like these real world benchmarks articles. Reply
snedzad - Friday, June 17, 2005 - linkAgain "Root me" wallpaper. Moron. Reply
Starglider - Friday, June 17, 2005 - linkI would guess that the problem is the netburst architecture's fast integer units. As I recall, the P4 integer units are split into two 16-bit stages and run at double the main clock using complicated differential signaling logic. I seriously doubt it would be feasible for Intel to add another two stages or to double the width of the units, as they're already power and chip area hungry and pretty much integral to the design. AMD on the other hand designed the Opteron to be 64-bit from the ground up and is running at a lower clock speed, making 64-bit wide single stage logic much easier.
Thus the authors speculation that the P4 is taking twice as many cycles to process 64-bit simple integer operations (while the Opteron needs no additional cycles) seems highly likely to me. I'm one of those (apparently) rare programmers that needs to use 64-bit integers a lot, so it's not surprising that all our compute servers are Opteron powered. Reply
Calin - Friday, June 17, 2005 - linkI really hope AMD will get a share of the higher profit server processor market. Unfortunately, it seems that their dual core processors will be more expensive than Intel's Reply
ZalmanKalman - Friday, June 17, 2005 - linkWow, great and detailed artical. The punchline is so sweet to my ears. Vary sad to INTeL Fans, but I guess they buy, and will buy, intel b/c of corporate safty.
but very important: AMD, OPEN YOUR EYES AND SEE WHAT INTEL IS DOING WITH PRICING ON DUAL CORES! don't get cought with pants down. Reply
imaheadcase - Friday, June 17, 2005 - linkWow that was a great Anandtech article. Pictures are good for those not to bright! numbers for those smart folks! :P
Good article all jokes aside. Reply
bersl2 - Friday, June 17, 2005 - link#3: The thing is, that the effectiveness of optimization flags is dependent on the application being used (specifically, what the application is doing and how it is designed). Activating the wrong optimization can have adverse effects on performance.
I would say that -march=xxx is always helpful, -O and -Os are always helpful, -O2 is almost always helpful, -ffast-math is usually helpful, and you should hold your breath on most anything else. You can also try Acovea (http://www.coyotegulch.com/products/acovea/index.h... which applies a genetic algorithm to compiler flags. Just don't expect to come out ahead, given the number of compiles you have to perform for such a small amount of performance. Reply
hondaman - Friday, June 17, 2005 - linkI'm quite surprised at the poor showing by gentoo vs suse. What compile flags where used out of curiousity?
Not that I'd ever use gentoo again. Traitor. :( Reply
Zebo - Friday, June 17, 2005 - linkIf you mean AMD dominates benchmarks and applications server, desktop, and worksation wise then everything is "pro AMD" Reply
Quanticles - Friday, June 17, 2005 - linkSUSE is very pro AMD, I guess it's worked out. =) Reply


text:
What Nehalem is really aboutby Johan De Gelas on 8/19/2008 12:00 AM EST
- Posted in
- IT Computing general
47 Comments
Back to Article
mobilecomputing - Monday, February 09, 2009 - linkthat much cache is going to make a collosal system. I'll stick with my netbooks for now. http://www.mobile-computing-news.co.uk/features/92...">http://www.mobile-computing-news.co.uk/...rend-in-... Reply
Poloasis - Thursday, August 21, 2008 - linkI currently run a E8500 @4.3 W/C and since the Core i7 is not gearing towards gaming, I would not expect intel dropping the Penryn that much unless we all starts running HPC and database @ home. Reply
perzy - Thursday, August 21, 2008 - linkThis heat wall is really a solid brick wall...
I think I will go out and search the bottom of the bargains bins at the shop for height of devolopment: old P4 Prescott 3.8 GHz.
Let's face it, 99% of the software I use are singlethreaded, and like cubic inches, there is no substitute for pure hertz! Reply
del - Friday, October 03, 2008 - linkblah...
A 3.0 GHz Core 2 Duo still runs single-threaded apps faster than a 3.8 GHz Pentium 4. Reply
gochichi - Thursday, August 21, 2008 - linkIt is ridiculous to wait for desktop parts, particularly for "gamers".
ATI just baffled us with a $175.00 very high end graphics card. Memory prices for DDR2 are basically what I would call "free of charge". Seriously, you can get 4GB of good RAM for $75.00...
8GB of RAM for a mere $150.00... that is going to take FOREVER to get to that price-point with DDR3... which means that 8GB of RAM will not go obsolete for a long time.
You can ALWAYS wait, but you have to balance out time and money because they are interchangeable. Computers are consumables, and you gotta eat. You can get a Lenovo X300 for $3k or wait ten years and spend $300.00... but what of your ten years of wait, and the lost utility?
I have a stock-clocked Q6600 (picked up a Dell refurbished desktop for $350.00), 4GB RAM (2 open slots), and Radeon 4850 and I seriously don't see a game worth playing that doesn't run beyond awesome. I hope something much better comes out that makes my system obsolete, that would be so much fun... but in the meantime I'm waiting in comfort and style and yall should too...
Running a single core Pentium is a waste of electricity. What are you using government money or something? You don't have to wait to spend $3k on a desktop and then wait 5 years until it's completely outdated junk... just spend $600 every two years and you'll have a great machine that runs the best software of its time.
In terms of laptops... I AM being a total hypocrite and waiting for LED displays to enter lower price points(one-two weeks now)... but that's because they are truly different than what's out there. I want to be able to see my laptop screen better... so I wait. But massive desktop performance is available right here and right now... waiting while you use outdated and slow junk is just weird.
silversound - Wednesday, August 20, 2008 - linkShould this nahelam be much faster like intel claimed last year? Up to 3 times faster than penryn?
Only up to 30% improvement in app and no improvement in games does not deserve a tock...
core2 still way better leap from the sucky P4 Reply
steveyballme - Wednesday, August 20, 2008 - linkThis will greatly increase speed of whirling, fading and spinning things on the desktop!
http://fakesteveballmer.blogspot.com">http://fakesteveballmer.blogspot.com Reply
CanamAldrin - Wednesday, August 20, 2008 - linkI don't think I'm nitpicking to say that this article is so full of grammatical errors I find it hard to read it fluidly. If English is a second language for the engineer/journalist, please have someone edit his writing before it gets posted. I don't think that is too much to expect from a site of AnandTech's stature. Reply
cokbun - Tuesday, August 19, 2008 - linki'll wait till next year when the mature nehalem comes out, 32 nm sounds good. Reply
melgross - Tuesday, August 19, 2008 - linkWhat I didn't get out of this article is whether gaming performance will be slightly better than Penyrn, about the same as Penyrn, or slightly worse.
I don't imagine that there will be a big difference. Reply
ryedizzel - Tuesday, August 19, 2008 - linklrn2read Reply
Saen11 - Tuesday, August 19, 2008 - linkIf Core i7 does not improve gaming performance, and AMD's new 45nm chips do, could this then give AMD a chance to steal the gaming performance crown? Reply
DXRick - Tuesday, August 19, 2008 - linkWith Intel fantasizing about doing away with graphics cards and making ray tracing a reality for games, and Nehalem offering a 30% increase in CPU power, I would guess it is a stepping stone to Larrabee for gamers then. I can't see current game developers doing anything differently yet, as they will continue to use shaders (DirectX or OpenGL).
The one exception is Microsoft's FlightSimX, which benefits more from CPU power than GPU.
How will Nehalem impact developers looking at CUDA and PhysX?
rgallant - Tuesday, August 19, 2008 - linkLook's like my E8600 @ 4.2 is good for a while. Reply
ICE1966 - Tuesday, August 26, 2008 - linkWhat in the hell do you need a 4.2ghz cpu for? Oh, wait, its just bragging rights, LOL Reply
Genx87 - Tuesday, August 19, 2008 - linkI didnt know it had such a small L2 cache with a big L3. I will guess this is a process issue? With subsequent process shrinks we will start to see larger L2 per core?
I would agree that small of a cache will cripple it in gaming. Possibly making any bebefits minimal over Core 2 duo.
Should be interesting to see how it works out. Thought we had some benchmarks from last Spring that showed it 20-30% faster per clock in gaming? Either way I am on an E8400 and happy. Reply
JohanAnandtech - Tuesday, August 19, 2008 - linkI wouldn't call it a process issue. 4 x 256 KB L2 + 8 MB L3 is a lot of cache. :-)
It is a trade-off as always. A small L2 cache for every core avoids that two cores at full throttle cause extra latencies and get in the way of each other. The L3 makes sure only one cache has to be kept coherent between the different socket.
It is completely inclusive L3, so it has to be a lot bigger than the L2, otherwise it is not effective. And it easier to keep the power cost down if you have a large L3 that is clocked lower and at a different power plane. Reply
chizow - Tuesday, August 19, 2008 - linkGreat points about the smaller L2 and slower L3, I'll have to keep an eye on that when looking at any i7 gaming performance benchies. My main buying point will be overclockability however. If Nehalem allows for higher clockspeeds, that should provide the benefit in gaming with all else counter-balancing against Penryn. If it clocks about the same as Penryn I'll just wait for the 32nm refresh before upgrading from my P45/Q6600 and let DDR3 prices drop a bit more. Reply
JohanAnandtech - Wednesday, August 20, 2008 - linkI have my doubts about higher overclockability, especially if you would compare with one of the youngest steppings of Penryn. After all, a tri channel memory channel and 2 QPI links do not come for free. Nehalem is a bit more power hungry running at full speed (but it can also shutdown it's cores so it will consume less running light tasks). I would expect Nehalem to stay a bit behind Penryn in clock speeds unless Intel artificially keeps Penryn low with newer steppings. Reply
IceBreakerG - Tuesday, August 19, 2008 - linkThis is interesting information. Right now I'm trying to decide if I should just go ahead and build a Q9550 system or try to wait for Nehalem. My current system, Athlon 64 3800+ single core, has been showing it's age for quite a while now, and I need an upgrade. Since gaming performance isn't expected to go up much, but other areas are, I'm still on the fence.
I have my Xbox 360 for games, so gaing isn't too important (as long as I can play Roller Coaster Tycoon 3 lol). However, I do a lot of video encoding and music production. Too many decisions. I think either way, whatever I decide, the new system will be significantly faster than what I have now so either will be a nice upgrade for me. Reply
gochichi - Thursday, August 21, 2008 - linkI think waiting is silly, particularly as DDR2 memory is so cheap and so good.
Get a Quad-core, get 8GB of RAM, and never look back... don't wait another minute. Reply
gabo - Tuesday, August 19, 2008 - linkI'm waiting for this new generation of processors. I'm currently using a P4 1.6 Mhz with 1.5 GB of RAM. I dont do to much work with 3D or gaming (for that I also use my XBOX360). I mainly work coding in C asp php java and some flash, some database related work like admin backup and such, and sometimes work with excel word powerpoint, etc. and obiously web surfing and email.
Of course any upgrade would be tremendous in my situation, but what would any of you recommend most? a very low cost Penryn, when they drop in price, or a more expensive Nehalem? Which is the most bang for the buck for my particular needs?
Thanks in advance Reply
theplaidfad - Tuesday, August 19, 2008 - linkThe correct decision is to hold onto that athlon a little longer, and THEN hit the q9550 when the i7 comes out and get in on that oh so sssschuuweeeeet price drop that should happen :) Reply
Calin - Tuesday, August 19, 2008 - linkThere is always something better in the future: a new architecture, faster (same architecture) processors, and price cuts.
As such, if you can wait until the next generation comes, you could hope for a price cut. And maybe better performance/overclockability due to new microprocessor stepping, and a better mainboard than right now (though this might not be so). Reply
wingless - Tuesday, August 19, 2008 - linkThis sort of validates AMD's approach with Barcelona in a way. Their actions were deliberate but they got berated because K10's architecture was not 100% focused on gaming. Now Nehalem is going to take an AMD-like approach but throw in that AMAZING Hyper-Threading which will take server applications and multi-threaded gaming to a new level past AMD's K10. On Xtremesystems.org I stated in a post that Penryn owners probably won't get much out of Nehalem that they can't already do with their 45nm Quads as far as gaming is concerned. My ego has just been given a boost now that my thoughts have been confirmed by the pros at Anandtech! Reply
MDme - Wednesday, August 20, 2008 - linkIn a VERY big way yes.
1. "NEW" cache architecture: small L2; big shared L3 = Barcelona
2. Point to point serial links: Hypertranspor er Quickpath = Barcelona
3. On board memory controller: oh that's Barcelona too (and K8)
4. EPT: sounds a lot like NPT or RVI to me
on all these points intel did incorporate AMD tech into the CPU. So i7 is kinda like the P4, K10, Core2 combined. Reply
JohanAnandtech - Wednesday, August 20, 2008 - linkP4 is not really in there, except for the the "trace cache alike" Loop Stream Detector. If you are talking about SMT, SMT in the P4 is only a shadow of what SMT should be. SMT is a lot better implemented in Nehalem.
But for the rest you are right, EPT = RVI/NPT. But I wouldn't call p2p serial links and IMC AMD tech. There are a lot of companies who have done this before AMD. Reply
formulav8 - Wednesday, August 20, 2008 - linkBut if AMD didn't have it would Intel have adopted it? I say No for the most part.
In a way AMD did alot of things before Intel, that Intel later followed/copied. IMC, HTT, x64, True/Native Dual and Quad Core, Shared L3 Cache, High Performance Discreet GPU's, High Performance IGP's, 4x4, DDR based memory, and so on.
Jason Reply
DigitalFreak - Tuesday, August 19, 2008 - linkLOL
It's been posted in a number of "previews" of Core i7 that it won't do much for gaming or single socket desktops, period. Perhaps your should get your ego under control and stop taking credit for information you ripped off from somewhere else. Reply
MonkeyPaw - Tuesday, August 19, 2008 - linkFrom what I gather, the third channel for the memory doesn't do much either. I can't imagine that dual channel DDR3 is at all handicapped for bandwidth. Perhaps the third channel is put in place for Larrabee descendants? Reply
Berger - Tuesday, August 19, 2008 - linkSeems all you ever do is go around is nitpicking DF, seeking personal glory or something? Reply
gaiden2k5 - Tuesday, August 19, 2008 - linkknowing that i wont be able to afford a Nahalem CPU, i become more interested in seeing the price drop for the Penryn's and hoping for Q9450 to fall below $200 :) Reply
Nehemoth - Tuesday, August 19, 2008 - linkI can't agreed more with u guys, cause I hope this architecture fly, course I Hope a fight between AMD and Intel on servers; is really no so easy as the desktop environment.
I really just hope for FBDIMM improvements, no so Hot please and also of course I really hope Good To Excellent competition between Shangai and Nehalem, but the real improvement here from AMD should be when they're switch to DDR3. Reply
Turas - Tuesday, August 19, 2008 - linkAren't FB-Dimms being dropped? I was under the impressions even the dual socket 1366 (or whatever it is) will be using regular DDR3 now. Reply
MonkeyPaw - Tuesday, August 19, 2008 - linkYeah, FB-Dimms are not the future. They add heat, complexity, and cost. Of course, most of that doesn't affect desktop users, unless you are a MacPro/Skulltrail user. The IMC and Hypertransport have effectively killed complex memory configurations, since each CPU finally gets to manage its own memory.
Really, Nehalem is just taking Opteron's strong points and adding it to the Core2 architecture. Intel should win a lot of server benches now. And to think they spent billions on Itanium for so many years. IA64's market keeps dwindling, and this will only chip away more. Just goes to show that Intel is not indestructible. Reply
Nehemoth - Tuesday, August 19, 2008 - linkReally nice to hear that.
That's what we need standard, as DDR3 becomes the new one.
Also the last time I hear an Itanium investment number was 10 Billions.
But for some cases (In our company we have some) Itanium is the right choice. Reply
AlexWade - Tuesday, August 19, 2008 - linkThe price of the old Core 2 products will come down. So even if Core i7 (or whatever crazy name it is called) doesn't help in games, it will help my wallet when I am upgrading my computer later this year. Reply
IntelUser2000 - Wednesday, August 20, 2008 - linkI also love how the latency comparisons between Yorkfield and Nehalem is being skewed in favor of the article.
According to ANANDTECH'S benchmarks, Nehalem's L2 latency was 11 cycles and Yorkfield was 15 cycles, not 12 and 14.
Multiple websites have argued that Core 2's performance was not achievable(4 issue cannot be fully utilized blah blah). While Nehalem won't be a miracle in single thread, I think it'll be better than what this article will imply. Reply
JohanAnandtech - Friday, August 22, 2008 - linkDo you think one cycle of L2-cache latency will matter? Depending on the tool you use, quadcore Intel's report a 14 tot 15 cycle L2. On Nehalem, I am just using the numbers I had at that point. Seems that 10-12 cycles is more or less accurate.
And no I didn't argue that 4-issue can not be fully utilized (that is BS, the 4-way decoding is for peak moments, to get the average higher). I argued that well implemented SMT can help typical low IPC loads such as database workloads to achieve much higher performance. Reply
Mithan - Tuesday, August 19, 2008 - linkI've got a E8400 OC'ed to 3.6ghz, so I am good :)
Worst case, I swap out my 8800GTS512 next year for whatever is "latest and greatest" and boom, double or triple frame rates in most games.
Core i7 can wait. Reply
Jedi2155 - Tuesday, August 19, 2008 - linkStill running with my nearly 2 year old E6600 OC'ed to 3.6 GHz :). Of course not as fast a penryn clock for clock, but I was thinking about moving to a Nehalem. I'm happy my CPU hasn't burnt out yet with nearly 2 years of 1.55 volts being pushed through it along with hot SoCal weather.
Still, I wonder how Nehalem helps with encoding performance. Reply
Mr Roboto - Tuesday, August 19, 2008 - linkGo easy with that 600Mhz overclock. Reply
Mithan - Tuesday, August 19, 2008 - linkI've got a E8400 OC'ed to 3.6ghz, so I am good :)
Worst case, I swap out my 8800GTS512 next year for whatever is "latest and greatest" and boom, double or triple frame rates in most games.
Core i7 can wait. Reply
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del - Friday, October 03, 2008 - linkwell, I will just complete my upgrade path, get a good Core 2 Quad with a 1,333-MHz FSB, and I guess, a better video card when the time comes. I still like Core i7 better though. Reply