What EXACTLY is a Quad-Core?

Is it 4 CPUs working? Is it 2 Cores in each CPU? If you had a Quad core 4 Ghz, does that mean each core is working at 4 Ghz, so you have 12 Ghz? Same thing applies to Core 2 Duo, where you just multiply it by 2. RyuHayabusaX

all I know is that 4 * 4 is 16.

4 x 4 = 16

And no that is not how it works

Quad core simply means that the chip package has four processing cores, so rather than needing four separate CPU sockets, you only have to have one. It could be two dual-cores in a single physical package (like what intel currently does with their Core 2 Quads), or four together in a single die (like AMD is slated to do with barcelona/a.k.a. "Phenom" chips).

No, the summary processing power does not just linearly multiply like that. Four cores at 4GHz does not equal 16GHz; unlikely it ever will. The challenges with software overhead and being able to have code that is both aware of and able to manage and implement all available processing cores would make that physically impossible. However, a well-written, multi-threaded program could effectively scale upwards almost linearly with the presence of more cores available.

There's also the (not so little) issue regarding dissipating the increased heat of those four cores in a system, and the increased power draw - it's one reason that we shouldn't expect to see a quad-core in a notebook anytime soon.

It is basically 4 seperate cores on one die or chip and the combined processing power of the cores together is 4GHz.

This article should help.

http://icrontic.com/articles/quad_core

There are not native quad core on the market yet, the Q series from Intel is not real a quadcore, is more like 2xdualcore. First nativ Quad will be Penryn, than we will have 16Ghzdayaccus007

There are not native quad core on the market yet, the Q series from Intel is not real a quadcore, is more like 2xdualcore. First nativ Quad will be Penryn, than we will have 16Ghzdayaccus007

Actually I'm pretty sure Penryn is the same architecture as the current Quads. The differance is that FSB is going to 1333 instead of 1066. Also it's moving from the 65 nm to the 45 nm. Including DAT technology and lastly there redoing some of the memory shuffling and adding SSE4 instruction set.

Nehalem is the earliest they will be doing a true quadcore. And even that is sharing some of the penryn architecture.

There are not native quad core on the market yet, the Q series from Intel is not real a quadcore, is more like 2xdualcore. First nativ Quad will be Penryn, than we will have 16Ghzdayaccus007

^november/december, also the phenom quad cores from amd will be making their debut at the same time so it should be intersting to see, i hope you got cash thoug, easily a good quad could cost $400-500.

[QUOTE="dayaccus007"]There are not native quad core on the market yet, the Q series from Intel is not real a quadcore, is more like 2xdualcore. First nativ Quad will be Penryn, than we will have 16GhzRyuHayabusaX

^november/december, also the phenom quad cores from amd will be making their debut at the same time so it should be intersting to see, i hope you got cash thoug, easily a good quad could cost $400-500.

filmography

[QUOTE="filmography"]

^november/december, also the phenom quad cores from amd will be making their debut at the same time so it should be intersting to see, i hope you got cash thoug, easily a good quad could cost $400-500.

RyuHayabusaX

that sound 5K$ to me :)

[QUOTE="RyuHayabusaX"][QUOTE="filmography"]

^november/december, also the phenom quad cores from amd will be making their debut at the same time so it should be intersting to see, i hope you got cash thoug, easily a good quad could cost $400-500.

ROCKINGFOOL

that sound 5K$ to me :)

^I would wait on blue-ray, its not very mainstream yet and its very expensive and if your gana download alot get 2 500GB drives but thats it, more than that is overkill and also you may wana pick up a nice 1900x1200 monitor to get your money's worth out of that 8900 or g90 whatever there gana call that card coming in november.filmography

about multiple cores, as others said, it isn't frequence x cores= performance

but to explain it better, i've once heared this to know how would a multicore perform:

think on cores like roads and on the CPU frequence as the max speed on the road.

if you increase the nomber of roads(more cores) more cars(data) can pass, but thier speed won't be higher.

For the monitor, I was wondering about this. Is the 1900 x 1200 a monitor that costs $500, or one of those $250 ones that are like 22"? If we get a big 50" LCD 1080p(doubt it, but could happen), I could just use that as my screen :). Though it wouldn't happen, I'm just fantasizing here, but i"ll probably get a smaller monitor anyways. RyuHayabusaX

yeah the 22inch are usually just 1680x1050 which for the8900 isn't really worth it, its like using a nuclear reactor to power a car. the $500 monitor is the 24inch 1900x1200 monitor. which is really the only monitor you should be getting for your card. Oh and 1900x1200=1080p just on a smaller screen.