Herbert,
Thanks for the comprehensive reply. You cut right through my excitement to the
heart of the matter, see below.
On Thu, 06 Jan 2000, Herbert Wengatz 42850
wrote: > +> Great response time guys!!
> +> Thanks to all of you for the help,
>
> Hold it!
>
> Want another opinion?
Yes please.
>........clipped
> I'm happy so far, but there is one little thing that annoys me:
>
> My old dual PPro felt somehow "snappier" under load. I guess this comes simply
> from the second CPU. - If you throw some heavy work on a dual system, there will
> be at least one CPU, taking most of the load (sure, well written software scales
>better,
> but still most applications are still single threaded) and the other one is "easier
>to
> access" for new tasks. So on my old system, when I started some hefty job and simply
> opened another xterm for me, it was there, almost immediately. On the 650 MHz Athlon,
> I have to wait 2-3 seconds (well maybe it's only 1-2 seconds... ;) ) for the new
>xterm
> to come up under heavy load.
>
> The pro of an SMP system is, that if you don't care how long a job needs, you can
> start a big job in the background and have virtually no impact on your systems
> performance, while a single CPU system may be indeed faster with a big job, but the
> system will feel slower to the user during the job.
This strikes a chord, the one thing I hate about my current work machine
(a PII 300) is when running a GIS image rectification (5 to 40 minutes)
running anything else is a waste of effort, the system is so slow under load it
is useless.
> Don't get me wrong: I'm a BIG fan of the Athlons, but it really depends on what you
> intend to do.
>
> For what I read in your mail, a dual CPU-system may be the more interesting choice
> for you:
>
> [EMAIL PROTECTED] said:
> +> My primary uses for this box will be:
> +> 1. GIS and satellite image processing and analysis.
>
> For Image-Processing the Athlon would be a real good choice!
> (Brute force)
> But if you can wait for the result while you want to work on in the foreground,
> take an SMP system!
>
> +> 2. Biological modelling using Objective-C and the Swarm Simulation System
> +>(see: http://www.santafe.edu/projects/swarm/)
>
> Same applies here.
>
> +> 3. General programming in C and Objective-C
>
> Ditto.
>
> [..]
> +> I understand that Objective-C can make use of 2 processors, and the Swarm
> +> developers are aiming for major SMP and Beowulf cluster support in the future.
>
> So in fact you _have_ interest in SMP and clustering!? - How will you do that
> without an SMP-box ? ;)
>
> +> Secondary use:
> +> My 13 yr old son playing Windows games.
>
> Hmmm... - Allow me the question: Are you buying the system for your son of for
> yourself?
> Quake or whatever will run almost as well on an SMP box. - OK, he may have 5-10
> fps fewer than with the faster Athlon, but: Who cares?
Right again, at home I have only a Pentium 166, so no matter what I buy my son
will be more than happy.
> - Maybe I have hitted here
> a weak spot of your own? - I admit I occasionally do play every now and then on my
> machines (that's the only reason for me to keep Win95 on one of my disks...).
I like games but I never seem to get time to play them. I think I have more fun
programming my models, they are like games to me.
> Why not? - But you should really take a deep look what you want to do MOST
> of the time with that machine.
You are right again, this machine will really be a work horse, more like a
pick-up truck than a ferrari. I will be making my living with this machine.
It is nice to be able to drive fast, but it is not much good for carting a
load of trash to the rubbish dump.
> That way you will become more satisfied. It's not always
> the best choice to get the lastest technological gimmick! > >
> Of course, my absolute top-favourite would be an SMP (2-way or 4 way) Athlon!
>
> I can't wait for them! But I do guess this will *slightly* be out of my budget...
>
> +> Sounds like the athlon is the way to go. My own reading around the hardware
> +> sites on the net was leaning me that way, but not being very SMP savvy I wasn't
>
> Depends on what you REALLY need and want.
You have put me firmly back on the side of a the dual celeron SMP box. It is
tempting to be the first kid on the block with an athlon, but I might regret it
when I am trying to run many processes (which I do a lot.)
Thanks again ;^)
Matt
--
Matt Aylward <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Deptartment of Botany, University of Western Australia
LINUX: The OS with the power for real science.
Long live Linux, Swarm modelling and Grass GIS.
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