Quote:
Originally Posted by RobotDevil
Doodz, the secret to multi-core systems lies mostly in the OS. First off, more than a dual core system on XP is retarted! The kernel was only created around a dual cpu design and therefore does not make effective use of anything over that. Second, a 32-bit OS will limit your addressable space and running code again decreasing the effectiveness of a multi-core system. 64-bit Vista is really the ONLY system for more than 2 cores (outside of Windows Server 2003 that is). And yes, more core DOES help with Vista (shhhh all you Vista haters!). I had a dual-core E6300 OC'd to 2.53GHz and it ran very well. Then I dropped in a Q6700 at stock settings (my PSU is a bit dated at this point) and it ran extremely well. All other components of the system were unchanged, I haven't even taken the time to reload the OS yet. Vista will delegate single-threaded code to a core that is idle if there are other functions to be done. This helps alot with netcode on a system with a quad-core CPU. 1 core runs the game engine, 1 core runs the OS and 1 core runs the net code leaving the fourth core idle until needed by another application. This is all documented very well in quad core benchmarks where they run multiple single-threaded apps at the same time.
Oh, and there are 3 games in stores now that will make use of a quad core:
Supreme Commander (although the performance boost is unnoticed)
Crysis (which runs like poop unless you have a quad SLI setup with 4 8800GTXs anyway)
and finally Unreal Tournament III (which has had the biggest improvement from my dualie to my quad).
Sorry I don't have any links, I worked a 12 hour day and don't feel like finding them right now. But the short and skinny of it is if you're not a hardcore gamer wanting to play the newest stuff right away don't bother with the expense of the quad right now.
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What about Windows XP 64 bit? How well does that use the other cores? I had problems with Vista not running a lot of my old games, even after setting them to run in Windows XP or Windows 2000 mode. I downloaded a trial of Windows XP 64 bit and most of them seem to work. Any suggestions for me on how I can get these games to work on Vista though? Mostly they are Battlefront 1 and 2 and Battlefield Vietnam.