How Do CPUs Use Multiple Cores?
Techquickie
·Techquickie
·2017-05-06
·
997 words · ~4 min read
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six cores eight cores 40 cores okay well
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maybe not the last one but High CPU core
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counts are a major selling point for computers and even other electronics
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these days whether you're shopping online or talking to a worker be at your
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local Big Box store and the idea behind it is simple higher core counts suggest
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more power kind of like impressive
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looking horsepower numbers on a car but is this this always the case well if you
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like many Techquickie viewers are a PC Gamer you've probably seen advice around
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the web or from friends that super high in CPUs with many cores or
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hyperthreading on something like a core i7 won't help you much if at all in
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games but why is that with the demand
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that current titles put on the hardware why are people averse to spending more
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on a more powerful C CPU well the answer
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lies in a concept called parallelization
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which means splitting a program's workload across multiple processing
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cores so a computer can work on two different parts of the same load at the
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same time for example let's say you want
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to know what 5 * 4 * 3 * 2 is a single
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core CPU would first multiply 5 * 4 to
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get 20 then multiply that time 3 to get 6 60 and so on and so forth however a
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dual core CPU could assign 5 * 4 to One
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Core and 3 * 2 to the other solve both
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problems at the same time and multiply the results together effectively saving
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time since it doesn't matter what order
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you execute the instructions in since you're just telling the CPU to multiply
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numbers this math problem is easy to
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parallelize now although this is a painfully simple example it does
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illustrate how certain programs can take advantage of multiple CPU cores because
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they require lots of number crunching that can be easily split up applications
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for video editing encryption file compression and even scientific research
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such as weather modeling do lots of calculations that can be parallelized
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easily also computer gpus are designed
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for parallel Computing since the same idea holds true for rendering 3D
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Graphics in a game so you can learn more about that in this video but lion is if
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my graphics card is designed for parallel processing why shouldn't I also
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be getting a CPU with tons of cores well
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the thing is that your GPU often doesn't handle much else other than pushing out
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frames to your monitor other important
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aspects of games such as artificial intelligence responding to inputs and
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telling the GPU what to render are still handled by the CPU because of the
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complexity involved in processing things like Ai and other forms of game logic
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and the fact that many of these code instructions for these types of things
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must be done in a specific order or in
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reaction to the gamer they're much harder for programmers to parallelize
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and split the workload especially as
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many current game engines aren't designed from the groundup to take
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advantage of multiple cores that said though your mileage may vary
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depending on what game you're playing some games due to variations in the
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processes the CPU is handling are more
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CPU bound than others and can benefit slightly from additional cores and since
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getting games to take advantage of lots of course is a bit of an unsolved
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problem in the industry work is ongoing to try to figure out how to make
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higher-end games easier to parallelize
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which could would ultimately result in cooler more immersive experiences but
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for now if you're just using your PC to game getting it anything above I'd say
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about a four core is probably Overkill and you're better off focusing your
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resources on well getting cores that perform well individually for one thing
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Linus so thanks for watching guys if you liked it liked it if you disliked it
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