"Although the Tegra 2 chip with integrated dual-core processor has recently been released, NVIDIA is already poised to announce its successor at the Mobile World Congress next month. According to Mike Rayfield of NVIDIA, Tegra 3 may incorporate a quad-core processor with main focus of supporting Android smartphones and tablet PCs."
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Member since:2007-03-06
Member since:2005-07-15
Member since:2006-02-15
I don't think going quad core benefits majority of users at all. What really matters is single core performance. Most apps are still single threaded.
I dare to disagree. What apps do a regular home-user use? Well, mostly web browser, video player, perhaps Office for budgeting or whatnot, and maybe a few games. Well, all major web browsers these days do run in several threads, video players do run in several threads, Office isn't CPU-bound anyways, it's more memory-bound, and any modern game these days also runs in several threads.
Now, only games from those are really CPU-bound anyways so quad-core would indeed be a waste. Dual-core would still be somewhat beneficial though, the amount of which can be debated.
Member since:2005-09-16
You are free to disagree. But in my experience you benefit from more cores only when the apps are heavily multithreaded and the workload is not I/O bound. Firefox, I think is not a good example - I often do a Ctrl-click on a bookmarks folder to open all bookmarks inside it in different tabs. It then freezes for several seconds. Behaves the same under Linux & XP. It's my biggest gripe with Firefox. And for most games, if you haven't invested in a high-end GPU the workload is GPU bound. And, BTW, where are those multithreaded ARM games?
Again, I'm all for multi-core. It's just that I think that 2 cores ought to be enough for anybody 
Member since:2005-09-08
There are no major web-browser capable of using more than one thread per web-page. The best you can do is start multiple browser processes and sometimes embed this processes into the same application, but this is similar to just starting multiple browsers and multiple applications in general.
Member since:2006-04-10
In my experience most games use 1.25 cores. Some games go all out and use 2.00 cores. But that is still only using 50% of my quad core.
I still don't get why they can't put a full core at work for the physics and a full core at work for 3d sound.
Member since:2005-08-18
Member since:2005-09-16
Like what most users do when they run a modern DE? "
Yes! However, most apps don't really do much most of the time. Usually, what you do is focus on one app, do sth there and expect an immediate answer. It's good to have another core if some other app decides it needs CPU love at the same time but this only helps a little. These days, it's mostly I/O that screws the desktop experience.
Member since:2008-07-12
Depends which OS you use. Like you said most users are with setups where they see little benefit from more than 2 CPUs but for a number of Linux-Heads who tune thier systems or people like me using Haiku-OS the gains are there.
I paid more for my Toshiba Netbook than a number of other models out there because I get 8-10 hours use on battery, and even that can be a too short at times.
An easy to carry machine that can run 24+ hours on a single charge is worth it to me and others.
Member since:2005-07-06
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Member since:
2005-09-16
enough powerfull for majority of user
I don't think going quad core benefits majority of users at all. What really matters is single core performance. Most apps are still single threaded. You only use more cores if you run more apps at a time or do sth really specific, like video transcoding, that can make use of more cores. Did you notice how long it took for the About Ubuntu window to appear? Ok, that may be due to slow I/O but it's things like these that matter for the average user. Most of them, unfortunately, don't even know what a core is.
Don't get me wrong - I'm all for quad (and more) cores. But I'm a geek. I can tune my system to get the best out of it and I take pleasure doing that. And what they say in the video, that it's a 2GHz chip, is certainly encouraging. So thanks for the video.