2005 May 09

Via Scott M. Fulton, III, through Jeff's pointer to Dueling Multicores- Intel and AMD Fight For the Future (Hardware):

Thanks for bringing attention to the dual-core article on Tom's Hardware Guide. You wanted to know why I didn't take apart Pat Gelsinger's comment about multiplying performance by a factor of 10 over 4 years. The reason is because any attempt to do so on my part might be construed as opinion, and I didn't want the reader's own opinion on this topic (yours) to become obstructed.
You think it's a vague formula? It may very well be because it _is_ vague. A lot has to happen in order to enable a ten-tupling of performance. Both Longhorn and future Linux must evolve substantially; otherwise, application performance could conceivably _decrease_ with the addition of new processing cores beyond the second one. The multithreading scheme of choice must evolve; in the update to the article, Intel finally admits that hyperthreading will evolve, and that's a significant statement on their part. But Gelsinger did manage to set a very high bar without detailing how that bar can be reached, especially with the performance curve not increasing along with Moore's Law. A lot of this absence of detail is self-evident…and you caught right onto it.
Again, my thanks for providing Lockergnome with a link, and I hope you'll stay tuned to Tom's for more news that Lockergnome can share.

Maybe a few weeks before Longhorn gets released, I'll update my primary system with all the latest bells and whistles.

Read more on Dual-core CPU Duels…

As Ponzi had noted a few days ago, her family has recently experienced a great loss. She's been helping her loved ones through this tough time, and has decided to stay with them a few days longer. She's run herself ragged, and I can hear it in her hoarse voice. The puppies and I miss having her here, but we understand that she has a lot of love to share. On Wednesday morning, she'll have returned to Seattle. Maybe I'll go with her when she heads back home to North Carolina after Gnomedex – with a layover in Des Moines? We'll see. I haven't met the greater part of her “Southern” family yet, and we both thought that this week would have been the wrong time to go.
As a child, the first deaths I ever had to deal with happened in the same year; my mother's grandmother passed away (if I remember correctly) in 1982, as did my father's father. I realize that death is a necessary part of life, but that doesn't make it any easier to face. May I have the strength of Ponzi when I have to face it again. My sincerest condolences to her father for losing his loving wife, and to her sister and brothers for losing their loving mother.

Read more on Dealing with Death…