The AMD FX (Bulldozer) Scheduling Hotfixes Tested
by Anand Lal Shimpi on January 27, 2012 12:47 PM ESTFinal Words
AMD didn't overpromise as far as the benefits of these new scheduling/core parking hotfixes for Windows 7 are concerned. Single digit percentage gains can be expected in most mixed workloads, although there's a chance that you'd see low double digit gains if the conditions are right. It's important to note that the hotfixes for Windows 7 aren't ideal either. They simply force threads to be scheduled on empty modules first rather than idle cores on occupied modules. To properly utilize Bulldozer's architecture we'd need a scheduler that schedules both based on available cores/modules but biases its scheduling depending on data dependency between threads.
If Bulldozer were the last architecture to present this type of scheduling challenge I'd say that it's unlikely we'll see things get better. Luckily for AMD, I don't believe homogeneous multi-core architectures will be all we get moving forward. Schedulers will get better at understanding the underlying hardware, just as they have in the past. We may see better utilization of Bulldozer cores/modules in Windows 8 but as always, don't use the promise of what may come as a basis for any present day purchasing decisions.
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Beenthere - Friday, January 27, 2012 - link
The Win 7 Hot Fix speaks for iteslf. As noted it's a small bump - but it's free. It's not AMD's fault that Microsucks O/Ss sucks. It's reported Linux does a better job of scheduling, probably because it's used on a lot of servers with heavy work loads.I always tell people to buy what makes them happy. If you're happy with a product from a convicted criminal corporation and chose to support their efforts to eliminate consumer choice and drive up PC hardware prices - that's your choice and you're perfectly free to do so. Bashing AMD is not going to change reality however, no matter how disappointed you are in them.
In reality ANY of todays current model CPUs have more than enough computing power for 90+ percent of PC users. If all you do is run benchmarks then you could be misinformed...
http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/2120866/i...
gamerk2 - Friday, January 27, 2012 - link
Funny, considering different Linux distributions use different schedulers. Lets not also forget there is OVERHEAD to doing a lot of processing within the scheduler, and keeping track of thread/resource use can be a pain.sor - Saturday, January 28, 2012 - link
Huh? The process scheduler in Linux is dependent on which version of the kernel you have. Any current distribution should be using CFS. You may be confusing this with the options of IO schedulers.B3an - Friday, January 27, 2012 - link
Oh grow up you immature moron (typical Linux user!). And Apple are FAR worse now than MS ever was, as well as bigger. BTW it's not the 1990's anymore,frozentundra123456 - Saturday, January 28, 2012 - link
I cant believe people are still blaming Microsoft for bulldozers failure. It seems to me that the responsibility of a company is to bring out a product that works in the current environment, i.e. that works efficiently with win 7. Especially when you control a small portion of the market, you should make a product that "just works". You shouldnt expect the software to be rewritten for your product. And Intel doesnt seem to have any problem making processers that work efficiently with the current environment.Morg. - Tuesday, January 31, 2012 - link
I like the *could* be misinformed -- if Intel didn't want benchmarks and reviewers to like them, I'm pretty sure they wouldn't do anything for it ;)cigar3tte - Friday, January 27, 2012 - link
I don't normally bother, but there is way too many here...Worth wild = worthwhile
It's = its
Their = There
Your = you're
Losses = loses
And yeah, it's more of a free fix than free performance. Bulldozer users are getting back what was lost, rather than gaining something.
snouter - Friday, January 27, 2012 - link
"there are way too many"I don't normally bother either.
jonup - Saturday, January 28, 2012 - link
You can always look at a glass as half-full or half-empty.@typos: Sad part is that some of them are native speakers.
gevorg - Friday, January 27, 2012 - link
Can the Sandy Bridge CPUs benefit from this by any chance?