On Sun, 29 Feb 2004 10:56:39 -0600 "Rad Craig" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> Even in OSX? It's made to use multiple processors since it is unix > based. Wouldn't that make all applications run on OSX faster on a dual > processor? Or is it still only for applications that were specifically > designed for multiple processors? Well -- I can't realy speak for OSX explicitly, but the OS can only provide threads and/or multi CPU parallel features which *still* have to be used by the applications. The only automatism the OS can offer is a load balancing with at least two running processes. That can be OS things like talking to harddrives, getting data from the scanner,... while the other CPU is working on a picture or something similar. In high performance computing(massive parallel systems) a lot of effort goes into parallelisation. Some fortran compilers have automatic parallelisation features, but that is working at *compile time*. Other parallelisation strategies (MPI library) can adapt at start time to the available number of CPU's -- but need lot's of explicit programming effort to make it parallelised, i.e. use more than one cpu effectively. But then quite a few Mac applications seem to support multi processor systems (patches, additional plugins,...) and spare cpu time on the second cpu is at least free for OS things like I/O. Also quite many opperations are not CPU limited but I/O limited (HD or RAM). Neither a second CPU nor a faster will speed up anything. K.-H. -- G-List is sponsored by <http://lowendmac.com/> and... Small Dog Electronics http://www.smalldog.com | Refurbished Drives | -- We have Apple Refurbished Monitors in stock! | & CDRWs on Sale! | Support Low End Mac <http://lowendmac.com/lists/support.html> G-List list info: <http://lowendmac.com/lists/g-list.shtml> --> AOL users, remove "mailto:"; Send list messages to: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To unsubscribe, email: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> For digest mode, email: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Subscription questions: <mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Archive: <http://www.mail-archive.com/g-list%40mail.maclaunch.com/> Using a Mac? Free email & more at Applelinks! http://www.applelinks.com
