When choosing to buy a processor, you normally look at the benchmarks to see which one is quicker.
What does it mean if a cpu has a higher single core benchmark and what doe sit mean if it has a higher multicore?
What types of things use single or multicores? Any examples would be great.
"What does it mean if a cpu has a higher single core benchmark"
This means that for a single thread, the CPU will process that thread faster. It used to be that this was the most important metric because few programs were multi threaded.
That is no longer the case, because most CPU intensive activities utilize multiple threads.
"what doe sit mean if it has a higher multicore? "
That means it is better at handling either a variety of tasks at once, or tasks that utilize more than one thread to do work.
This covers the majority of what people consider to be CPU intensive, such as PC games, encoding/transcoding video, running benchmark software, doing graphics software, running computational programs, etc.
This is usually determined by more cores = more power, but also includes the architecture of the processor, as some designs share memory between cores better for more efficiency.
Beyond 4 cores, you won't notice much of a difference in 'everyday use', because once you've freed up a couple threads for multiple simultaneous applications to run, the CPU can free up to do other things like… User input.
That is why old computers felt slow. You would minimize something and your mouse would lock up, for example, or you'd start two programs and both would bog down to almost not be usable.
Where it starts to make a difference is when you are doing CPU intensive things. For example, a transcode with 4 cores might take an hour, while a transcode with 8 cores and the same single core performance might take half an hour.
For me, the CPU intensive things I do include:
1. Folding@home - utilizes 7 of the 8 cores I have, with the 8th core devoted to feeding my GPU
2. PC Games - Planetside 2 makes tremendous use of every available core, while some games like BF3 only use 4 cores, and other games like CS: GO make use of only one or two. With 8 cores, I can run minecraft as a server and as a client, so I can host and play at the same time.
3. Making youtube videos - More cores = faster transcoding time = less time to go from recording/editing to publishing.
Things I do that aren't CPU intensive and aren't effected by CPU choice are:
1. Surfing the web
2. Watching movies
3. Drawing stuff in Gimp
4. Doing paperwork From a theoretical stand point the more cores you have the more threads you can run in true parallel. The more cores you have and the more threads you can run means you will have less context switching, which takes time and on a heavily loaded system can be noticeable by the user. Just to add to Equinox's excellent write-up, starting with Windows 10 and DirectX 12, all future games will require multi-cores from now on. The days of the brawny single-core are over in games.
Tested: DirectX 12's potential performance leap is insane | PCWorld
http://www.pcworld.com/...nsane.html" rel='nofollow' class='ext_link'>http://www.pcworld.com/...nsane.html Is this a joke?
From a theoretical stand point the more cores you have the more threads you can run in true parallel. The more cores you have and the more threads you can run means you will have less context switching, which takes time and on a heavily loaded system can be noticeable by the user.
Just to add to Equinox's excellent write-up, starting with Windows 10 and DirectX 12, all future games will require multi-cores from now on. The days of the brawny single-core are over in games.
Tested: DirectX 12's potential performance leap is insane | PCWorld
http://www.pcworld.com/article/2900814/tested-directx-12s-potential-performance-leap-is-insane.html
Is this a joke?