Dual Core Vs Dual Processor Vs Hyper Threading
As we start talking of high performance computing, 64-bit platform offerings etc. some of the buzz words that come into play are dual processor, dual core and Hyper Threading. I thought it would be a good idea to find and write about what these technologies are all about, who fares where and what is the best.
While the Dual-core systems refers to having a CPU that includes two complete execution cores per physical processor, a Dual-processor (DP) systems is one which contains two separate physical computer processors on the same chassis. Unlike dual processors systems where the two procs can be located on the same motherboard and at times on separate boards, in Dual Core, one integrated circuit contains two complete computer processors. In the Dual core systems, there is a combined cache and the controller between the two processors, it is independent in dual processor systems. The Advanced Programmable Interrupt Controllers (APIC) in both these cases are separate for each processor, providing multi processor interrupt management.
Hyper Threading (HT) technology was developed by Intel and is somewhere midway between the above two. In HT enabled systems, the circuitry enables one physical processor to appear as two logical processors. This enables a separate APIC for each logical processor while maintaining a single cache.
As they say a picture speak louder than a thousand words, here is the picture of what I described above.
I would more about these, there pros and cons etc. in some of my next blogs.
