CompuServe Messages

> But, no, the day of the several CPU machines has long past you > by. We've had 'em on the mainframes for (it seems like) ages. My world is the military and we've had'em for years. It just hasn't "clicked" yet in the PC world. We need cheaper CPUs, an OS that can handle it, and program paradigms that support parallel work. Many tasks just can't be broken into seperate tasks. I agree a four '060 config in an Amiga would help raytracing folk a _lot_, but most others would see a minimal speedup. People somehow have it in their heads that a multi CPU system works by pooling all the power and then dividing it up on the tasks! It don't work that way! If the task can't be broken down, it only runs on one CPU! This implies the "average" user might only get two CPU's worth of work out of it. His "big" problem will hog 100% of one CPU and all the rest of his stuff (OS, daemons, comm program, game) would probably run okay on a second CPU. Of course you could come up with special cases otherwise, but todays current code will still run fastest on one super CPU than one four medium CPU's. There are a few exceptions of course. (But not many!) ——- Andrew