Intel has projected that by the end of 2006 more than
70% of desktop and mobile Pentium processors and 85% of server
processors shipped will be dual-core.
Dual-core and multicore processing, combined with
hyper-threading, works by allowing one processor core to function
as two or more "logical" cores. This boosts the amount of work a
processor can do in the same time as a processor with a single
core.
Analyst firm Gartner said dual-core x86 systems will offer
price/performance benefits. How large these will be is difficult to
say until Intel introduces its fully-fledged dual-core processors
(code-named Dempsey), which will include technology to make the two
cores work together more efficiently.
Another attraction of dual-core and multicore x86 systems is
that they allow users to get higher levels of scalability without
having to pay extra for an expensively designed symmetric
multiprocessor system, said Ian Brown, research vice-president at
Gartner.
PC makers such as Dell recently began to sell systems based on
the Intel Xeon MP, saying the multicore platform could at least
double the performance of existing dual-processor 64-bit servers
running certain optimised software applications.
However, for software to make use of this feature, it has to be
rewritten in a way that allows portions of the application to run
independently of one another.
Commercial applications that make use of dual-core processors'
multithreading capabilities - termed hyperthreading by Intel - may
be lacking when the processors arrive in volume.
"Although Intel's 2002 hyperthreading technology and related
developer and application enabling programs and services have led
to mainstream operating systems and hundreds of multithreaded
applications, there continues to be much work left to do," said
Intel.
Cengiz Oztelcan, Intel's Xeon platform marketing manager EMEA,
said many computer-aided design and animation applications are
ready to take advantage of dual-core. But he added, "We do not have
figures of how many independent software suppliers have
multithreaded their applications.
"If the application is not multithreaded it is not going to make
use of dual-core."
Intel is dedicating "thousands" of software architects,
programmes and services, and developer tools such as threading
tools, analysers and binaries to help software suppliers develop
threaded code.
Martin Hingley, vice-president of the European systems group at
analyst firm IDC, said the big software suppliers such as SAP and
Oracle are likely to be preparing their applications to take
advantage of dual and multicore processors from both Intel and
AMD.
"They understand multithreading and multicore because they have
been writing their applications to work with Alpha and Power PC
processors, and are therefore likely to find the move to multicore
Intel and AMD chips fairly straightforward," said Hingley.
"The difficulty is that the mass of software companies are not
going to rewrite or recompile their applications. The mass of the
applications out there have never shifted from being single-core
and single-threaded."
A Microsoft spokesman said it was too early to talk about
Microsoft's support for dual-core and multicore chips, although the
company does have plans to enhance both the tools and operating
system.
"With Visual Studio 2005 still fresh and Windows Vista not even
out yet, we are a bit premature to be talking about those today,"
he said.
However, Microsoft said, "By default, Windows treats multicore
chips as very efficient multprocessor systems, and will offload
background tasks such as indexing, virus scanning and searching to
other processors to help boost performance. And Visual Studio 2005
includes features to ease multicore programming, such as support
for OpenMP and enhanced debugging support."
Meanwhile, the open source community has the opportunity to
offer a robust alternative to Microsoft on dual-core chips,
according to Gartner.
Brown said, "The leading Unix operating systems have very
effective thread handling which generally means they scale well on
multithreaded workloads and handle mixed workloads effectively.
Linux is improving in its thread handling and more improvements are
on the way, but it does not match the leading Unixes yet."
Analysts said most enterprise middleware platforms, J2EE
application servers and database software is already multithreaded
to take advantage of Risc-based servers based on dual-core
processors, such as Sun's Ultrasparc IV, IBM Power, and HP
PA-Risc.
Analysts said one issue that would continue to hold back the
adoption of dual-core systems is software licensing, with some
suppliers choosing to charge per processor, and others charging
users for each processor core.
"The software licensing issue is going to become a real mess.
All the server suppliers are having to keep a single-core version
of their applications so people will not have to pay two licences,"
said Hingley.
Nevertheless, analysts seem to agree that users will get better
value from dual-core and multicore processor-based servers.
Is it worth moving to dual-core?
Business users should think before moving to dual-core processor
platforms, according to analyst firm Gartner. Companies should make
their decision based on the applications they use, and issues such
as software licensing costs.
Ian Brown, research vice-president at Gartner, said if users
have a performance-hungry application, or an application that is
growing fast, then the extra headroom offered by dual-core may be
useful.
However, there are other ways to increase performance. Systems
that have 64-bit processing may offer a more useful performance
boost for database software, for example, than sticking with 32-bit
and going to dual-core, Brown said.
"If your application does not need strong processor performance
- say it is file-and-print, web serving or some other
infrastructure application - then you needn't feel obliged to
invest in dual-core while there is still a premium for it.
"By the end of 2006, most x86 servers will have dual-core
processors, so the price premium will be going away," he said.