Re: Dual Core CPUs vs Quad Core CPUs

From: Greg Rahn <greg_at_structureddata.org>
Date: Fri, 4 Jan 2008 11:28:13 -0800
Message-ID: <a9c093440801041128t6e81ab5cm5fe3ae4a7ce56f98@mail.gmail.com>


I would avoid the AMD quads for now due to the TLB bug: http://www.google.com/search?q=amd+barcelona+tlb+bug

I've used both the DL580 G4 (dual core Xeon) and G5 (quad core Xeon) but the clock speeds were not equivalent so a direct comparison can't be made. The FSB and memory speeds are also faster on the quad core boards so there are many variables that come into play.

You can check out the SPEC results if you feel that would provide a data point of interest:
http://www.spec.org/cpu2006/results/

Are you considering N quad core nodes vs. 2N dual core nodes for a RAC cluster or just a single host with 2N as many dual cores (vs. quad)?

I don't know if you have a preferred hardware vendor or what you would pay for performance, but the new IBM X series (x3950 M2 with the X4 chipset) has a snoop filter (it did exist in the X3 chipset as well) that yields some notable performance gains in comparison to the DL580 G5. I'd say 20%-30% depending on the exact db workload.

Hope that helps.

On 1/4/08, Allan Nelson <anelson77388_at_gmail.com> wrote:
> We are going to be building a reporting environment starting next month.
> I'm wondering if anyone has experience working with dual core vs quad core
> boxes running Oracle and Linux and has information about how well those quad
> cores scale compared to dual core procs.
>
> Thanks
> Allan
>

-- 
Regards,

Greg Rahn
http://structureddata.org
--
http://www.freelists.org/webpage/oracle-l
Received on Fri Jan 04 2008 - 13:28:13 CST

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