Gulftown i7 980x Six core + DCS

[hannibal]

http://www.fudzilla.com/content/view/18065/1/

 

ok, lets hear it.

6 core, 12 threads, 3.3 GHz...

 

sometimes it drives me nuts that they down benchmark DCS blackshark, and seem to stop benchmark FSX, as much as we know how CPU intensive DCS can be...

 

this will be the processor i will get once A-10C comes out, or if im tempted, when LOCKON 2.0 comes out....

 

if anyone can run black shark with this and then tell about it... let us know!

[Distiler]

Because DCS only uses 2 cores and FSX, AFAIK, up to 4 cores.

 

You won't get much of a perfomance increase with that core in DCS (and many other games) as long as it is not a real multithreaded application. The only thing perhaps in new i5 and i7 is the auto-overclocking of cores in use when others are inactive.

 

This trend of increasing the number of cores it's like the apocalypse for programmers, I think XD

Edited March 12, 2010 by Distiler

[coolts]

and the cpu is $999 on its own! overkill unless you are running a renderfarm. we may get some....for our renderfarm :music_whistling:

 

seriously though, 2 quad xeons are cheaper and will outperform, but as the man said, DCS only uses two. the upcoming 970 will drop the "extreme" suffix and the insane price but still retail for a walley busting £500-£600.

 

i would rather spend that on a nice 27" monitor. much better returns. see those SAM trails a lot quicker!

[hannibal]

i just ordered a 22" 1080p monitor to run DCS and lockon in triple-head portrait.. (3x1080)x1920...

 

i just want an awesome DCS A-10C PC.... looking to dump some cash into this PC, cause i been trying to get an awesome PC for the last 3 years, but no games worth building a PC for...

[hannibal]

One of my LOCKON Buddies are telling me thae using the DCSMAX application, you are able to run DCS Blackshark utilizing up to 7 cores....

 

COMMENTS ANYONE?

[topdog]

Yes, here's a comment :)

 

Have your buddy read up more on CPU Affinity because that's all DCSMax enables*.

 

Summary: affinity helps the OS select WHICH cores an app runs on, not how many cores it can SATURATE.

 

*Edit: To be fair, DCSMax does other things too, but with regards to CPU cores, this is what it did.

Edited March 12, 2010 by topdog

[Distiler]

One of my LOCKON Buddies are telling me thae using the DCSMAX application, you are able to run DCS Blackshark utilizing up to 7 cores....

 

COMMENTS ANYONE?

 

It wont help. Patch 1.01 activates all cores, but that doesen't mean DCS will use them. DCS only uses 2 cores.

 

DCSMax was used before patch 1.01 because there was a bug wich just activated 1 core, patch 1.01 fixed that.

[hannibal]

i wish i can hear this answer from a developer, or any screens that show windows task mgmr utilizing only 2 cores...of if anyone else will interject...

 

i like to see some proof?

but thanks for the info and comments distiller..

 

im interested in the gulftown six core, but if what you say is true, then theres no point, unless the DCS engine will utilize unlimited cores in the future...

Edited March 12, 2010 by hannibal

[topdog]

http://forums.eagle.ru/showpost.php?p=568711&postcount=7

 

Q: Does DCS: Black Shark take advantage of multi-core processors?

 

A: DCS: Black Shark uses a modified version of The Fighter Collection Simulation Engine (TFCSE), which was not originally designed to take advantage of multi-core processor technologies. Nevertheless, such systems do generally provide better game performance as a result of their native capabilities.

 

11/20/08 EDIT:

You can try manually setting the core affinity for DCS to all of the CPU cores, which may boost your game performance. To do this, Alt-Tab out of a running mission, set the CPU affinity for DCS and Alt-Tab back in. You will have to do this every time you run the sim.

 

I'm a developer, but I'm not a developer for ED/TFC, but the concept is clear - single threaded apps cannot use more than 1 core worth of power. Apps need to be designed for a multi-threaded environment (with careful marshaling/synchronisation of data so as to not create adverse performance effects through thread deadlocks - this means multiple threads accessing the same data have to be careful about attempting to make changes to that data whilst another thread/core wants to use it) in order to exceed 1 core worth of power.

 

Having 2 cores helps because you can dedicate 100% of a core to DCS whilst the other core handles other tasks (services, drivers, OS, etc.), more than 2 cores does not help, nor would DCS use more than 1 core itself.

Edited March 12, 2010 by topdog

[Distiler]

I'm no expert, but in fact DCS has multiple threads (at least according to resource monitor), tho it just uses two cores in Vista or W7, because it's not realy multithreaded optimized application. I suppose it's not because DCS itself, but because SO management (directx, etc. dunno really).

 

The thing is, when going from affinity 1 core to 2 cores it gains around 50% more fps (Vista or W7, not in XP). Going from affinity 2 cores to more cores it doesen't increase fps at all. There are many test here and there in the forums.

 

PD: that line from the FAQ "You can try manually setting the core affinity for DCS to all of the CPU cores, which may boost your game performance. To do this, Alt-Tab out of a running mission, set the CPU affinity for DCS and Alt-Tab back in. You will have to do this every time you run the sim.", forget it, patch 1.01 fixed that.

Edited March 12, 2010 by Distiler

[topdog]

Just having multiple threads doesn't necessarily mean multi-processing of those threads (i.e. different threads across different CPUs) - sorry for not being clearer. My DCS:BS is reporting 14 threads at the moment as it happens, so it isn't strictly 'single threaded', but it may be limited still to only executing one thread at a time even if it can bounce back and forth between them.

 

I take the comment from the producers to mean it would not use multi-processing, at least not by design. Lua (which DCS integrates and uses, and can be extended by users with further scripting,) has the ability to spawn multiple threads itself too, but even that as you'll see mentioned here doesn't necessarily instantly enable it to be effective across multi-processing platforms either:-

 

http://lua-users.org/wiki/ThreadsTutorial

 

I'll concede your comment about the performance benefit of having a 2nd core though :) an unexpected and unplanned benefit it would seem.

[hannibal]

so topdog, are you saying that 2+ cores makes a different, or not... im reading your comments, and i am getting conflicting opinions..

 

or if anything, what do you say about 6 core gulftown in respect to DCS/lock on performance potential..., as opposed to just a duel core or quad..

[topdog]

With a single-threaded / single-processing app, even then an extra core could help a little bit.

 

Let's say your system has to dedicate 15% processing time to 'other stuff' (though this number is a bit high for normal idle use), and then if you only had 1 core available total, it would only get 85% left for it to use for a game.

 

So adding 1 extra core can mean you'd get a little extra performance out of any app that was previously maxed (provided it wasn't forced onto the wrong core), because instead of peaking at 85% it can now peak at 100% (with total system load now 115%).

 

It seems 'by accident' (not by design or development) that DCS is able to use some extra available processing from a second core - due to things like Distiler suggests - but not enough to max out 200%+ of CPU load to make more cores worthwhile at this time.

 

I do not have a quad core myself at the moment I could try DCS:BS on, so that isn't proven by me, but it is what I believe to be true. I therefore also believe that if you had a 6 core CPU, that playing DCS would mean 4 of those cores would be doing nothing for you.

 

The fudzilla post you linked explains why, and even suggests that if there is a time to take advantage of more than 4 cores, then wait for the non-extreme edition - you'd have to be using some serious and uncommon engineering/modelling type software to use more for some time. The advice they give there is quite good; gamers should stay away from it for now.

[Pilotasso]

Thse I7's are marginaly better than what I have now for gaming. Seems were close and closer to silicon limits. Someday we will need optical CPU's.

[hannibal]

The fudzilla post you linked explains why, and even suggests that if there is a time to take advantage of more than 4 cores, then wait for the non-extreme edition - you'd have to be using some serious and uncommon engineering/modelling type software to use more for some time. The advice they give there is quite good; gamers should stay away from it for now.

 

well, i wanted to go for a 6 core Highest speed, and the extreme editions have the highest stock clock...

 

i guess i can go for the 4 core extreme edition, being it has the highest stock clock 3.33 for a quad ..

[Pilotasso]

Actualy all it takes is to open 4 video convertion apps, each 4 threaded, wich are widely avaiable and I have one of them to convert 4 videos at the same and it destroys any PC in existence (thats 16 threads). Time and again I despair for the wait to convert videos, but yes, its udeless for gaming and Im not going to change mine so soon just for video convertion.

[G3]

i just ordered a 22" 1080p monitor to run DCS and lockon in triple-head portrait.. (3x1080)x1920...

 

i saw a video of this setup the other day flying i believe A10A,

3 widescreens in portrait, really looked great, much better than landscape orientation.

 

not sure how it was done, maybe eyefinity or softTH, but it sure looked sexy.

[hannibal]

well, im going to find out, i just know that fps wise, its more better than landscape, because the FOV isnt too high..

[coolts]

Eyefinity on the new Radeons. 2 x DVI & 1 x displayport outputs. Simple to setup I believe, although FC doesn't "officially" support it AFAIK, it's done at the driver level so it should be application agnostic, (if they get the drivers sorted unlike the 3+ years of SLI / Crossfire buffoonery).

To address Hannibal's points. You can go ahead and spend £1,000 on the "fastest / bestest CPU" but you won't get an y higher FC frame rates as it will only utilise 2 cores and after that, it's all about pure Ghz.

In my experience, speaking as a professional technologist its generally wiser to stay just behind the curve. that way, you benefit from proven / mature products at a reduced price. As an example I have been 'umming and ahhing' about upgrading my Q6600 rig for 6+ months and only this week have taken the plunge for a £200 i7 930. I know I con overlook the nuts off that to 4.4 - 4.4ghz and make FC2.0 sing. And it didn't cost much compared to a £1,000 white elephant.

Once Gulftown has matured and down to about £300, I will upgrade. (but not for FC2.0)

[hannibal]

just dropped 2500$ for a 128GB SSD, HD5870, 6GB,asus mb, and the GULFTOWN UBER LEET 6 core 3.33 Extreme edition...

[*Rage*]

just dropped 2500$ for a 128GB SSD, HD5870, 6GB,asus mb, and the GULFTOWN UBER LEET 6 core 3.33 Extreme edition...

 

Nice!

 

Please add your results to the benchmark thread.

[EtherealN]

What Rage said. :)

 

http://forums.eagle.ru/showthread.php?t=45931

 

I personally feel there's nothing "uber leet" about that CPU. You could have gotten the same performance (for DCS:BS, DCS:Warthog and FC2) out of an i7 920, most likely. But it would be interesting to see a benchmark anyhow to see how it compares - it may be something to look out for in the future.

[mayu22]

I myself plan to get the Intel i7 980x later as the prices drop. I hope the A-10C would take full advantage of the 6-Cores and all the processor has to offer :)

[hannibal]

980x = UBER LEET

[Pilotasso]

980x will never drop in price like all other extreme versions