SW uses all cores?

SW'06 SP5.1, XP pro, Core 2 @2,66GHz, 2Go RAM

I've asked the question before:
Does SW uses all cores ?
In other words:is it useful to buy multi-core processor for new machines?

The topic has been polluted, I got no answer. Now I want to know, and I
tried to run a simple benchmark (Star)
1- alone, and then
2- aside for example a vdub processing of a DivX

and see whether there is a significant difference.

.... But the star bench I got stops in the firts steps issuing a " error
'13', non compatible type". It is the 'star 2.0' bench.
Is there a better bench to use? ('light' and processor intensive)
Anyone has the answer to the question?

TIA

 

Answering my own questions:

1- Star bench: modified the code, hard-coded the 'CheckRelease = 12'. Seems
to run as it should. Hope I did not broke anything meaningful.

2 - SW used 2 cores?

Not in my opinion:
Without Vdub : star levels = 5 . Time = 44,48 S
Task manager 'eye-avg' : 45

With Vdub running, conversion + blur filter : star levels = 5 . Time = 47.30
S.
Task manager 'eye-avg' : 95


That's on SW'06 SP5.1. If anyone cares to check on a more recent release...
You're welcomed to post it here.

HIH
Bye
JM

 

Well the likelihood of you buying just a single core pc in the future is
falling to zero quickly. Even dual core could be in danger of extinction.

The new Nehalem will be hyperthreaded quads - shows as 8 processors in
Windows Task Manager. For a physical two cpu machine that's 16 threads
straining at the leash...
Intel have said that software companies should write for many
threads -4,8,16,32...

back to your question though..
SW is apparently almost all a single core application because the solving is
undertaken sequentially but there are some activities that will utilise a
second core to assist with processes in the background.

I understand this amounts to about a 20% improvement overall although that
figure would depend on exactly what you did and how often.

Unfortunately SW are reluctant to name directly those tasks that benefit
however opening drawings,some surfacing, loading and saving assemblies, and
simulation are supposed to be on the list.

Why exactly they are so secretive about this is a bit of a mystery...go
figure..but there is lots of useful stuff they don't like sharing
officially.
Its a bit like the ineffectual help manual - it makes SW look like idiots
but hey they do it anyway ...

The only work that truly benefits fulltime from multicore is rendering, PDM
and analysis

So I guess you could say that SW doesn't use all cores but it does get a
helping hand here and there where possible.

Will you see that as a 50% reduction in a benchmark? Wouldn't think so.
even 20% ? not sure -probably not -occasionally maybe.

It would seem re-architecting SW to be more parallel is a difficult
undertaking that may never truly come about.
Probably there will continue to be small improvements from release to
release.

Of course having say a quad for SW doesn't necessarily mean a lot of cpu
cycles going to waste if you use other applications at the same time. I am
sure there are useful things you can do while waiting for a long load or
rebuild....HTH