Re: Hardware considerations and Octave

[Dmitri A. Sergatskov]

Joan Picanyol i Puig wrote:
> * Steve C. Thompson <address@hidden> [20050429 20:33]:
>
> > I'm thinking about getting a new workstation, and am finding many
> > options.  I run Octave Debian GNU/Linux (testing).  Will my work run
> > better on a dual core processor?  A dual processor system?  I image that
> > the kernel just needs to be modified to support this type of hardware;
> > and Octave, and the entire system, will just run faster.
>
>
> I'm afraid this is not so. I can't get my dual Athlon-MP system to
> effectively use both processors for Octave (I'm on FreeBSD, YMMV). 

I had compiled octave against multithreaded ATLAS and that speeds up some
matrix manipulations by almost 90%. But for some operations this also imposes
some penalty (due to thread spawning overhead, I guess). So do not expect
2x speedup.

Another advantage of dual system if you plot (and replot)
large data sets. Since gnuplot runs as a separate process it can use
a second cpu. Also compiling stuff on dual CPU is a little faster.

Dmitri.
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