FX 8120 question

[winterwolf]

Ok guys. For couple of mounths I have new build.
MB: GB 990xa ud3
PSU: Cooler Master Gx 750
RAM: kingston hyperX kit 2x2gb 1600Mhz
CPU: fx 8120
GPU: GTX 570HD SC
case: YESICO with dust filters on the sides, infront, top and 2 120 mm fans from Arctic Cooling.

well iam not the type of person who is thinking only about what more he can squeeze from his build. Iam a ordinary gamer so give me some slack.
So.. i have "8 core CPU", but i noticed that none of my software products is using all of these cores. Well the task manager is showing full load on all cores but .. for example cinebench or 3dmark 11 are showing that I use 4 cores/8 threads. (lol it suposed to be 8 core AMD CPU not i7). Iam asking - is that normal and if not what i can do about it.

Thanks in advance

 

[ssjwizard]

But it is a 4Core 8Thread CPU so why should it report anything else?

 

[agonbar]

But it is a 4Core 8Thread CPU so why should it report anything else?

Nope, it's the first world's 8 core cpu, nothing about multithread in this case XD.

Maybe the problem it's more from the old software, to have a full use of 8 core-cpus, you will need windows 8 or a patch for windows 7, you have rumours about both posibilitys.

Anyway, i have this cpu, and i'm always using 3 or 4 screens with a full load, even more than 1 game at the same time, and i can't use more than de 15% of the total cpu XD

 

[slynutcase]

the fx 8120 is meant to be an 8 core cpu but reading into it it only has 4 physical cores called modules, and each module has 2 virtual cores inside them if im right, but as the virtual cores are not technically hyperthreading they get away with calling it an 8 core.
feel free to correct me if im wrong there anyone.

 

[winterwolf]

Well I took a good look at the CPU architecture even before i decided to get it. And if Iam remembering right it has 8 physical cores. The catch here is they are combined in pairs by only one thing - the modules for fractional digits. Thats the only thing they share.

 

[slynutcase]

you may be right, i just tohught id say what i got from reading the information about them, if it doesnt help it doesnt help.. always worth a try

 

[manu2b]

yes, it has 8 "marketing" cores!

 

[slynutcase]

that is good to know, iv always been confused with the modules part of it, i was just saying it how i understood it.

 

[ssjwizard]

The CPU has 8 integer schedulers, 4 L3 cachce, 4 L2 cache, and 8 L1 cache, 4 Float schedulers, humm that #4 sure comes up alot in this "8" core cpu doesnt it? The windows update to fix the BD multithreading performance loss registers the CPU as 4C8T because thats exactly what it is. Its a very advanced 4 core but it is infact a 4 core. The problem is the term core as we have known it to be in the past does not quite apply with the design of the FX. If a core were to be considered as 1 Compute Unit then FX is a 4 core and each core is capable of handling 2 threads at once BUT it has some actual extra hardware to handle that VS Intel hyper threading which virtually handles the extra thread. AMDs marketing team are the ones who came up with the "8Core CPU" moniker and it is not accurate.

 

[mjw21a]

^^^ Well, they did fire pretty much all their marketing guys after this. I believe they should have dumped the term core altogether and called them modules. The FX-8120 is a 4 module CPU with a very different number of resources to what is seen in more traditional designs. AMD refers to them internally as modules and I believe this is what they should have done in marketing also.

Many resources are shared and as such Windows 7 can't make use of them properly. I'm waiting for Windows 8 myself but just really hope that the aweful Metro interface can be turned off.

 

[ssjwizard]

I would have called it the worlds most advanced 4 unit CPU personally, but then module and modular seem to be popular buzz words in marketing lately it might have worked. The problem as I mentioned is that the design of these cpus is so different that you have to take a new approach to "What is a core?"

 

[slynutcase]

So for this discussion it may be fairer to call it a 4 module cpu, as each module has 2 "virtual cores" which is how they get around calling it an 8 core cpu, its sort of a slightly more complex system similar to intels hyperthreading?

 

[mjw21a]

Well, if a core is as AMD markets them then these would be the most under resources 8 core chips ever to be made so I really don't think it is redefining what a core is. I don't actually believe that "core" is a term which should be used with BD chips. If they were cores then you should be able to turn off half a module to get a whole core. Since resources are shared I'd argue a module is only useable as a whole and since a module is somewhere in between they should have called it 4 module rather than confusing matters. I'd not be surprised if they end up with a class action suit against them eventually.

So for this discussion it may be fairer to call it a 4 module cpu, as each module has 2 "virtual cores" which is how they get around calling it an 8 core cpu, its sort of a slightly more complex system similar to intels hyperthreading?

Yes and no. Yes it should be called 4 module, however it's essentially the exact opposite of what Intel case done. These are not virtual cores, they simply doubled up on the amount of hardware which would work on integer threads and shared resources between them. For the FPU they created two smaller FPU's which could work together as 1 big FPU as required so these are shared too. Module is the correct term, but don't think AMD's approach is similar to Intel's as its actually the exact opposite.

 

[slynutcase]

They have sort of thrown a curve ball at us with the way they have made/ marketed the BD chips. One interesting thing to see is wether they have continued this "module" form with PD, only time will tell.

 

[ssjwizard]

Basically we have a 4 module chip. Each module contains 2 schedulers, they share memory access and they share the floating point scheduler. Its basically the hardware level equivalent of hyperthreading but is actually as you say more advanced. What would be super duper fabulous would be if you could get both AMDs multithread module and Intels hyper threading together imagine the multi tasking!

Long story short it handles 8 threads so who the hell cares what the marketing people called it.

 

[slynutcase]

It would be interesting to play with a frankinstien chip cross between amd modules and intels hyperthreading, but on the side of marketing clarity may have been nice, but as you say it works as 8 threads so I guess they are not wrong in how they have marketed these chips.

 

[mjw21a]

They have sort of thrown a curve ball at us with the way they have made/ marketed the BD chips. One interesting thing to see is wether they have continued this "module" form with PD, only time will tell.

They have, it's just a fixed BD on 28nm bulk with resonant clock mesh thrown in there for good measure.

Basically we have a 4 module chip. Each module contains 2 schedulers, they share memory access and they share the floating point scheduler. Its basically the hardware level equivalent of hyperthreading but is actually as you say more advanced. What would be super duper fabulous would be if you could get both AMDs multithread module and Intels hyper threading together imagine the multi tasking!

Long story short it handles 8 threads so who the hell cares what the marketing people called it.

I imagine given Intel and AMD's cross licensing we'll end up seeing this eventually anyway. There's no reason both of these technologies can't work together. Intel would do better out of it though due to better branch prediction.

It would be interesting to play with a frankinstien chip cross between amd modules and intels hyperthreading, but on the side of marketing clarity may have been nice, but as you say it works as 8 threads so I guess they are not wrong in how they have marketed these chips.

They've marketed it so as to take advantage on consumers who don't know better. I was happy to buy my FX-8120 as I knew already what I was buying when I got it. The best is yet to come.

 

[winterwolf]

Ok. I see you point, but still cant get it. Why when I check my 3dmark11 or cinebench results with similar builds in the logs I read number of cores -8, number ot threads -8. And in my log it says 4core/8threads.?!?!?!

 

[mjw21a]

Don't ever trust a company. Just a product. Companies lie to get sales. In thus Intel and AMD are the same