only 1/2 of potential power?

[Orionetheus]

When I ran one of the distributed.net programs that tries to find aliens etc and uses my idle cycles. I noticed that on my Mac book pro my CPU usage went up to 170%.

Now when I'm doing day to day things I don't see 170% so I'm wondering why don't I get those numbers normally?

[Performa636CD]

I think it's because it has two cores. So if both cores were running at "full throttle" then you'd see 200%. Anyone want to confirm this?

"Normal" operations shouldn't require more than 100% of one core, I would assume.

[Mackilroy]

Checking this out on my MacBook…

The maximum percentage IS 200% with two cores. Your normal work must not push the processor that hard, so that's why you're not seeing 170% usage of the chip.

[Orionetheus]

I push it hard plenty, it never goes beyond 100% though.

[Chucker]

Originally posted by Orionetheus
I push it hard plenty, it never goes beyond 100% though.

Open two Terminal windows and type "yes >/dev/null" into each. You should see CPU usage go up to 200%.

[PB]

Originally posted by Orionetheus
I push it hard plenty, it never goes beyond 100% though.
Run at the same time two demanding processes (or one well multi-threaded) and watch CPU usage.

EDIT: got beaten by Chucker :D

[McNewbie]

Is it unhealthy so to speak for the MB or any computers for that matter to run at full throttle? How would I know if my computer has the ability though to run close to full throttle so I know that it's got the capacity to do so and I don't have a comp advertised at 1.83ghz but really never goes beyond 1.0ghz:devil:

[Mackilroy]

No, it's not bad. And your computer doesn't actually run at 1.0 GHz – there's always a few processes going on - the idle speed is probably 1.33 or 1.5 GHz.

If you want to see it push itself, do as Chucker said, open up two Terminal Windows, and type "yes >/dev/null" into each.

[Chucker]

My 2 GHz MacBook Pro runs between 1.33 and 1.5 GHz most of the time, sometimes even 1 GHz. It rarely ever uses full speed. The bottlenecks are elsewhere.

[McNewbie]

Originally posted by Mackilroy
And your computer doesn't actually run at 1.0 GHz – there's always a few processes going on - the idle speed is probably 1.33 or 1.5 GHz.

Whilst saying that it runs a mere 1.0ghz was a bit of an overeaction I just wanted to know if my MB has the capacity that it has been advertised to have.

Prior to purchasing my MB I purchased an Acer laptop which was advertised as 1.66ghz, with a 1.73ghz chip but ran at a max of 1.30ghz :wow:

[Mackilroy]

Well, McNewbie - fear not - your computer DOES have the capacity to run at the max speed stated.

[McNewbie]

Originally posted by Mackilroy
Well, McNewbie - fear not - your computer DOES have the capacity to run at the max speed stated.

The test you mentioned in previous post, is that the only way to test if it is able to run at full capacity?

[Chucker]

Originally posted by McNewbie
Whilst saying that it runs a mere 1.0ghz was a bit of an overeaction I just wanted to know if my MB has the capacity that it has been advertised to have.

Of course it does.

Prior to purchasing my MB I purchased an Acer laptop which was advertised as 1.66ghz, with a 1.73ghz chip but ran at a max of 1.30ghz :wow:

I doubt that. How do you figure?

[Leonard]

Very few desktop and laptop computers run fully loaded because most of the time they're waiting on user input. Yes, that's right, they're waiting on YOU! Unless your running something CPU intensive like SETI, which doesn't need much user input, you will never fully load your computer. Even then, some programs will never utilize all of the CPU power of your computer. Mail, Word, Internet surfing don't need all that power. Computers get things done in nanoseconds and output it to the screen faster than Superman can get undressed. Programs like SETI, 3D rendering, 3D games, actually get close to using most of your computer's power.

[McNewbie]

[i]I doubt that. How do you figure? [/B] Well my partner did some tests and it would not allow for it to go over 1.30ghz, took it back to Acer and they admitted that the laptop is meant to have a 1.66ghz chip but a 1.73ghz was placed in it instead and mobo was not supporting it thus the reason as to why it's only running at 1.30

[Chucker]

Ouch. That's quite a blunder on Acer's part.

In any case, I haven't heard of such incidents wrt/ the MacBook or MacBook Pro. Personally, my MacBook Pro (advertised as 2 GHz) runs anywhere between 1 and 2 GHz, just as expected.

[Orionetheus]

Okay I tried it.

My cpu usage went up to 200% with the two processes "yes" running all of it.

But right now my world of warcraft is only using 100% no more no less. How do I make the other processor get used.

[Kickaha]

Run another copy of WoW. :D

The CPUs will be utilized according to the threading used in the application, and that's not something that anyone but the developers control.

[Chucker]

Sounds like World of Warcraft isn't multithreaded.

[jdcfsu]

So, theoretically could you have WoW running at full load on one core and then another core running Mail or iTunes going? Is that how this works?

[Kickaha]

Yup.

[Orionetheus]

Is there a way for me to "assign" WoW to another processor core?

[kupan787]

Originally posted by Chucker
In any case, I haven't heard of such incidents wrt/ the MacBook or MacBook Pro. Personally, my MacBook Pro (advertised as 2 GHz) runs anywhere between 1 and 2 GHz, just as expected.

Thats not really how it works, is it? The frequency at which the processor runs doesn't scale based on the load you put on the chip (meaning you have to get a 100% load to be running at 2GHz, and a 50% load is running at 1GHz). Modern day processors can scale back the frequency when idle, but it is not a direct relation to the % of CPU being used.

That % from top, is just a figure of time that each processes are using the CPU, not what % of the CPU is being utilized. So if a process uses 100% of the CPU, but only for a few microseconds, because the rest of the time the processor was idle, the % wont hardly budge. And within most programs, so little is being done, because it is blocking for i/o (user, disk, memory, etc), that makes for a lot of idle time. There are some programs that can stream their data in nicely, and can use high percentages of time of the CPU. But that is not to say that those processes are getting more GHz than a process utilizing 30% of the CPU time.

[kupan787]

Originally posted by Orionetheus
Is there a way for me to "assign" WoW to another processor core?

OS X does all of this automatically. There are tons of processes running all the time on your machine. Even if all you have open is WOW and the Finder, there are probably 20-30 other processes (each with multitudes of threads) all running (or sleeping, depending on their functions). The OS handles passing off the processes to the cores, and does its best to make for maximum utilization of your available resources.

[JeffDM]

Originally posted by kupan787
OS X does all of this automatically. There are tons of processes running all the time on your machine. Even if all you have open is WOW and the Finder, there are probably 20-30 other processes (each with multitudes of threads) all running (or sleeping, depending on their functions). The OS handles passing off the processes to the cores, and does its best to make for maximum utilization of your available resources.

All multiprocessor operating systems do this automatically, but others do allow the user to assign a specific task to specific processors. This can be useful for performance because otherwise the kernel scheduler would just assign the load equally between the processors. Assigning a processor affinity to a task would reduce the amount of cache thrashing.

[Marvin]

Originally posted by Orionetheus
I push it hard plenty, it never goes beyond 100% though.

Leopard will hopefully change this. It's rumored to be better at threading.

Most programs just use one core and at that, the most you should get is 2GHz. Using both cores, it would go up to nearer 4GHz. This is why the Intels are benching so close to the G5s, even the quad.

Programs that are multi-threaded tend to use two processors so a quad mostly goes at 2x2.5 ~ 5GHz and the Intels at 2x2Ghz ~ 4GHz and as mentioned, you can't really go by clock speed alone even though they are a rough guide if the machines are built well enough, so they come pretty close.

The best way to push the machine is to learn how to multitask. If you need to rip/burn a DVD then don't wait until you've finished what you are doing. Set it to work in the background and it will use one core while you work with another.

I ripped all my Family Guy episodes to ipod video fromat on the quad G5 and I did 3 at a time while I was doing my office work because quicktime only uses about one processor. I probably should've used isquint or something but I didn't know about it at the time.

[JeffDM]

Originally posted by Marvin
Leopard will hopefully change this. It's rumored to be better at threading.

Most programs just use one core and at that, the most you should get is 2GHz. Using both cores, it would go up to nearer 4GHz. This is why the Intels are benching so close to the G5s, even the quad.


It's pretty unfortunate that many of those benchmarks don't mention the CPU load, I mean, what you see is what you suggested, that the software in question isn't smart enough to spread the load over more processors. This doesn't have much to do with the OS right now, most of the load is computation by the software in question. I don't think there is any OS that can break up a thread to spread around the load, that has to be programmed in.

[slughead]

Thank God for single processor programs.

When they get into an infinite loop, I can use my other processor to end that process with 't3h quickness'

great for php programming while drunk

CHEERS!

[lundy]

I don't think there is any OS that can break up a thread to spread around the load, that has to be programmed in.


Right. All that multiprocessing OSes like OS X can do is use load-balancing to put other threads on the other processor(s). This keeps the busy process from having to get swapped in and out every 10 milliseconds as it would be if there were only 1 processor in the system. When the timeslice is up, the OS can see that there aren't any threads waiting in the run queue for that busy processor, or if there are, they can be moved to the other processor's queue, and leave the busy process to take the next timeslice without the overhead of a process switch.

[chych]

Originally posted by slughead
Thank God for single processor programs.

When they get into an infinite loop, I can use my other processor to end that process with 't3h quickness'

great for php programming while drunk

CHEERS!

I doubt this is true; these aren't OS 9 days anymore. The kernel will manage processes and share time between them; unless your php program is preempting the kernel (and it isn't), you can always kill the infinite looping program, independent of # of processors.

[Hiro]

Originally posted by Orionetheus
I push it hard plenty, it never goes beyond 100% though.

No, what you think is pushing it isn't. Very few people actually push their computers much anymore, despite what their ego's say.

[Hiro]

Originally posted by Orionetheus
Is there a way for me to "assign" WoW to another processor core?

No.

[Hiro]

Originally posted by chych
I doubt this is true; these aren't OS 9 days anymore. The kernel will manage processes and share time between them; unless your php program is preempting the kernel (and it isn't), you can always kill the infinite looping program, independent of # of processors.

This depends whether or not the infinite loop process is holding a kernel funnel lock or not. If it is you are generally screwed. Luckily this doesn't happen often because most of the boneheaded software isn't running as a kernel extension/driver.