Two Athlons 1800 or one 2100?

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alonso

alonso

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What is better, to have a setup with an Athlon XP2100 or one with two XP 1800? Because the price of the 2100 is almost two 1800s. Also talking about performance and being able to have faster and more processing power for computer home recording, which setup is the most desirable, a dual processor setup or a one processor setup. I know that some programs don´t take advantage of the dual setup, but if it does what can you tell me?
 
First of all, SMP does not double the performance. There's overhead associated with having multiple processors, so an MP 1800 rig might be around 50% faster than a single 1800 rig. Another thing to consider is that a dual Athlon motherboard is considerably more expensive than a single, plus you're probably going to need a more powerful power supply - I believe Tyan recommends 430W for their MP boards.

Something I'm curious about is how plugins are handled. I'm not sure if the host app is responsible for its threading, if the plugin itself handles that, or if it lets the OS decide. Each way can have different implications in an SMP environment.
 
Threads are threads, NT will distribute them between processors. This includes DX and VST plugins.

I agree though, it doesn't seem to be as cost effective to get two "pretty good" processors compared to one "really good" processor.

Not to mention that there are benefits to the faster processor. For instance, doing destructive edits on single tracks will be faster if you have one fast processor than it will be if you have two slower processors. That is, if you have two 1Ghz processors and apply a destructive edit to a track, the maximum processing power you have available is 1Ghz (less the OS/app overhead). If you have single 2Ghz processor, however, you have 2Ghz worth of processing power for your edit. Follow?

Slackmaster 2000
 
Is destructive editing inherently a single threaded process?...if so, why?

Also, how about this scenario: Sound Forge 6 is supposed to have background rendering, which seems to mean that you can destructively edit more than one file/track (applying edits while the previous one is still being processed). In this case, wouldn't a dual rig come out ahead?
 
In *most* cases, a destructive edit is just running a single DSP process on a track. In fact you can use regular DX or VST plugins to do destructive edits...in fact it's the most common way of doing things.

It would be possible for an editor to include DSP functions that divide & conquer a file using multiple threads, but that would be a lot more work (e.g. how do you merge???) and the process wouldn't work in realtime. It's not like image processing.

Yes, when you're running multiple plugin instances they will be distributed as necessary across the processors, but will the gain be enough to warrant the considerably increased costs of a dual processor system? I for one, would rather put money into a single fast processor and a motherboard that can handle twice that power (in my dreams) for future upgrades.

You can also run into driver snags when you setup a dual processor system. I know that the old gadgetlabs wave cards wouldn't work in a dual processor NT system for instance.

Slackmaster 2000
 
I've been doing the SMP (Dual processor) thing for years now, and am currently running a Tiger MPX with dual Athlon XP 1700+(s). I think the biggest advangage of dualies, is the fact that the OS (Win2K or XP) take advantage of SMP and give you a creamy smooth running system overall. My OS is Win2K Adv Server, and I run FTP, SMTP, IIS, and quite a few other processes in the background while running mail, browsers, ICQ, and Vegas Video 3.0 (multi-processor supported) in the foreground. I have not even begun to run out of processor power (about 50%), even with 30+ DirectX plugins running at once, on 24 tracks of 24bit 44.1Khz audio.

There are advantages to having a single processor machine, especially one that's faster (games like single processors better than dualies), but to me, once you go dual you never go back.
 
So if had the money to buy an Athlon 2100 you would all suggest this is better than two 1800s? Because a double 2100 setup would run my bank account to the ground....
 
I would go with the dual. There are a lot of advantages, and theres not that much of a differance between an 1800 and a 2100. For one thing, you can set the affinaty for non time critical processes to one processor, and leave the other completely free for recording. I really want one. I built one for a customer to do photo editing on, and it was extremely hard to give it to him once I was done.
 
Yep, duals are great. But to be honest they do have their amount of problems regarding compatability. Some soundcards do not like them.

Regarding price, it depends what you need for frills onboard. If you go for a basic board without scsi, dual gigabit ethernet etc they are not that expensive. If you go dual, do not cut corners on psu and memory.

NO, I won't go back to a single.
 
You will spend at least $100 more for your dual 1800 setup than you will for a single 2100 rig.

There are advantages and disadvantages. Maybe we should consider your needs?

Slackmaster 2000
 
If you happen to do things like video, 3D modeling, or CAD work, in addition to audio, then you would probably benefit from going dual. 3D and CAD work will gobble up as much CPU as you can throw at them.

System responsiveness is something I forgot about. I use a dual 366Mhz Celeron rig at home for audio and I have a 650Mhz P3 at work. The P3 is a faster computer, but my computer at home feels faster.
 
The thing is that I want my pC 90% for audio and the rest of the time forgaming and surfing the net and keeping personal file and stuff. That's why I'll have two hd. I also plan to buy the delta 1010 and use Sonar. I think i'm gonna invest like $1500 on the PC alone. 8 tracks is the highest number of tracks I'll ever record simultaneously, because i am a drummer...but most of the time I'll do one or two tracks at the same time. I really want flexibility to edit all the tracks and apply effects without having to worry about cpu.
 
I really want flexibility to edit all the tracks and apply effects without having to worry about cpu.
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With either of the options you're entertaining, you're not going to have to worry about having anough CPU.
 
If you think about Sonar, then dual is an option. Sonar makes use of a dual.

For gaming, a single is far better.

Surfing: any old pentium will do.

An other thing to consider: how good are you at putting this together and configure it. A dual is not a starters project. For a studio, also consider the noise. Keeping 2 +1800's cool is not silent.
 
Don't forget: I don't think windows XP home will support MPs. You may have to get Pro... if thats the OS you're gonna wanna use.
 
For all the reasons listed above, if it were me I would get the fast single. And spend the savings elsewhere.
 
You said you're only going to record 8 tracks at once. Are your mixes going to be in the 8 track range? A single XP 1800 processor will be plenty of power if that's the case.

Slackmaster 2000
 
Basically the setup would be for my little home studio aka my bedroom. I hadn't really thought about the cooling of two processors....and how much noise it would make....and yes. I'm trying to gather information about all the components I need and them buy them somewhere, but not from a retailer.....
 
and I forgot, i'll probably run everything to a mixer and then to an 8 track like a tascam 88 or something equal
 
...buy them somewhere, but not from a retailer
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You mean, like from the guy down the street? You really can't do better than Newegg, unless of course you've got a guy down the street.;)
 
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