Or not.

Well I managed to set up a Windows virtual machine easily enough. 
Although there is the *minor* problem of how to activate it. At work 
it's a non-issue; we have a volume license, so we can install as many 
copies as we want. But at home, I only have a regular single-user 
license, and I'm using that for my physical machine. Legally you're 
supposed to *buy* another license for the VM. Which is especially 
galling, given that MICROSOFT DON'T SELL THEM ANY MORE! >_< So I really 
have no idea what the legal way to proceed is here.

I tried to set up a Linux VM, but the installer tells me that the VM 
doesn't support 64-bit mode. I check the Virtual Box manual, and it says 
you have to turn on these particular settings. I turn them on; still 
nothing. (For some reason, some of the options are disabled; but they 
seem to be set correctly. I just can't change them, is all.)

So then I discover that you can also control Virtual Box from the 
command-line, and this gives you access to a bazillion options that you 
can't get at from the GUI. In particular, I had set the OS type to 
"OpenSUSE", but from the CLI I get access to an extra option called 
"OpenSUSE_64", which doesn't appear in the GUI. (Oh, that's nice!)

Now when I start up the VM, it instantly gives me some error about 
virtualisation hardware not being enabled in the BIOS. So I hunt around 
in the BIOS; no options available to change. So I start doing some 
digging...

...yes, that's right. I possess one of the last AMD CPUs ever to be made 
which does *not* support AMD-V. In fact, no processor supporting AMD-V 
has ever been made for socket 939. So if I want AMD-V, I must upgrade to 
a newer motherboard. And since Virtual Box won't do 64-bit on a 32-bit 
OS unless you have AMD-V (or Intel VT-x), that means I just plain can't 
run a 64-bit OS *at all*. At least, not using Virtual Box.

Well that's just awesome. *sigh*



In not entirely unrelated news:






Um... ouch.



always pay that much - or more - if you desire. But this is THE CHEAPEST 

stuff, so I suppose it's not *that* pricey. And hey, it's Kingston-branded.

Clearly I will have to sit down and see how this equation computes for 
various other platforms. (Core i5, Core 2 Quad, Phenom II...)

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Invisible wrote:

> So then I discover that you can also control Virtual Box from the 
> command-line, and this gives you access to a bazillion options that you 
> can't get at from the GUI. In particular, I had set the OS type to 
> "OpenSUSE", but from the CLI I get access to an extra option called 
> "OpenSUSE_64", which doesn't appear in the GUI. (Oh, that's nice!)

Now I'm wondering if it doesn't show up in the GUI *because* the 
necessary hardware is unavailable, or whether it's just a big oversight...

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Invisible wrote:

> In not entirely unrelated news:
> 




> 
> Um... ouch.
> 
> Clearly I will have to sit down and see how this equation computes for 
> various other platforms. (Core i5, Core 2 Quad, Phenom II...)

A similar bunch of stuff to run an Intel Core 2 Quad (specifically, a 


On the other hand, we have:

   AMD Phenom II X4 995: 3,770 PC Marks
   Intel Core 2 Quad Q9550: 4,178 PC marks
   Intel Core i7 920: 5,451 PC Marks

If you do an X-Y scatter plot, you'll vividly see that the first two 
systems are of approximately similar price and power, with the Core 2 
being slightly faster and slightly more expensive. The Core i7, on the 
other hand, is something like 45% faster but 65% more expensive.

Just for completeness, I asked Tom's Hardware:

   http://tinyurl.com/y97nhje

Unfortunately there doesn't seem to be a way to graph these numbers. 
Most of the benchmarks paint a picture similar to PC Mark (i.e., Phenom 
II and Core 2 are comparable, Core i7 is significantly faster). A few 
benchmarks show all three practically identical, and sometimes Core 2 is 
a tad slower than Phenom II.

(It appears that the Phenom II has greater memory bandwidth, but the 
Core 2 has greater ALU performance, so it varies depending on whether a 
given benchmark makes use of more of one than the other. The Core i7, 
however, is superior on both counts.)

As you can see, this conclusively proves... something.

(Now, if the Internet had become the searchable database that many 
people invisenged, I could just do an SQL query against the XML data 
holding the benchmark rules and plot the data in Excel. But nooooo...)

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Have a look at the 800 series of the i7 in the 1156 socket.
They're just as fast.
Even the RAM interface is as fast because it has faster clocks but the boards
are cheaper.

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Aydan wrote:
> Have a look at the 800 series of the i7 in the 1156 socket.
> They're just as fast.
> Even the RAM interface is as fast because it has faster clocks but the boards
> are cheaper.

It appears the main difference between the 800 series and 900 series is 
that the 900 has triple-channel RAM, while the 800 series uses "only" 
dual-channel.

That would certainly make one hell of a difference to the price of the 
motherboard, but I wonder what it does to performance?

The solution, of course, is to compile a parts list, price it up, look 
and the performance benchmarks, and see where it slots in...

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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Aydan wrote:
> Have a look at the 800 series of the i7 in the 1156 socket.
> They're just as fast.

http://tinyurl.com/y8bdj8a

For whatever reason, Tom's Hardware only has data for the Core i7 870, 
the most powerful 800-series model. Comparing this against a 900-series 
model with identical clock speed (and several other parameters, as it 
happens) produces this chart.

It seems the 900-series has higher theoretical bandwidth and ALU power, 
and yet on a couple of the benchmarks it gets beaten. But then, if a 
task takes almost 5 minutes to complete, does anybody care about 2 
seconds one way or the other? The long and short of it is that, yes, 
these two CPUs are in fact quite well-matched.

-- 
http://blog.orphi.me.uk/
http://www.zazzle.com/MathematicalOrchid*

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