Curious about Ghz to GB/s

iParanormalx

The strange one
Messages
1,276
Location
US
Kindof an engineering question that can relate to decision making about system upgrades. I'm almost sure I'm missing elements of the equation so tell me where my logic is flawed:

CPU clock speed measures how many CPU cycles per second.
CPU cycle speeds are measured by frequency per second (hz).
Every cycle contains as much data the system type or memory interface allows.

Ok so for an idealistic example a 1Ghz processor (which would be 1,000,000,000 hz) running on a 32-bit OS could cycle up to 32,000,000,000 bits/sec

There are 8 bits in a byte so total CPU bandwidth in bytes could be about 4,000,000,000 bytes/sec.

In a similar example with a 64-bit OS would it double the overall bandwidth of the CPU from 4GB/s to 8GB/s?
 
Last edited:
In a similar example with a 64-bit OS would it double the overall bandwidth of the CPU from 4GB/s to 8GB/s?

Alright could you tell me what you mean by bandwidth ?
Do you mean the actual ram installed on the system or do you mean the memory added on by AMD/Intel chip maker ?

If you mean the memory on the cpu itself sadly no what you see there is stock only.
The cpu needs the ram to throw stuff back and forth while peforming jobs.
Clocking up the cpu or underclocking that would be be based off the ram you got.

Check this old newegg ad page and look at the product feature.
You have a very interesting question but even I am at a lost here at the moment.
Intel Celeron 420 Conroe-L Single-Core 1.6GHz LGA 775 35W Processor BX80557420 - Newegg.com
 
Alright could you tell me what you mean by bandwidth ?
I mean its' capacity to process data

Do you mean the actual ram installed on the system or do you mean the memory added on by AMD/Intel chip maker ?
I'm talking more about idealistic CPU specs like in a perfect world - rather than realistic CPU specs where the variables are affected by many factors such as background processes, FSB speed, RAM efficiency/amount, ect... I may be mistakenly separating the two analytic approaches and I may be blowing air because I don't have a good grasp on this topic.. i'm just dangerously curious lol

If we look at the total potential datarate of what a CPU is capable of would we expect to find double the rate on a 64-bit system compared to a 32-bit system?

In the newegg product you linked it seems to confirm it because it says this:
newegg said:
The Advanced Digital Media Boos significantly improves media performance for audio, video, image processing, multimedia and more. 128-bit SSE instructions are now handled at 1 per clock cycle, effectively doubling the speed of execution over the previous generation of processors.
 
Last edited:
AFAIK that's one Hz is one cycle, one transition from 1 to 0 or 0 to 1. So a 1Ghz processor can cycle through 1,000,000,000 bits in a second, ~125,000,000 bytes per second, not 4 billion.

And even then you're severely limited by the speed of the cache on the processor.
And instruction set :tongue:
 
Last edited:
And even then you're severely limited by the speed of the cache on the processor.
And instruction set :tongue:

Well I guess I was partially correct, but looking at his question just seems non explanatory.

When the cpu makers make chips they set them up to exactly what their suppose to do.
Bypassing what the cpu has currently installed into it would be impossible.

@Iparanormal: let me ask you something why would you want to know something like this ?
Its a sure fire gurantee most techs couldn't answer this if you need a more clearer answer.
Speak with a software engineer or ask amd/intel makers on their own forums.
 
^ The pursuit of knowledge! No other reason is necessary ;)

But no, I don't think there are any electrical engineers on this forum sadly, iParanormal :tongue:
 
@Iparanormal: let me ask you something why would you want to know something like this ?
Its a sure fire gurantee most techs couldn't answer this if you need a more clearer answer.
Speak with a software engineer or ask amd/intel makers on their own forums.

Like iFargle said, pretty much just for what it could theoretically do in a perfect world.

Though this question wouldn't be for a software engineer - more of an Electrical Engineeer or Computer Architect question. I'd know, since I'm a software developer and we only briefly touched on this kind of stuff in classes :p.
 
AFAIK that's one Hz is one cycle, one transition from 1 to 0 or 0 to 1. So a 1Ghz processor can cycle through 1,000,000,000 bits in a second, ~125,000,000 bytes per second, not 4 billion.

Do you think the memory interface or system type effect it? For example in a 32-bit OS 32-bits of information are processed each CPU cycle. If running a 64-bit OS would it process 64-bits of information each cycle?
 
Do you think the memory interface or system type effect it? For example in a 32-bit OS 32-bits of information are processed each CPU cycle. If running a 64-bit OS would it process 64-bits of information each cycle?

If the main BUS is large enough..I'd think it could.
 
If the main BUS is large enough..I'd think it could.

Could you give an example of how much bus space would be needed ?
Also about 64bit os and 64bit cpu what are the positives and draw backs about this ?

Also I do think he would need to speak with a software engineer.
Especially those that know cpu and can program them during development.
 
Back
Top Bottom