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The Processor Performance Equation

- Computer processors operate at a constant clock rate measured in ticks, cycles, or hertz - A program's CPU time can be expressed as either the duration of each clock period or the clock rate - The document provides an example problem calculating the weighted execution time and speedup of different processors on memory-intensive and processor-intensive benchmarks

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81 views8 pages

The Processor Performance Equation

- Computer processors operate at a constant clock rate measured in ticks, cycles, or hertz - A program's CPU time can be expressed as either the duration of each clock period or the clock rate - The document provides an example problem calculating the weighted execution time and speedup of different processors on memory-intensive and processor-intensive benchmarks

Uploaded by

Ñă Đîä
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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The Processor Performance Equation

Essentially all computers are constructed using a clock running at


constant rate. These discrete time events are called ticks, clock ticks,
clock periods, clocks, cycles, or clock cycles. Computer designers refer to
the time of a clock period by its duration (e.g., 1 ns) or by its rate (e.g., 1
GHz). CPU time for a program can then be expressed two ways:
Practice Problem
Imagine that your company is trying to decide between a single-processor
system and a dual-processor system. Figure below gives the performance
on two sets of benchmarks—a memory benchmark and a processor
benchmark. You know that your application will spend 40% of its time on
memory-centric computations, and 60% of its time on processor-centric
computations.
• Calculate the weighted execution time of the benchmarks.

• How much speedup do you anticipate getting if you move from


using a Pentium 4 to an Athlon 64 X2 4800+ on a CPU-intensive
application suite?

• At what ratio of memory to processor computation would the


performance of the Pentium 4 570 be equal to the Pentium D
820?
Solution
c) Let the required ratio of memory-processor computation
be ‘a’. Then, for equal performance, we can consider the
following equation.

3501a + 11210(1-a) = 3000a + 15220(1-a)


Thus, 4511a = 4010
i.e. a = 0.89

Thus, the performance of Pentium 4 570 equals Pentium D


820 when there are 89% memory operations and 11%
processor operations.

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