| MikeB said: The Cell setup is excellent for throughput. - First step of course is to not share main Ram between GPU and CPU like on the 360, separate buses maximise potential (less latency). - Low latency main RAM, like XDR is crucial for getting the most out of a 8 processor chip like the Cell chip. - But most importantly IMO are the SPE's dedicate memory. They function as real system memory, but operates as fast as cache memory. This together with the huge EIB ring bandwidth is what allows the Cell to reach a near linear performance increases when tapping more SPEs. |
The SPEs each have 256K of memory, that's not much. And each SPE can only touch it's own local memory. So memory has to be read from main memory, sent to the SPE, SPE works on it, sent back to main memory.
The Cell is best suited for processing continuous and predictable (no branches) data streams, such as video compression or folding at home. The Cell's useful throughput falls apart for just about everything else because of branching, as the SPEs sit idle most of the time starved for data.
The Cell would be better suited in a Tivo/DVR. I think CELL tests showed it decompressing 12 HD TV streams at the same time.
Yet, today, America's leaders are reenacting every folly that brought these great powers [Russia, Germany, and Japan] to ruin -- from arrogance and hubris, to assertions of global hegemony, to imperial overstretch, to trumpeting new 'crusades,' to handing out war guarantees to regions and countries where Americans have never fought before. We are piling up the kind of commitments that produced the greatest disasters of the twentieth century.
— Pat Buchanan – A Republic, Not an Empire
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