Viper1 said:
No, they are not cores. Cores operate independantly, SPE's are not independant and their code is in order execution. Think of them as a middle ground between a 2 thread operational CPU and a real second core. |
"When we talk about cores we will always be using the most agreed upon definition of cores – the integer logic." - AMD on why Bulldozer has 16 cores not 8
The SPE can independently execute integer code. Therefore it is a core. Intel Atom is in-order and is considered a CPU still. The dependent part you are talking about is that the scheduling and memory management is done by the PPE, but it's done by a shared decoder in Larrabee and Bulldozer and those were cores as well.
