News Acer leaks AMD triple-core mobile chip

http://www.bit-tech.net/news/hardware/2010/05/05/acer-leaks-amd-triple-core-chip/1

 

Duff four core CPU's again?
I assume so as a lot of people would rather have faster running dual core CPU's than slower triple core ones.

 

In THEORY, triple-core CPUs have always been a good idea. Most programs can handle 2 cores no bother, which leaves the third core to potter about making sure your OS is happy. In practice, it's usually been slower on the basis of clock speed. At 2.1GHz, I can't see that changing any time soon, especially with the massive Turbo Boosts that can be eked out of the i5 and i7 mobile chips.

 

Yeah, but I wish you could have progs remember they're "Set Affinity". For example, Handbrake encodes always crash after about 5 files on my (OC'd) 3.8GHz Q6600. So I have to set HB to use 2/3 cores, depending how long its going to be running, stop it from overheating. (It does however, still encode faster than all four cores at stock speeds, I have checked)

It would be awesome, if, like you said, you could set one core, or say 10% of all cores, to be devoted entirely to background stuff, something new that pops up whatever, and have your primary program utilising the rest (Say Adobe CS, or Handbrake, whatever)

 

AMD need something that can reduce clocks on unused cores. While extra cores are good, as shown by quads, they suck too much power.

 

Hmm, will be interesting to see if "core unlock" will be a feature on laptops but somehow I doubt it due to the extra heat churned out from the extra core.

Seems like a nice stepping stone until quad cores become the mainstream thing in laptops!