SMP programs?

[garbageis]

are all/most of the more popular linux programs coded so they can use SMP?

[nick098]

Why don't you use SMP? Or do you?
I'm sure you can find a few things that don't use SMP.

[garbageis]

well im planning on getting a new computer and i want to get a dual amd system and im just wondering how much i will notice having two cpus compared to one for overall use

[Craig McPherson]

Well, most programs probably aren't written for SMP, but still, you'll have half the processes on the system running on one CPU, and half on the other, so you'll still be a lot better off than with just one CPU. The kernel itself is SMP (assuming it's compiled as such), which means that internal kernel processes like disk swapping and disk flushing use SMP, which should help out a lot. And many programs that actually need a lot of CPU time are written for SMP, including all the important stuff like Quake 3.

[garbageis]

sorry never liked q3a ill be playing tribes2 if anything at all :)
thanks for the info

[ph34r]

Even if your apps aren't smp coded, you will notice a difference when doing several things at once. Like last night, I was compiling KDE2 and playing StrikeForce (a UT mod) at the same time with no hardware lag.

My system is a dual 450 with 384mb of ram.