Windows 7: Dual Processor Speed Question

Hello again.
Im pretty sure you guys are ganna think im dumb but oh well.
I was wondering if you have dual processors and say it's 2.2ghz, is that the total speed or is it 4.4ghz becuase theres 2 cores?
Thx


P.S
Hope this is in the right spot.

This is 2.2. per core - that means core1 can do things at the 2.2 speed and core2 can do something else at the 2.2 speed in parallel. You cannot add them up.

2.2 is the max speed of each processor. It is not cumulative. So it is not 2.2 +2.2

But two cores are faster than one

Ohhh,
So im guessing its also the same with quad cores as well. I thought you like added them up or something lol.
Can you buy more then 4 cores or is that the limit btw?

Yeah, that's a pretty dumb question alright.

I am KIDDING!

Let's be clear about the difference between Dual Processors and Dual-Core Processors. Dual Processors means you actually have two separate physical processors in two different sockets on the same motherboard. Something like this:

dual cpu mobo help needed - Vista Forums

In that case, each CPU would run at 2.2GHz and you would have twice that in processing power.

Dual-Core means there are two separate CPU cores on one die (one physical processor). This gets a little trickier to explain, as there are many different ways of putting this together. In some cases, the CPU cache is shared between cores. In others, each core gets its own. There are also different ways that the individual cores can communicate with each other, or maybe not communicate at all with their fellow core(s). Multi-core processors are rated at the speed of an individual core, so you can't just add them all together and call that your "CPU speed".

How useful these are depends somewhat on the software they are running. If the software runs a lot of parallel processes (two or more going on at the same time), then multi-core CPU's are great. If the processes are serial (one after the other), then the spare core(s) don't have much to do.

You can read a little more here:

Multi-core processor - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

There are 6 core processors from AMD. But there are quasi no programs that can make use of them. The same goes for quad cores. A fast duo core (e.g. 3.2GHZ) is preferable over a slower quad (e.g. 2.5GHZ) - at least for now. You have to run things an awful lot of times in parallel to notice a difference.

Profdlp,
I looked at those links and now i feel more informed about processors, (yay!).
Thanks guys.

Not to sound like an Intel fanboy, but I think the I7 980X came to market first. It also supports hyperthreading, so Windows would report 12 CPUs. (It also costs about $1kUS, vs. about $300 for the most expensive AMD desktop 6 core CPU.)

Instead of "there are no programs that good make use of them", I'd say that there are few games that make good use of them. There are applications that can exploit many threads simultaneously. Most reviews of 6 core CPUs will include them. Example:

AMD's Six-Core Phenom II X6 1090T & 1055T Reviewed - AnandTech :: Your Source for Hardware Analysis and News

12 CPU's!?!?!
JEEZ i bet its fast lol.

Spot on, but IMO, the best part of owning a quad core is being able to open 8 to 10 apps at the same time with no perceptible loss of performance.

It's gonna be years before the majority of mainstream apps can take advantage of more than a dual core. There aren't even many mainstream 64 bit apps, and we've had a viable 64 bit Windows version for more than four years, possibly more if you count XP x64.