Pushing an i7-965 under Linux...

[Rob Williams]

Here's another great reason I feel like we should be including some Linux "benchmarks" in our processor reviews. Compiling is one area where threading is loved, and this screenshot proves it:



Ironically, I was compiling a newer version of the compiler. I compiled Firefox the other day and the entire process hovered at around 90 - 95% of each of the available eight threads.

 

[Optix]

At least I know that my i3 530 will be of use if I ever have to do this...which I probably won't. Linux makes me skeered!

Now I just need to get said chip.

 

[Rob Williams]

There's no reason to be scared of Linux. If you ever want to dive in, feel free to make a forum post about it and I can give you some recommendations

 

[Optix]

The most I have done with Linux is using SLAX to boot and grab data off of a hard drive if I corrupt an OS due to overclocking or helping to troubleshoot hardware for friends. Other than that I'm a Windows kinda guy.

 

[Rob Williams]

So I decided to give the same kind of test a go on Gulftown, and the results are again quite good. I didn't get to compile just what I wanted to with a quick install of Ubuntu, so I settled on compiling the kernel itself.

It's nice to see something quite so multi-threaded! I wish I could find a similar test like this in Windows, though. I've never found an easy-to-compile application there that would yield results quite as impressive as this.