Hyper threading PC

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Hi I have a new hyper threading P4. It works as advertised and is fast. When I encode video though, task manager only shows 50% processor use. The "second" (virtual) processor is basically idle. Is there a way I can configure both processors for the video encoding process? If both processors can be working on the same process (ie video encoding) it should get done faster. I thought I had read an article about this somewhere, but it was before I bought a hyper-threading PC, didn't pay much attention to it, and now I can't find the article again. Does XP expose this type of setting to the end user?

Thanks; Paul Hubbard
 
The problem is not in the way the processor or Windows works, but in the way
the video encoding program and/or codec is programmed. A process can only
make use of more than one processor (whether they are virtual or not) if the
process is multi-threaded, if the program is not programmed in such a way it
will only use one processor. Basically the only remedy is to use better
encoding software.

Regards, Wichetael

Paul Hubbard said:
Hi I have a new hyper threading P4. It works as advertised and is fast.
Click to expand...
When I encode video though, task manager only shows 50% processor use. The
"second" (virtual) processor is basically idle. Is there a way I can
configure both processors for the video encoding process? If both processors
can be working on the same process (ie video encoding) it should get done
faster. I thought I had read an article about this somewhere, but it was
before I bought a hyper-threading PC, didn't pay much attention to it, and
now I can't find the article again. Does XP expose this type of setting to
the end user?
 
Only software programs written to utilize the performance of
hyper-threading can benefit from hyper-threading technology.

Hyper-Threading Technology
http://www.intel.com/technology/hyperthread/

--
Carey Frisch
Microsoft MVP
Windows XP - Shell/User

Protect your PC!
http://www.microsoft.com/security/protect/

---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------


| Hi I have a new hyper threading P4. It works as advertised and is fast. When I encode video though, task
manager only shows 50% processor use. The "second" (virtual) processor is basically idle. Is there a way I can
configure both processors for the video encoding process? If both processors can be working on the same
process (ie video encoding) it should get done faster. I thought I had read an article about this somewhere,
but it was before I bought a hyper-threading PC, didn't pay much attention to it, and now I can't find the
article again. Does XP expose this type of setting to the end user?
|
| Thanks; Paul Hubbard
 
I have exactly the same with Word 2003. Can I assume that Word 2003 is not
written
to utilize hyper-threading.

Dave G

Carey Frisch said:
Only software programs written to utilize the performance of
hyper-threading can benefit from hyper-threading technology.

Hyper-Threading Technology
http://www.intel.com/technology/hyperthread/

--
Carey Frisch
Microsoft MVP
Windows XP - Shell/User

Protect your PC!
http://www.microsoft.com/security/protect/

-------------------------------------------------------------------------- -------------------------------


| Hi I have a new hyper threading P4. It works as advertised and is fast.
Click to expand...
When I encode video though, task
manager only shows 50% processor use. The "second" (virtual) processor is
Click to expand...
basically idle. Is there a way I can
configure both processors for the video encoding process? If both
Click to expand...
processors can be working on the same
process (ie video encoding) it should get done faster. I thought I had
Click to expand...
read an article about this somewhere,
but it was before I bought a hyper-threading PC, didn't pay much attention
Click to expand...
to it, and now I can't find the
 
Hi Dave; Interesting point you bring up. I saw a demo video from Intel that showed off the advantages of Hyper threading. It used an Excell Spreadsheet and video rendering software in the example, once with HP off and then HP turned on. When turned on, HP made a huge difference and both processes finished much faster. In 'single' processor mode it took much longer to complete. Is Excell multi thread (support HP), but Word is not? Both are part of the same software suite.
It seems to me some more investigation is necessary to take full advantage of HP technology. Maybe MS could get together with Intel to write some more about HP
Paul Hubbard
 
Hi Paul,

The plot thickens!! I will try some tests with Excel and Access to see how
they run.

I use Word mainly in conjunction with Abbyy Finereader OCR s/w to proofread
large (400-500 page) documents. The latest version of Finereader together
with Word 2003
has the ability to provide a "zoom window" within Word which shows the
original scan
of the section of text your checking. Unfortunately the process does mean
that the Word files
do get rather large. I assumed it was the large file size that caused the
slow opening and saving
of files but when I checked with task manager, Word never goes above 50%
proc. usage.

Is there anyone from MS that can explain this??

DaveG

Paul Hubbard said:
Hi Dave; Interesting point you bring up. I saw a demo video from Intel
Click to expand...
that showed off the advantages of Hyper threading. It used an Excell
Spreadsheet and video rendering software in the example, once with HP off
and then HP turned on. When turned on, HP made a huge difference and both
processes finished much faster. In 'single' processor mode it took much
longer to complete. Is Excell multi thread (support HP), but Word is not?
Both are part of the same software suite.
It seems to me some more investigation is necessary to take full advantage
Click to expand...
of HP technology. Maybe MS could get together with Intel to write some more
about HP.
 
I can't say if Word is programmed to utilize multi-threading, but if the
Finereader software is a plug-in to Word it might be that it is that
software actually tying up the processor and which is programmed for a
uni-processor environment. Word would just be waiting for the plug-in to
finish...

Also note that it is quite a momentous task to convert a package the size of
Office into a complete, efficient and well-designed multithreaded solution,
it's not just a matter of recompiling it or something. And aside from that
it depends on the task needing to be done whether multi-threading is useful
for it, some tasks just have to be done sequentially and as such there is no
use in trying to make it multi-threaded as it will give you no performance
gain whatsoever. And lastly Windows only shows the CPU utilization based on
the virtual processor model and honestly, there is no worse way to portray
the utilization of the CPU... Internally the CPU works so much differently
from it's executional model that this visualization is only a very very
rough indication. Note that the processor itself is actually a RISC
processor executing micro-code which already introduces much paralellization
into the execution stream giving todays processors the performance that they
have. If only one of the virtual processors is being used at any one time it
most certainly does not mean that the processor is only being used half of
the time, far from it, in that situation the processor is simply used as it
would have been when HT would have been disabled. HT only lets other
processes use certain parts of the processor core which are not being used
by any other process at the time. For instance if you have one program
simply moving a whole lot of data, it will only use the instruction and data
fetch units and leav the ALU and FPU units idling in the background, HT is a
technology which enables other processes which would like to use these
particular parts of the processor to use them, if you have two processor
trying to use the same parts of the processor they will not be executed
concurrently. Do keep in mind that hyper-threading is something completely
different from an actual multi-processor system and can, apart from the
execution model, in no way be compared.

Regards, Wichetael.
 
Paul Hubbard said:
Is there a way I can configure both processors for the video encoding process?
Click to expand...

If you are end user - no you can not.
Do some experimenting with your apps.
Watch the CPU usage graph in the task manager - are both CPUs busy when "heavy" apps are running?

--
 
Hi Wichetael
Thanks for your imput on HP. It's a good explanation. I realize now that programs do have to be optimized to take full advantage of HP. Intel has been pushing it's new compilers that optimize for HP. The visual model that Windows task manager presents is not very accurate in presenting the way HP works. Maybe the next version of Windows (after HP is a more mature technology) will address this

Paul Hubbard
 
I have a very particular problem with HT. If I have it enabled my Fidelity Active Trader Pro software crashes on open about 3-5 times before finally running (and will then generally crash sometime in the next few hours). With HT disabled this problem has never happened. This, by the way, is the only application that suffers from this problem (ironic since I bought the machine primarily for stock trading).

Any configuration ideas that might help or is this problem purely a problem with Fidelity's software?

Thanks,
Jordan
 
Jordan said:
I have a very particular problem with HT. If I have it enabled my Fidelity
Click to expand...
Active Trader Pro software crashes on open about 3-5 times before finally
running (and will then generally crash sometime in the next few hours). With
HT disabled this problem has never happened. This, by the way, is the only
application that suffers from this problem (ironic since I bought the
machine primarily for stock trading).
Any configuration ideas that might help or is this problem purely a
Click to expand...
problem with Fidelity's software?
Thanks,
Jordan
Click to expand...

Likely a problem with that software, it's probably seeing the hyperthreaded
processor as 2 physical procs and asking it to do things it really can't.
There are a few apps that just don't understand hyperthreading very well.
 
See if they have a software patch, check with the people who
provided the software.


|
message
| | > I have a very particular problem with HT. If I have it
enabled my Fidelity
| Active Trader Pro software crashes on open about 3-5 times
before finally
| running (and will then generally crash sometime in the
next few hours). With
| HT disabled this problem has never happened. This, by the
way, is the only
| application that suffers from this problem (ironic since I
bought the
| machine primarily for stock trading).
| >
| > Any configuration ideas that might help or is this
problem purely a
| problem with Fidelity's software?
| >
| > Thanks,
| > Jordan
|
| Likely a problem with that software, it's probably seeing
the hyperthreaded
| processor as 2 physical procs and asking it to do things
it really can't.
| There are a few apps that just don't understand
hyperthreading very well.
|
|
 
Thanks for the response. I contacted the software provider and they have no fix for the problem at the moment. Perhaps they'll be compelled to deal with the issue as more people start getting HT processors.
 
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