Best processor (i386) for Python performance?

[Tom Locke]

Hi All,

I'd be grateful if anyone could provide insight into choosing a good
i386 processor for Python performance.

Are any of the following of particular importance, or less relevant,
with respect to Python?

Raw clock speed?
Cache size?
Bus speed?
Intel's Hyperthreading?
AMD's 64 bits?

What about a dual processor? Can multithreaded Python take advantage
of this? Is it stable?

Thanks very much,

Tom.

[Martin v. Löwis]

> Raw clock speed?

Cache size?
Bus speed?
Intel's Hyperthreading?
AMD's 64 bits?

Python applications are often memory intensive, so a fast bus
and a large cache should help. Also, raw clock speed should help.
Hyperthreading and AMD64 are irrelevant (although for the latter,
it would be interesting to see how linux-x86 compares to
linux-amd64 on the same machine for Python performance).

Regards,
Martin

[Peter Hansen]

Tom Locke wrote:

I'd be grateful if anyone could provide insight into choosing a good
i386 processor for Python performance.

Are any of the following of particular importance, or less relevant,
with respect to Python?

Raw clock speed?
Cache size?
Bus speed?
Intel's Hyperthreading?
AMD's 64 bits?

What about a dual processor? Can multithreaded Python take advantage
of this? Is it stable?

I don't think anyone has yet studied this issue extensively.

Please buy one of each and let us know which one was fastest. ;-)

-Peter

[Jeremy Sanders]

On Thu, 26 Aug 2004 08:09:40 +0200, Martin v. Löwis wrote:

Python applications are often memory intensive, so a fast bus and a large
cache should help. Also, raw clock speed should help. Hyperthreading and
AMD64 are irrelevant (although for the latter, it would be interesting to
see how linux-x86 compares to linux-amd64 on the same machine for Python
performance).

Yes - AMD64 could be relevant if Python gets a speed boost from the extra
registers it has available.

Jeremy

[Martin v. Löwis]

Jeremy Sanders wrote:

Yes - AMD64 could be relevant if Python gets a speed boost from the extra
registers it has available.

Yes, could be. OTOH, it is 64 bits, so it could also see a slow down
because of the larger amounts of memory that needs to be moved for
pointers and longs.

Regards,
Martin

[Michael Hudson]

to*@livelogix.com (Tom Locke) writes:

Hi All,

I'd be grateful if anyone could provide insight into choosing a good
i386 processor for Python performance.

Are any of the following of particular importance, or less relevant,
with respect to Python?

Raw clock speed?
Cache size?
Bus speed?
Intel's Hyperthreading?
AMD's 64 bits?
Lots of cache is likely to help. There were some posts -- somewhere,
python-dev maybe -- which showed terrible parrotbench times on some
Pentium variant with almost no cache.

More of everything else is also good, but you knew that, right?

Cheers,
mwh

-- What are mathematicians' critical job skills? [...]

The ability to work long and hard on entirely meaningless problems.
-- Michael Hudson & Gordon McMillan, c.l.py