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| GeoCommunity Mailing List |
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| Mailing List Archives |
| Subject: | Re: [gislist] Workstation Recommendations |
| Date: |
01/24/2007 10:25:00 AM |
| From: |
Quantitative Decisions |
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At 09:47 AM 1/24/2007 -0500, Tripp Corbin wrote:
>As to processors, it have been my experience the multiple or duocore do
>not offer great increases in performance unless you run multiple
>applications at one time.
This is true in theory and in some circumstances, but in practice it often
turns out otherwise. I have run dual processors, single processors, and
(currently) a dual core processor and I routinely monitor resource
usage. Here are some additional considerations suggested by this experience:
* You are *always* running multiple applications. Just open up Task
Manager and look at the list of processes: there will be dozens of
them. Sometimes your machine bogs down because one or more of them fires
up right in the middle of your GIS operation and they compete for CPU
cycles and disk I/O bandwidth.
* ArcGIS in particular has an architecture that (sort of) exploits
multiple processors. This becomes clearest whenever you run a "model" or
script-based tool. Your computer is running ArcGIS on top of Python (or
whatever). This maxes out both my cores, giving me an effective CPU speed
of 6 GHz.
* When you have CPU resources in reserve, such as an additional
processor or core, then (usually) the machine remains responsive while you
are running a compute-intensive process, such as a cartographic modeling
operation on a large layer. This makes it possible to do other work while
the process occurs, which greatly reduces operator frustration.
* After upgrades, I have noticed the most spectacular increases in
responsiveness have come with increases in disk I/O bandwidth.
* A "bogging down" of the machine might not be a hardware
problem. Virus checkers can be the worst culprits, along with
malfunctioning networks.
To make an informed decision about an upgrade, you ought to run some
performance monitors while doing the operations that slow down your current
machine. Even something simple like the "System Monitor" on Google Desktop
is much better than nothing. Find out where the bottleneck is and address it.
By the way, a fancy video card does exceptionally little for you unless you
are doing 3D work. I have benchmarked this with GIS software over the past
10 years. For routine 2D display, the Quadro FX 1400 I'm currently using
is not measurably better than any of the lower-end cards I have had over
the past five to seven years. (3D is a different matter!) I could pay
another two grand for the highest-end Quadro, for which I would get twice
the 3D performance and exactly the same 2D (that is, GIS display)
performance. (I could drive four screens at a time with it, though :-).
Cheers,
Bill Huber
Quantitative Decisions
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