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Date:      Wed, 22 Dec 1999 23:53:13 +0100 (CET)
From:      Oliver Fromme <olli@dorifer.heim3.tu-clausthal.de>
To:        freebsd-stable@FreeBSD.ORG
Subject:   Re: AMD 3DNow instructions on FreeBSD
Message-ID:  <199912222253.XAA16064@dorifer.heim3.tu-clausthal.de>

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Sean-Paul Rees wrote in list.freebsd-stable:
 > Is there a MMX enabled setiathome for us with non-3DNow! enhanced
 > processors?

No, MMX is completely useless for this kind of stuff, because
MMX does not support floating point operations.  Sorry.

However, I modified the FFT algorithm to optimize memory
throughput, at the cost of memory footprint (it needs about
2 Mbyte more RAM).  The speed increase is not as impressive
as with the 3DNow version, but it's still significant.
Here are some numbers:

Dual Celeron-466, Gigabyte 6BXD mainboard:
        original code:           18.0 - 18.5  hours per CPU
        generic optimized code:  10.5 - 11.0  hours per CPU
        speed increase:  ~ 40%

Single Celeron-333, Asus P2B mainboard:
        original code:           14.0 - 14.5  hours
        generic optimized code:  10.5 - 11.0  hours
        speed increase:  ~ 25%

Single Pentium-II-450, Asus P2B-LS mainboard:
        original code:           9.0 - 9.5  hours
        generic optimized code:  7.5 - 8.0  hours
        speed increase:  ~ 16%

As you can see, the Dual Celeron benefits the most, because
it has a very weak RAM bandwidth, but fast (though small)
L2 cache.

AMD K7-500, MSI MS6167 mainboard:
        original code:          10.0 - 10.5  hours
        Athlon optimized code:   4.0 -  4.5  hours
        speed increase:  ~ 60%

These numbers speak for themselves.  3DNow rules.  :)

I'm still waiting for a response from the Seti@home folks.
They have all the code, but they seem to ignore it.

Regards
   Oliver

-- 
Oliver Fromme, Leibnizstr. 18/61, 38678 Clausthal, Germany
(Info: finger userinfo:olli@dorifer.heim3.tu-clausthal.de)

"In jedem Stück Kohle wartet ein Diamant auf seine Geburt"
                                         (Terry Pratchett)


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