[ale] Confused about processor speeds

[brian at polibyte.com (Brian Pitts)]

Christopher Fowler wrote:
> I have to admit that the numbering scheme in use today has been
> confusing me.  I got some new hardware in that is supposed to replace my
> older PIV HT processors.  My issue is that these new processors are
> 1.8Ghz and the old were 3.0Ghz.  These are dual core and old was
> hyperthreaded.  Do I really have a faster processor?  The bogomips score
> of the new processor is lower than the old.

Clock speed has always been a poor indicator of performance. I think a 
classic example of this is Intel's Pentium 4 versus Motorola's G4e. Ars 
Technica wrote a piece in 2001 on the different design philosophies of 
these two chips at 
http://arstechnica.com/articles/paedia/cpu/p4andg4e.ars . Reading it 
will explain some of the the many design factors that affect different 
aspects of CPU performance.

Anyway, the bogo in bogomips does stand for "bogus."

-Brian