Processor balance (was Re: Welcome and VME)

From: Chuck McManis <cmcmanis_at_mcmanis.com>
Date: Wed Nov 15 15:44:22 2000

All this discussion about bits and widths got me thinking again about an
issue I've followed from time to time which is processor "balance."

There seems to be some ideal ratios between memory, cache, and disk that
cause some systems to be more balanced than others. For example a CP/M
system with 64K of ram, no cache and a 5MB hard drive was fairly balanced.
A PIII with 256MB of ram, 128K of cache and 40GB of disk does not seem
"balanced." In this case the processor seems under powered.

I thought at one time that it related to bus bandwidth and processor
bandwidth (how long a processor would take to execute ram filled with NOPS)
that kind of stuff but I've never been able to quantify it.

--Chuck
Received on Wed Nov 15 2000 - 15:44:22 GMT