X-Message-Number: 26914 From: Date: Fri, 2 Sep 2005 10:00:35 EDT Subject: Re: CryoNet #26904 Sequential and parallel processors From: Daniel Crevier _ (mailto:) : I believe the discussion between Yvan Bozzonetti and Thomas Donaldson would be clarified if they took into account the notion of cycle time. A parallel computer cannot react faster than the cycle time of its processors. Call this cycle time tau. If there are N processors, then it should be possible to simulate them in real time with a single processor having a shorter cycle time. The cycle time of this single processor simply has to be short enough that it can figure out, in time tau/N, what one of the parallel processors will do in time tau. This is perfectly true. It is why I said that parallel processors are faster than single one * at equal technology level*, that is, at equal clock speed. If the sequential, single processor run far faster than the parallel device it can compete with it or even overrun it. At most, the biological system is at one kHz clock speed, the electronics microprocessor is a 3 - 4 GHz. The last Intel biprocessor at 3.2 GHz is not as fast as the 3.8 GHz Intel P4... Yvan Bozzonetti. Content-Type: text/html; charset="US-ASCII" [ AUTOMATICALLY SKIPPING HTML ENCODING! ] Rate This Message: http://www.cryonet.org/cgi-bin/rate.cgi?msg=26914