alt Hacker NewsIt is funny to see how these older machines perform at their higher end limits. I'm guessing the idea on this was that if you needed that much RAM, the sacrifice of L2 cache was a worth while trade off.
It was only a few weeks ago that I found out the original BeBOX computers would switch off L2 cache when running in dual CPU mode. It was just a limitation of the memory controller. Again, the thinking of, if you need the extra compute over memory bus it would be a worth while trade off.
Replies
Looks like the BeBox motherboard didn't have the external L2 in the first place.
Besides web sources, logic dictates this as well: Since dual-cpu was its selling point, it wouldn't make sense to ship a disabled L2 implementaton on the mobo at extra cost. There was no single-cpu model.
Honestly asking though is it worth that trade off? I enjoy watching people benchmark older Intel x86 based chips and without cache they are frankly awful slow. I'm not sure two without cache beat one with. The BeBox did run a totally different processor though so I have zero domain knowledge for that which is why I'm genuinely curious.