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HP Vectra XU 6/XXX Optimization Manual
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HP Vectra XU 6/XXX Optimization Manual

HP Vectra XU 6/XXX Optimization Manual

Hp vectra xu 6/xxx - guide to optimization performance
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Download this manual See also: Service Handbook, Optimization Manual
GUIDE TO OPTIMIZING PERFORMANCE
A guide to the performance benefits of your HP Vectra XU PC.
THE PERFORMANCE BENEFITS OF YOUR HP VECTRA PC
Your Hewlett-Packard PC makes use of a number of new features to provide you with the best
performance currently available from a PC. The configuration of your PC has been optimized
by HP to make the best use of these features for general applications.
The performance of your PC will depend on the applications you use. For example, different
software applications require different amounts of memory and will produce files of different
sizes. Best performance is obtained by balancing your PC's configuration with the requirements
of your software.
To provide versatility in your PC's configuration, Hewlett-Packard offers a number of
performance-enhancing accessories. Some of these are upgrades that allow you to increase
the performance of your PC in one particular area. Other accessories add to your PC's existing
capabilities.
This guide describes the high-performance features of your PC and how you can obtain
maximum benefit from them. This will help you to optimize the performance of your HP Vectra
PC for your specific use.
This guide is presented in two chapters:
•
Your PC's performance features
Describes the new features used by your PC, with suggestions on how to optimize their
performance.
•
Technical reference
Gives general technical reference information, with emphasis on the new features used by
the HP Vectra XU PC.
NOTE
The advanced Pentium™ Pro processor installed in
your PC provides the best performance when used
with 32-bit operating systems and applications.

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  • Page 1 A guide to the performance benefits of your HP Vectra XU PC. THE PERFORMANCE BENEFITS OF YOUR HP VECTRA PC Your Hewlett-Packard PC makes use of a number of new features to provide you with the best performance currently available from a PC. The configuration of your PC has been optimized by HP to make the best use of these features for general applications.

  • Page 2: Your Pc's Performance Features

    YOUR PC’S PERFORMANCE FEATURES This chapter describes the new features of your HP Vectra XU PC and how these features can bring optimized performance to your desktop application. OVERVIEW Your HP Vectra XU PC provides a number of new features that bring unprecedented levels of performance to your desktop application.

  • Page 3: Performance Topics

    NOTE The advanced Pentium Pro processor installed in your PC provides the best performance when used with 32-bit operating systems and applications. PERFORMANCE TOPICS The following topics are covered in this chapter: • Improving the performance of your PC’s processor •...
  • Page 4 NOTE The advanced Pentium Pro processor installed in your PC provides the best performance when used with 32-bit operating systems and applications. Inside the Processor Internally, your PC’s processor performs tasks by breaking them down into sub-tasks. Each of these sub-tasks requires a number of clock cycles to complete. The Pentium Pro processor integrates some functions that were performed by external components in previous generations of PCs;...
  • Page 5 The Scope for Improvement The multiplication factor that the processor applies to the (external) clock source to produce its internal clock can be compared to the transmission in a car; increasing the transmission ratio allows the car to go at higher speeds. Similarly, increasing the multiplication factor that the processor applies to the clock source causes the processor to use a faster internal clock, and so to operate more quickly.

  • Page 6: Advantages Of Dual Processor Configurations

    Replacing the Pentium Pro processor in your HP Vectra PC with one that uses a faster internal clock will improve the performance of your PC. For more information on installing a processor, refer to the User’s Guide supplied with your PC. ADVANTAGES OF DUAL PROCESSOR CONFIGURATIONS Although the Pentium Pro processor in your PC is the most powerful processor currently used by any HP Vectra PC, one HP Vectra is able to offer an even higher processing performance:...
  • Page 7 If your PC is running an MPS-ready operating system, installing a second Pentium Pro processor will yield a significant performance advantage. The second processor works alongside the first and shares the processing workload. This can increase the overall processing performance of your PC by up to 80%, depending on your application. NOTE The advanced Pentium Pro processor installed in your PC provides the best performance when used...
  • Page 8 Multithreaded Operating Systems Any operating system consists of a number of functions, each of which controls some small part of the PC’s operation. Application software uses these functions as building blocks to create specific, more powerful tools for the user. Under a single threaded operating system no individual function is independent.
  • Page 9 Multithreaded Applications Applications written specifically for multithreaded operating systems are also multithreaded. These applications permit their own operation to be performed through separate threads. Refer to the manual supplied with your software application to determine if it is multithreaded. The Advantages of Dual Processing in your PC Your HP Vectra PC is able to bring the advantages of multiprocessing to your desktop.
  • Page 10 This distinction is important. If you are running a multithreaded operating system, and use multithreaded applications or multiple single-threaded applications, installing a second Pentium Pro processor will significantly improve the performance of your PC. If, however, you run just one single-threaded application, then installing a second processor will offer little, or no performance advantage.

  • Page 11: Matching Memory Capacity To Your Requirements

    Additional Advantages of Dual Processing with your HP Vectra PC HP has proven experience in the successful design of dual processing PCs. Previous HP Vectra PCs have used the Pentium processor to bring MPS-compliant multiprocessing to desktop applications. Compared with the previous generation Pentium processor, the Pentium Pro offers an additional performance advantage when used in dual processing configurations: an integrated 256 KB level-two cache memory.
  • Page 12 This memory can be upgraded through installation of additional memory modules. Memory modules must be installed in pairs and can be ordered from HP in the following capacities: • 16 MB (two 8 MB modules) • 32 MB (two 16 MB modules) •...
  • Page 13 Windows NT If you are using Windows NT, you can use the Performance Monitor utility to monitor your use of memory and other system resources. Among other indications, the Performance Monitor will report any use you are making of the Windows NT swap file. The swap file is the virtual memory on your hard disk used by the processor when insufficient memory is available.
  • Page 14 Some operating systems, such as Windows for Workgroups, allocate a fixed disk cache, which you can configure directly. Others, such as Windows NT and Windows 95, use a dynamic allocation mechanism that configures the disk cache according to the amount of memory available.

  • Page 15: Benefits Of 32-Bit Applications

    Does Installing More Memory Always Improve Performance? Once you have sufficient memory, any extra memory you install will have no effect on performance. Indeed, surplus memory will probably not be used. BENEFITS OF 32-BIT APPLICATIONS Your HP Vectra PC has been designed to offer optimized performance. The benefit that you can gain from your PC’s advanced features will be determined by the software that you use.
  • Page 16 16-bit Applications Many of today’s more popular applications, including any designed for Windows for Workgroups, are 16-bit applications. These use 16-bit instructions, and handle both data and memory addresses as 16-bit quantities. The Pentium Pro Processor The Pentium Pro processor in your PC is a 32-bit processor. This means that it has been specifically designed to execute 32-bit instructions, and has 32-bit registers for storing data and addresses.
  • Page 17 Since the pipeline is the processor's most important means of accelerating instruction execution, the negative impact on performance is significant. NOTE For the reasons explained above, HP does not recommend using your PC to run 16-bit applications. Best performance can only be obtained when running 32-bit applications.

  • Page 18: Installing Fast Peripherals On The Pci Bus

    INSTALLING FAST PERIPHERALS ON THE PCI BUS The HP Vectra XU PC provides six slots for accessory boards. Two of these slots are already occupied by your advanced graphics controller and LAN controller. The remaining four slots are available for installing accessory boards and can be used to add extra peripheral devices to your PC.

  • Page 19: Increasing The Speed Limit With Ultra Scsi

    If you need to install an accessory board in your PC, HP recommends that the PCI bus is your first choice for expansion. PCI Plug and Play The PCI standard supports Plug and Play, which means easy configuration for installed peripherals.
  • Page 20 Multithreaded Operating System Support The PCI SCSI controller in your PC offers additional performance advantages under multithreaded operating systems. Your PC’s integrated SCSI controller is capable of receiving and processing the multiple commands issued by a multithreaded operating system. The SCSI controller is also able to re-order operating system commands to obtain the most efficient execution order.
  • Page 21 Automatic Configuration Your PC is able to configure many SCSI mass storage devices automatically through a new feature, SCSI Configured Automatically (SCAM). When installing SCSI devices, refer to the documentation supplied with the device to see if it supports this feature. SCSI devices which do not support this feature will probably need jumpers to be set for their configuration.

  • Page 22: Disk Striping

    When connecting SCSI devices, it is recommended that you observe the following overall cable length restrictions. Configuration Maximum Recommended Cable Length Ultra SCSI operation (20 MB/s) with up to four devices connected Ultra SCSI operation (20 MB/s) with 1.5 m five or more devices connected SCSI-2 operation (10 MB/s) with up to seven devices connected...

  • Page 23: Making The Most Of Your Pc's Ide Channels

    the buffer on to the disk. Before transferring more data to the disk drive buffer, the integrated SCSI controller must wait until the previous data has been transferred on to the disk. By using disk striping, your PC’s integrated SCSI controller can avoid this wait, by making the next data transfer to the next disk drive in the striping group.
  • Page 24 The IDE controller transfers data to or from IDE devices in response to data transfers received or requested on your PC's PCI bus. The technique used for a particular data transfer with an IDE device is chosen according to the type of transfer received or requested on the PCI bus. In this way, the IDE controller ensures that data transfers are optimized between the PCI bus and the IDE device.
  • Page 25 Your PC's integrated IDE controller can be configured as either a PCI master or a PCI slave. As a PCI master, the IDE controller will give a significantly improved performance for data transfers on the PCI bus. Typical PCI transfer rates are greater than 15 MB per second (with a maximum of 16.7 MB/s) when operating as a PCI master, compared with up to 5 MB per second as a PCI slave.

  • Page 26: More Video Performance

    MORE VIDEO PERFORMANCE Highest Graphic Performance Your PC's Millennium Video Adapter offers the highest video performance currently available for a PC. The Video Adapter provides all the latest graphic acceleration features as well as MPEG-1 software support for high quality video playback. The Millennium Video Adapter gives optimized performance with Graphic User Interfaces (GUIs), such as any of the Windows operating systems.
  • Page 27 The graphics controller stores screens of data for output to the display in video memory. These screens of data are called frames and so your video memory is also known as a frame buffer. Pixel Data The pixel data stored by the graphics controller defines the color to be displayed for each pixel. The amount of data required for each pixel is determined by the number of displayable colors;...
  • Page 28 The screen resolution determines how many pixels make up a screen for the display. The number of pixels required is typically very large. Even a standard VGA screen at 640 5 480 resolution consists of over 300,000 pixels. Consequently, when writing a screen of pixel data to the video memory, the video controller is manipulating very large amounts of data.
  • Page 29 The advantage of WRAM is that it allows both ports to operate simultaneously, meaning that it can receive new pixel data to be displayed while outputting existing data to the display. This makes WRAM up to 50% faster than previous types of video memory. Increasing Video Memory The Millennium Video Adaptor is supplied with 2 MB of WRAM video memory.

  • Page 30: Your Pc's Audio Resources

    The Millennium Video Adapter supports video refresh rates of up to 120 Hz for flicker free displays. The 120 Hz refresh rate supported by the MGA Video Adaptor is nearly twice the rate used by typical Ultra VGA controllers, making it one of the most ergonomic video controllers currently available.

  • Page 31: Hp Pci Integrated 10/100Vg Lan Interface

    Upgrading to Wave Table If you want to expand the sound generation capabilities of your PC’s audio subsystem, you can install an AWE-32 capable accessory board. This board uses a digital signal processor (DSP) to create synthesized sounds from a wave table of 32 polyphonic voices. The wave table is a library of recorded, real, orchestral audio samples that are stored in ROM memory.

  • Page 32: Performance Topic/Configuration Cross-Reference

    PERFORMANCE TOPIC/CONFIGURATION CROSS-REFERENCE The following table shows which category of configuration change is required to obtain the full performance benefits discussed in this chapter. Where different types of configuration change are indicated for a topic, these may refer to different performance benefits: for full details, refer to the performance topic.

  • Page 33: Technical Reference

    TECHNICAL REFERENCE This chapter describes the hardware architecture of your HP Vectra PC and explains how the latest advances in component technology have been harnessed to bring extra power to your desktop application. ARCHITECTURAL OVERVIEW Bus architecture Your HP Vectra XU PC is based on a three-bus architecture. Each bus connects functional components of your PC which have similar data handling requirements.

  • Page 34: The Intel Pentium Pro Processor

    THE INTEL PENTIUM PRO PROCESSOR Your PC uses the latest development in x86 family processors, the Intel Pentium Pro. This processor implements a number of new features, such as superpipelining and an integrated level-two cache. It offers a performance that is almost twice that of a Pentium processor operating at the same external clock speed.

  • Page 35: Superpipeline Architecture

    CHARACTERISTICS The Pentium Pro processor uses a 64-bit external data path and a 36-bit address bus. It integrates two 8 KB level-one cache memories (one for instructions, one for data) and a 256 KB level-two cache. Internally it uses three pipelines and five execution units for instruction execution.
  • Page 36 and addresses. The Pentium Pro provides five execution units, giving it increased flexibility for instruction execution. To ensure that the pipelines are used to their greatest efficiency, the Pentium Pro must keep its instruction units busy. For this reason, the Pentium Pro implements two additional features for instruction execution: out-of-order execution;...

  • Page 37: Integrated Cache Memory

    INTEGRATED CACHE MEMORY Cache memories are used by processors to accelerate access times for frequently used data and instructions. A cache is located between the processor and main memory, and stores copies of the last data read or written by the processor. If the same data is requested again by the processor, it will be supplied from the cache at significantly reduced access time.
  • Page 38 Dedicated Level-Two Cache Bus The Pentium Pro increases the performance of its level-two cache by accessing it over a dedicated, 64-bit internal bus. This means that accesses to the cache will cause no contention with any operations on the local bus. It also ensures that the level-two cache is able to operate at the full internal clock speed of the processor.

  • Page 39: Higher Clock Speeds

    • Shared — the data is valid and copies are stored in the caches of different processors • Invalid — the data is not valid. Data is stored in cache memories as cache lines of 32-bytes. Associated with each cache line are two status bits which define the MESI state of the cache line.

  • Page 40: Main Memory

    MAIN MEMORY The main memory in your PC consists of two, four, six or eight Double Interline Memory Modules (DIMMs). 16 MB of memory is fitted as standard (two 8 MB modules) and can be upgraded to a maximum of 256 MB. Memory modules are available in three capacities: 8 MB, 16 MB and 32 MB.

  • Page 41: Data Integrity

    With interleaved accesses, the memory controller begins to access the both modules in the pair simultaneously. The time required to access both memory modules is thus less than twice the time required to access a single module. The maximum (peak) data transfer rate that your PC’s memory can provide is 267 MB/s.

  • Page 42: Memory Upgrade Path

    MEMORY UPGRADE PATH The memory configuration of your HP Vectra XU PC is very flexible. Your PC’s memory capacity can be increased by installing pairs of memory modules of 8 MB, 16 MB or 32 MB in any memory bank in any order. The total memory capacities available are indicated in the following tables (duplicate configurations are ignored).

  • Page 43: Technical Characteristics

    TECHNICAL CHARACTERISTICS The technical characteristics of the HP Vectra XU PC are summarized in the following tables. Processors Type Intel Pentium Pro Clock speeds supported 150 MHz, 166 MHz, 180 MHz, 200 MHz Architecture Three-way, superscaler 64-bit data, 36-bit address Five execution units Out-of-order and speculative execution Advanced dynamic branch prediction...
  • Page 44 IDE Channels Description Two fast IDE channels supporting split-mode timings Connectivity Up to four IDE mass storage devices (two per channel) Data transfer rate Up to 16,7 MB/s (PIO mode 4 or DMA Mode 2) Video Controller Description 64-bit MGA Millennium Video Adapter installed on PCI bus Video memory 2 MB WRAM, upgradeable to 4 MB or 8 MB Supported resolutions...
  • Page 45 F0000h - FFFFFh BIOS Area (960 KB to 1024 KB) 100000h - F00000h Extended MemoryUsed by software applications (1024 KB to top of memory) DMA Channels DMA 0 Available DMA 1 Available if not used by parallel port or audio subsystem DMA 2 Flexible disk drive controller DMA 3...
  • Page 46 IRQ 12 Mouse controller if not disabled through the Setup program (if so - available) IRQ 13 Processor (floating-point unit) IRQ 14 Integrated IDE controller IRQ 15 Available if not used by integrated IDE controller...

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