What if a single core breaks in an 8 core processor?

[thesnowtiger]

Hi,

Just wanted to know what the effect of one core breaking is.

Will the entire processor cease to function? Or will it just decrease performance?

Thanks.

 

[answ3r]

The processor most likely would just cease to function. However, it may only crash or have issues when that core gets under load, so in theory, you might be able to disable some cores and solve the problem, but not very likely.

 

[BrightCandle]

You don't get to choose which cores are disabled in the BIOS (if you have that option) and Windows has no support for partially failed hardware. So a single core failing would be the death of the part.

 

[itsmydamnation]

on AMD you can disable the exact core you want to. you cant disable a module but you can disable both cores in a module, if your catastrophic error was in the L2 of a module you might still have problems.

 

[gevorg]

define "break"

 

[sniffin]

define "break"

I imagine he means fault that means that core ceases to work correctly.

I remember unlocking a X4 960T to a 6 core part and I would occasionally get BSOD unless I shut off the 5th core. I could leave the 6th on and it would work perfectly. System instability, blue screens, etc is what would probably happen OP.