While I was learning about cpu load, I came to know that it depends on the number of cores. If I have 2 cores then load 2 will give 100% cpu utilization.
So I tried to find out cores.( I already know that system has 2 cores, 4 threads so 2 virtual cores Check here about processor).So I ran cat /proc/cpuinfo
Which gave me
processor : 0
vendor_id : GenuineIntel
cpu family : 6
model : 69
model name : Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-4500U CPU @ 1.80GHz
stepping : 1
microcode : 0x17
cpu MHz : 774.000
cache size : 4096 KB
physical id : 0
siblings : 4
core id : 0
cpu cores : 2
apicid : 0
initial apicid : 0
fpu : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 13
wp : yes
flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss ht tm pbe syscall nx pdpe1gb rdtscp lm constant_tsc arch_perfmon pebs bts rep_good nopl xtopology nonstop_tsc aperfmperf eagerfpu pni pclmulqdq dtes64 monitor ds_cpl vmx est tm2 ssse3 fma cx16 xtpr pdcm pcid sse4_1 sse4_2 movbe popcnt tsc_deadline_timer aes xsave avx f16c rdrand lahf_lm abm ida arat epb xsaveopt pln pts dtherm tpr_shadow vnmi flexpriority ept vpid fsgsbase tsc_adjust bmi1 avx2 smep bmi2 erms invpcid
bogomips : 3591.40
clflush size : 64
cache_alignment : 64
address sizes : 39 bits physical, 48 bits virtual
power management:
processor : 1
vendor_id : GenuineIntel
cpu family : 6
model : 69
model name : Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-4500U CPU @ 1.80GHz
stepping : 1
microcode : 0x17
cpu MHz : 1600.000
cache size : 4096 KB
physical id : 0
siblings : 4
core id : 0
cpu cores : 2
apicid : 1
initial apicid : 1
fpu : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 13
wp : yes
flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss ht tm pbe syscall nx pdpe1gb rdtscp lm constant_tsc arch_perfmon pebs bts rep_good nopl xtopology nonstop_tsc aperfmperf eagerfpu pni pclmulqdq dtes64 monitor ds_cpl vmx est tm2 ssse3 fma cx16 xtpr pdcm pcid sse4_1 sse4_2 movbe popcnt tsc_deadline_timer aes xsave avx f16c rdrand lahf_lm abm ida arat epb xsaveopt pln pts dtherm tpr_shadow vnmi flexpriority ept vpid fsgsbase tsc_adjust bmi1 avx2 smep bmi2 erms invpcid
bogomips : 3591.40
clflush size : 64
cache_alignment : 64
address sizes : 39 bits physical, 48 bits virtual
power management:
processor : 2
vendor_id : GenuineIntel
cpu family : 6
model : 69
model name : Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-4500U CPU @ 1.80GHz
stepping : 1
microcode : 0x17
cpu MHz : 800.000
cache size : 4096 KB
physical id : 0
siblings : 4
core id : 1
cpu cores : 2
apicid : 2
initial apicid : 2
fpu : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 13
wp : yes
flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss ht tm pbe syscall nx pdpe1gb rdtscp lm constant_tsc arch_perfmon pebs bts rep_good nopl xtopology nonstop_tsc aperfmperf eagerfpu pni pclmulqdq dtes64 monitor ds_cpl vmx est tm2 ssse3 fma cx16 xtpr pdcm pcid sse4_1 sse4_2 movbe popcnt tsc_deadline_timer aes xsave avx f16c rdrand lahf_lm abm ida arat epb xsaveopt pln pts dtherm tpr_shadow vnmi flexpriority ept vpid fsgsbase tsc_adjust bmi1 avx2 smep bmi2 erms invpcid
bogomips : 3591.40
clflush size : 64
cache_alignment : 64
address sizes : 39 bits physical, 48 bits virtual
power management:
processor : 3
vendor_id : GenuineIntel
cpu family : 6
model : 69
model name : Intel(R) Core(TM) i7-4500U CPU @ 1.80GHz
stepping : 1
microcode : 0x17
cpu MHz : 774.000
cache size : 4096 KB
physical id : 0
siblings : 4
core id : 1
cpu cores : 2
apicid : 3
initial apicid : 3
fpu : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 13
wp : yes
flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat pse36 clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss ht tm pbe syscall nx pdpe1gb rdtscp lm constant_tsc arch_perfmon pebs bts rep_good nopl xtopology nonstop_tsc aperfmperf eagerfpu pni pclmulqdq dtes64 monitor ds_cpl vmx est tm2 ssse3 fma cx16 xtpr pdcm pcid sse4_1 sse4_2 movbe popcnt tsc_deadline_timer aes xsave avx f16c rdrand lahf_lm abm ida arat epb xsaveopt pln pts dtherm tpr_shadow vnmi flexpriority ept vpid fsgsbase tsc_adjust bmi1 avx2 smep bmi2 erms invpcid
bogomips : 3591.40
clflush size : 64
cache_alignment : 64
address sizes : 39 bits physical, 48 bits virtual
power management:
Now I am totally confused. It shows 4 processors, with 2 cpu cores.
Can anyone explain this output?
Once my cpu load was 3.70, Is this maximum load? Still at that time cpu was at <50%.
What about turbo boost? Are all cores are turbo boosted or only physical?
Any method in Ubuntu to get current cpu frequency to see if the processor is on turbo boost or not?
Load was to 3.70 about 100%. But CPU usage wasn't 100% because of IO response time. This does not means that IO device will be at maximum speed, but io device will be 100% busy, which sometimes affects applications using IO ex: music may break.
Best Answer
The words “CPU”, “processor” and “core” are used in somewhat confusing ways. They refer to the processor architecture. A core is the smallest independent unit that implements a general-purpose processor; a processor is an assemblage of cores (on some ARM systems, a processor is an assemblage of clusters which themselves are assemblages of cores). A chip can contain one or more processors (x86 chips contain a single processor, in this sense of the word processor).
Hyperthreading means that some parts of a core are duplicated. A core with hyperthreading is sometimes presented as an assemblage of two “virtual cores” — meaning not that each core is virtual, but that the plural is virtual because these are not actually separate cores and they will sometimes have to wait while the other core is making use of a shared part.
As far as software is concerned, there is only one concept that's useful almost everywhere: the notion of parallel threads of execution. So in most software manuals, the terms CPU and processor are used to mean any one piece of hardware that executes program code. In hardware terms, this means one core, or one virtual core with hyperthreading.
Thus
topshows you 4 CPUs, because you can have 4 threads executing at the same time./proc/cpuinfohas 4 entries, one for each CPU (in that sense). Theprocessornumbers (which are the number of thecpuNUMBERentries in/sys/devices/system/cpu) correspond to these 4 threads./proc/cpuinfois one of the few places where you get information about what hardware implements these threads of execution:means that
cpu0is one of 4 threads inside physical component (processor) number 0, and that's in core 0 among 2 in this processor.