A customer wants a computer for performing a single-threaded task as quickly as possible. Which of the following CPU characteristics is the MOST important?

The correct answer is A. Clock speed. Single-threaded tasks execute instructions sequentially on one core, so the speed at which that core processes instructions - the clock speed (measured in GHz) - is the primary factor. A higher clock speed means more instruction cycles per second, directly speeding up…

Hardware

Question

A customer wants a computer for performing a single-threaded task as quickly as possible. Which of the following CPU characteristics is the MOST important?

Options

AClock speed
BHyperthreading
CFan speed
DNumber of cores

How the community answered

(55 responses)

A
87% (48)
B
7% (4)
C
2% (1)
D
4% (2)

Explanation

Single-threaded tasks execute instructions sequentially on one core, so the speed at which that core processes instructions - the clock speed (measured in GHz) - is the primary factor. A higher clock speed means more instruction cycles per second, directly speeding up single-threaded workloads. Hyperthreading and additional cores help with parallel/multi-threaded workloads but provide no benefit when only one thread is in use. Fan speed affects cooling, not processing performance.

Topics

#clock speed#single-threaded performance#CPU selection#processor characteristics

Community Discussion

No community discussion yet for this question.

Full 220-801 Practice