Instructions per cycle?

Posted by Matt Simmons on Super User See other posts from Super User or by Matt Simmons
Published on 2009-07-25T19:49:35Z Indexed on 2010/04/30 14:38 UTC
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cpu

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Hardware

I've been learning a little bit more about how processors work, but I haven't been able to find a straight answer about instructions per cycle.

For instance, I was under the impression that a four core CPU could execute four instructions per cycle, so a four core CPU running at 2Ghz would execute 8 billion operations per second. Is this the case?

I'm sure it's oversimplifying things, but if there's a guide or something else I can use to set myself straight, I'm definitely open to ideas.

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