Re: [gentoo-amd64] MAKEOPTS values for Athlon 64 X2

["Thomas Rösner" <Thomas.Roesner@digital-trauma.de>]

PaulNM wrote:
> Hey folks,
[...]
> I've also seen some mentions of -j9 by people with dual core systems 
> elsewhere, indicating it drastically speed up some emerges.

...and drastically slow down others?

>     So this leaves me with several possibilities. There's -j3 (current 
> setting), -j5, -j (no limit), -j9, or some other random number. Any 
> suggestions/warnings/links would be appreciated.

Compiling the kernel with -j is a popular benchmark, because it really 
stresses the VM/disk/CPU. And before you get your hopes up too high: the 
ebuilds that really take long (mozilla, openoffice, glibc, gcc) won't 
use your makeopts anyway.

My guess; going higher than -j5 won't do much for you, there will always 
be a process not waiting for IO (if your disk can handle the load, that 
is) for each CPU. -j3 will be better for cpp compiles, which hog the CPU 
longer and won't have to be scheduled out like with -j5.

Other factors: is this a desktop system? Do you want to actually do 
something with it while it compiles? How much RAM do you have?

(These are rethorical questions ;-))

Regards,
    T.
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