How to Use More Cores in CPU?

Undoubtedly, the current-era technical evolution has changed the current performance conditions of the Bost CPU and other components. If we compare the Intel 4004, the first processor released in 1971, to the modern-day Intel 10th Series Processors, these chips have seen a staggering increase in speed and computing power in just five short decades. The cheapest budget smartphone can now handle computing tasks that were once unthinkable for even the most giant mainframe computers a few decades ago. Even the most basic laptops with hundreds of times more power than the computers that ran the Apollo missions. 

However, Everything from smartphones and tablets to laptops, desktops, and servers now contain multi-core processors. And it is always believed that the more processor cores you have, the better the performance. Everyone thinks this religiously, but it’s not always true. Even if you have a dual, quad, six, or core processor, you are not guaranteed that they are all constantly on. It is up to your operating system to decide which of your cores is active at any given time. In any of these cases, you must know how to use more cores in CPU to utilize the actual capabilities. 

How many cores does your CPU have?

Whether you’re into gaming, heavy audio, or video editing, knowing the total number of CPU cores can be very helpful. Estimating this can be useful when troubleshooting or seeing your CPU’s power. You must follow these simple steps to find out how many CPU cores your process has before enabling multiple cores. 

Step 1: Launch Task Manager

To open Task Manager, right-click on your taskbar or use the keyboard shortcut Ctrl + Shift + Esc to launch it.

Step 2: Head Over to the Performance Tab

You can find your CPU’s core and logical processor counts in the Performance tab. The core number stands for the number of physical cores your processor has. In contrast, logical processors show the number of logical cores. Additionally, Task Manager displays the performance of each CPU core. That way, you can determine whether enabling all CPU cores is worth the trouble.

What are the other factors to consider?

To manage CPU cores from within Windows, you must first ensure some relevant capabilities or whether these are enabled for the processor or not. Two main functions need to be managed by the BIOS:

• Multi-Core Support
• HyperThreading

If both of the conditions are fulfilled, it’s probably time to proceed with enabling multiple or all the physical cores of your processor. We have discussed three methods to help you go through the process. 

Method 1: Enable All Physical CPU Cores from BIOS

First, you must do some basic settings by configuring your system BIOS to use all physical cores in the processor. Follow the steps given below to do so:

Step 1: Restart your PC > Access the BIOS settings.

Step 4: Go to Multicore Support (or related settings) > select the All option.

Step 3: Restart your computer, again.

After going through the above process, it’s time to enable hyper-threading for your processor. Do not exit BIOS yet; instead, perform the following steps below related to enabling hyper-threading. 

Method 2: Enable HyperThreading

Hyperthreading is Intel’s proprietary function that divides a physical core on a CPU into virtual cores (or logical processors), where each acts as an independent processor. This means more tasks can be executed simultaneously, increasing the processor’s performance. For example, having 4 physical cores with hyperthreading will split each core into 2, making 8 logical cores/processors. To enable this:

Step 1: Go to the BIOS settings.

Step 2: Find the Hyper-Threading settings in the BIOS settings section. 

Step 3: Select the Enabled option.

The hyper-threading feature would have been enabled up to this point. Now that it is enabled, you can save the settings and exit the BIOS. Enjoy the multi-core performance!

Method 3: Enable all logical CPU Cores 

The second way on the list is to manually enable all logical CPU cores. Once you’re done with the BIOS, boot into Windows and perform the following steps to manually enable all CPU cores:

Step 1: Open System Configuration

The System Configuration is a settings pane provided by Microsoft Windows that permits users to configure the Windows environment. There are two ways to access these settings: by using the Windows search console method or via visiting the Run command section.

Windows search console method: 

• Go to the Windows search console by clicking the Windows logo given in the left-bottom corner. 
• Search for “System Configuration” in the Windows search bar 

Run command method: 

• Open the Run command by entering the Windows key + W from the keyboard. 
• Now, enter MSConfig in Run to open System Configuration. 

Step 2: Head Over to Advanced Options

Click on the “Boot” tab > select “Advanced Options” In the System Configuration from there. You will be taken to the advanced options, where you can fix the number of cores.

Step 3: Adjust the Number of Cores

Select how many cores you want to enable from the drop-down menu in the Advanced Settings window by check-marking the box next to the number of processors.

Step 4: Save the Settings and Reboot

Once you’ve chosen the number of cores you want to enable, save the changes, and you’ll be prompted to restart the PC.

Is it good to enable more cores?

Just because you can enable all cores on your CPU doesn’t mean you should. Your operating system and running programs will use as much core and processing power as they need. Multi-core processors have more cores, meaning more power and better processing speed. This is especially useful when running software that can use several cores.

However, there is no need to enable all cores on your CPU unless you are doing some kind of intensive computing or rendering that requires a lot of resources. You may encounter compatibility issues with some of your programs that enable all cores manually. We recommend this to you if you know what you are doing and are fully aware of all the risks.

How many CPU Cores do I need?

The theory is that the more cores you have, the more instructions you can process at once, leading to higher performance when multitasking. But do you need these extra covers all the time? For office work such as word processing, spreadsheets, emails, accounting software, and maybe some occasional Netflix or YouTube viewing, a dual-core CPU with 2 cores is sufficient.

Things change a bit when it comes to gaming, though. Most modern game titles now require potent processors, so to get a smooth, high frame-rate gaming experience, you’ll need a decisive 4- or 6-core processor. Likewise, if you want to use your CPU for graphics design, video editing, audio production, 3D rendering, or animation, an 8-core or higher CPU is preferable.

Related:

How Many CPU Cores Do I Need for Gaming?

Conclusion

We believe that tampering with the CPU core is not a wise decision. If you’re already on Windows 10 or 11, we recommend leaving it as the default and letting Windows manage the core for you. Going beyond four cores isn’t really necessary for the average user. But there is an exception. If you are running high-performance software that can only run on high CPU power. Plus, performance will improve for those who can use all the cores.

But again, a question arises, how to use more cores in CPU? Well, we have discussed different ways of doing so together with several other factors and things that you must consider while going through the process. First of all, you have to configure whether your processor really has multiple cores or the capability to use multiple cores by checking multi-threading or hyper-threading. After that, just follow the above methods in this post.