How to make software faster (with hardware)

I also read over the holidays some nice posts from a Photoshop architect (and engineer) about performance in software with regards to both 64 bit computing and the broader proliferation of multi-core processors (with Photoshop specifically, in this case). I've said this many (many) times, but this is a good excuse to repeat it: the best way for hardware designers and vendors (*cough* Intel *cough*) to improve utility (and therefore value) of the CPU is to improve memory bandwidth from the CPU. Clock speeds and cores and more processors and fancier instructions will make micro-benchmarks perform better, but RAM access is what will provide BY FAR the most improvement for well optimized software (read: where algorithms trump assembly).

For example, the biggest advantage that NVidia and ATI, with their GPUs, provide isn't the specialized HW instructions for rendering graphics (though those help): its that they can access RAM, oh, about a 50x to 100x faster than it can be addressed by the CPU.

That said, it is clear that the dramatic increase in multi-core processors in computers (and units per CPU) will create a new class of software and algorithms to be advantaged by them. Nobody's arguing that their sh!# doesn't stink...