What is a bottleneck?

I see this term thrown around a lot here. I'm under the impression that it's a component of a computer that prevents the entire system from reaching its full potential.

But I could be totally wrong.

 

Correct! 2 Rep point

 

Umm yeah. I think the term comes from the fact that the neck of a bottle is usually narrower than the bottle itself, so the rate at which you can pour is always limited by the diameter of the neck.

Take a game for instance, the CPU needs to make many calculations, run the AI, run the physics, etc., and the video card needs to render the graphics. If your video card is really terrible though, no matter how fast your CPU is, your framerates are still going to be limited by how fast the video card can render the graphics. In this case, the video card would be the bottleneck.

 

Makes sense. Thank you very much, both of you.

 

It's not a computer component, it's actually not even a computer term specifically. (I've heard it used in everyday language fairly often too)

It's just, well, a bottleneck. The narrowest part, so to speak. If you turn a bottle upside down, it's the neck that prevents all the contents from pouring out instantly. It's holding everything back or limiting the speed.

When it's used about computers, it's the same. Its simply "whichever component is so slow it's holding everything back". It might be the RAM, the harddrive, the GPU, the CPU, or any other piece of hardware you can think of... Or it might be the user in some cases. (Think how much faster Word would go if you could just type 5000 characters per second... In that case, the user might be the bottleneck)

If you have a high end GPU, but only, say, 256MB system RAM, you'll get crappy performance in games. Your RAM is the bottleneck that holds back your GPU and everytihng else.

Make sense?

 

A bottleneck is actually the neck of a bottle... the part you drink from.

J/k these guys answered correctly!

 

Forget what these other guys said. Here it is in detail. The real scoop. Make sense now?

 

THAT is a bottle, a glass and some colored bits. A bottleneck is something else....

 

Quite the astute observer. For more details, see here: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/humor

 

A real world example. A highway with 3 lanes. Due to repair works ,2 lanes are closed near the end of the highway, leaving only 1 lane for traffic. The cars will end up slowing down and cause a jam.

 

Real example, say for example you have a bottle, it has a neck (thinner than the body) you turn it upside down, it takes time for the liquid to pour out ergo a bottleneck. I think everyone has done a great job explaining! R.I.P.

 

ZOMG! MY METAPHOR PWNZ YOU ALL!

 

I just had a really mean image come up to my mind to parody that one... but I dont think its appropriate for the forums.

anyways the bottleneck in a computer is the slowest running part that is causing all the faster running parts to have to run slower.

in games the gpu is usually the bottleneck, even more so in notebooks than desktops due to weaker gpus but pretty strong cpus.

 

Phritz
you da man!

 

And fro mthat we conclude that a CPU can handle more water than a GPU... Good to know.
When taking your laptop out in the rain, remember to give the GPU a raincoat on

 

I forgot to put a few arrows wth the label- the flow of information