
Stata gets the most out of multicore systems.
No other statistical software comes close.
Almost every computer can take advantage of the advanced multiprocessing capabilities of Stata/MP. Stata/MP provides the most extensive multicore support of any statistics and data management package.
Stata/MP lets you analyze data in one-half to two-thirds the time compared with Stata/SE on inexpensive dual-core laptops and in one-quarter to one-half the time on quad-core desktops and laptops. Stata/MP runs even faster on multiprocessor servers. Stata/MP supports up to 64 cores/processors.
Speed is often most crucial when performing computationally intense estimation procedures. A few of Stata's estimation procedures, including linear regression, are nearly perfectly parallelized, meaning they run twice as fast on two cores, four times as fast on four cores, eight times as fast on eight cores, and so on. Some estimation commands can be parallelized more than others. Taken at the median, estimation commands run 1.8 times faster on 2 cores, 2.9 times faster on 4 cores, and 4.1 times faster on 8 cores.
Speed can also be important when managing large datasets. Adding new variables is nearly 100 percent parallelized, and sorting is 61 percent parallelized.
Some procedures are not parallelized and some are inherently sequential, meaning they run the same speed in Stata/MP.
For a complete assessment of Stata/MP's performance, including command-by-command statistics, see the Stata/MP Performance Report.
Stata/SE can analyze up to 2 billion observations. Stata/MP can analyze 10 to 20 billion observations on the largest computers currently available and is ready to analyze up to 1 trillion observations once computer hardware catches up. Stata/MP also allows 120,000 variables compared to 32,767 variables allowed by Stata/SE.
Max. no. of variables |
Max. no. of independent variables |
Max. no. of observations |
|
---|---|---|---|
Stata/MP | 120,000 | 65,532 | 20 billion* |
Stata/SE | 32,767 | 10,998 | 2.14 billion |
Stata/BE | 2,048 | 798 | 2.14 billion |
*The maximum number of observations is limited by the amount of available RAM on your system. |
Analyses do not have to be reformulated or modified in any way to obtain Stata/MP's speed improvements.
Which is to say, all platforms supported by Stata.
To run Stata/MP, you can use a desktop computer with a dual-core or quad-core processor, or you can use a server with multiple processors. Whether a computer has separate processors or one processor with multiple cores makes no difference. More processors or cores make Stata/MP run faster.
For more advice on hardware, see our discussion of hardware for Stata/MP.
For more information, please contact us or read the complete Stata/MP Performance Report.