[QUOTE=Cool Matty]No, they're nice at most right now.
Unless you have serious background processes eating lots of CPU time, it won't make any sort of impact on performance. And since hardly any programs actually make full use of dual cores, and that Vista will be the first Windows to really be "smart" about dual-cores, it is not nice.
And having dual cores doesn't affect multiple monitor usage at all. I play Ragnarok or Starcraft while watching anime all the time, on my single-core CPU. Same with torrents running. I've had 3 torrents running while playing a CS:S, I saw no FPS difference (my ping went nuts though, thank god for upload restrictions!). Finally, Anti-virus or spyware scans won't be much assisted by dual core either, since they're actually rather CPU unintensive, they just rape the hard drive. If your games stutter from antivirus scans, its more because of the hard drive raping than anything else.[/QUOTE]
Actually, if you've ever used a multicore CPU or a hyperthreaded Intel processor at the least, I think Patrick Norton put it best when it just runs "smoother". Multitasking does get a good boost, especially if, say, you're doing some modelling and, instead of saving and closing decide "Hey, I wanna play some games". Or if you're doing some photoshop, or illustrator, or anything like that. I still consider this boost only nice, but if you can afford it and you're upgrading anyways, definitely go for dual core.
Unless you have serious background processes eating lots of CPU time, it won't make any sort of impact on performance. And since hardly any programs actually make full use of dual cores, and that Vista will be the first Windows to really be "smart" about dual-cores, it is not nice.
And having dual cores doesn't affect multiple monitor usage at all. I play Ragnarok or Starcraft while watching anime all the time, on my single-core CPU. Same with torrents running. I've had 3 torrents running while playing a CS:S, I saw no FPS difference (my ping went nuts though, thank god for upload restrictions!). Finally, Anti-virus or spyware scans won't be much assisted by dual core either, since they're actually rather CPU unintensive, they just rape the hard drive. If your games stutter from antivirus scans, its more because of the hard drive raping than anything else.[/QUOTE]
Actually, if you've ever used a multicore CPU or a hyperthreaded Intel processor at the least, I think Patrick Norton put it best when it just runs "smoother". Multitasking does get a good boost, especially if, say, you're doing some modelling and, instead of saving and closing decide "Hey, I wanna play some games". Or if you're doing some photoshop, or illustrator, or anything like that. I still consider this boost only nice, but if you can afford it and you're upgrading anyways, definitely go for dual core.
D E A T H