Ryzom

gretchen wrote:OK my system is dead/dying and I'm looking at new systems. Some general questions about these new Intel processors...

I note that the speed seems lower than the old P4's, is that because you have 2 cores both running at that speed so the listed speed is really doubled?

Could look at it like that but it's not really correct. For sake of simplicity say yes.

Do both cores work if you are only using one program, like running Ryzom?

Ryzom doesn't support multiple cores/threading.

much of the descriptive language I have been able to find about Core 2 Duo seem to extoll the ability to run multiple applications without slowdown, so do the 2 processors only run different things, or are they able to run 1 program fast by sharing the load? I'm trying to sort out this from my past experiences with hyperthreaded P4s, where it "simulated" 2 virtual processors.

That comes down to not only how the OS handles it but also if the application you looking at is supporting/making use of it.
For example Win XP isn't up to it for real. Which is in certain setups respective configurations. There is a hotfix you can apply tho. Again simplifying it.
To be more specific, you can decide in a out-of-the-box configuration that application A may only run on core 0 and application B may only run on core 1. Which is done manually and not reliable in my opinion. I got no further experience with that either.

Basically, if you are mainly concerned with running one game, will it only be running on 1 core or the other?

Will be running on one/first core.

As you can see I'm not really technically clear on what these do, so keep it simple if you can Also I understand already some people prefer AMD and that's fine, not really what I'm asking about though. (That always seems to descend into spats, like nvidia vs ATI or coke vs pepsi.)

No worries here. Be aware that older Dual Core have some issues with the generated heat. Also there is a major improvement between the generations of Pentium D and Core 2 Duo (Conroe), there the Core 2 Duo is the way to go. I'm mentioning the Pentium D series as for the pricing but if you're able in any way go get the Core 2 Duo.

If you want to overclock it, you can gain incredible speed/performance ups with the right mainboard. In case you're gonna spend some money on a good cooling you could double the performance easily.

Well anyway there are more things to think about like getting 64bit now or later. Furthermore you must be aware that there are, last time I checked, only two mainboards available supporting AGP and PCIe same time. I was unlucky enough to own one of it for two weeks and all I can say it was biggest mistake I ever made. After that two weeks I kicked it in the trashcan and got a new one supporting only PCIe and my rig runs like a charm now.

Bottom line is that you can't go wrong with a Conroe.

magick1 wrote:Ryzom is a single thread program, that means it will only use one core. You can then run something else on the other core without affecting Ryzom.