Intel says it will be shipping dual core Pentiums by the second quarter. I was wondering if the dual core feature will improve performance of FS 2004, or whether an application has to be specifically programmed to take advantage of the dual core technology?I ask because my experience with dual G5 processors is that an application has to be specifically designed to take advantage of the dual processors, and I was wondering if dual core technology has a similar requirement.Robert

Robert,There has been countless posts on the subject (use search button) and short answer is very clear - dual core will give you ZERO benefit for FS2004.Michael J.WinXP-Home SP2,AMD64 3500+,Abit AV8,Radeon X800Pro,36GB Raptor,1GB PC3200,Audigy 2

Get 2 Opterons instead ;)

Dual core CPUs is something we still know little about... Nevertheless, I could imagine that offloading add-ons like ActieSky and alike to 'true multi-cores', could become more effective than on 'fake multi-cores' (alias HT). Another thought is: Where's the market if there aren't any apps? Yet another question is, who's interested in burning 130W (apart from the energy companies??) or even more energy, when friendlier alternatives are available? Maybe it's easier to compile software for multiple cores than multiple CPUs? I mean, the logics could be integrated into the CPU or chipsets? Last but not least, 'multiple-multiple-cores', Sony, Toshiba and IBM have just announced (which is i.e. going into the Playstation3), is yet to be factors qicker than Intel's upcoming P'X's... Therefore, IMHO, dual-core is only the beginning of what we'll see in the near future and perhaps not more than a marketing hype..? I'm not too excited about these energy killers to be frank. Besides, Intel certainly needs some good PR after the -what I call- 'Prescott Disaster'... Good luck and kind regards Jaap

I say we just wait until Cell Processors come out. They're suppose to be the new revolution in computers. A friend of mine has really followed the technology for quite some time. According to him, your refrigerator, microwave, TV, telephone, etc will all have these "cell processors" in them. Through this technology, in real-time, your computer can borrow networked resources through whichever appliance has the availability. It's like having a huge ultr-fast networked rendering farm for your applications. You'll never need to upgrade your processor because the horsepower will be irrelevant.The Cell Processor technology was recently announced earlier this month. If you google it, you can probably find out more. Sure it will be out of reach for most of us for quite some time, but just think, when shopping for a new TV or DVD player, you can ask "Does it have a Cell Processor?" and then your mind can start to wonder how fast your Flight Simulator will run :)I know this is way off topic, and most of it's hearsay, but just think of the potential! Ok, enough beer, I'm going to bed!

Hi Eric, absolutely, the Cell Processor is exactly what I meant with 'multiple-multiple-cores'. It's multiple (afaik min. 8-fold) parallelization and should be much more powerful than the recently announced dual-core CPUs. The PS-3 should be the first popular product to implement Cell technology. MS' upcoming Xbox is taking a simular approach with 3 dual-core IBM CPUs. Although it's not exactly the same, the concept of multiple parallelization is. AFAIK-2, Sony, Toshiba and IBM have been taking it easy to announce the 'Cell' (originally, the announcement should have taken place last year), to first manage all the IP related issues. Anyway, in the meantime, I'll just enjoy the sheer power of the AMD64, lean back and wait and see what happens... Good luck and kind regards Jaap PS, very nice homepage you have...