How is dual core similar to quad core? Thats like saying a cavalier motor is similar to a 350 small block. A 350 has twice the displacement and twice the power of a cavalier motor. The quad core is much better than the dual core. The point of the exercise was to prove that Macs are overpriced. You can build a PC that is twice as fast for the same price of an iMac(proven twice by two different people). As far as updating a machine, you don't have to update it. The P3 machine my brother runs Vista on has two upgrades. A new video card (workstations don't come with gaming video cards) and some more ram. Thats the only upgrades we had to make in order to run Vista on a 8 year old machine (which wasn't possible by what you said earlier). That machine was also not the top of the line. Top of the line would be a workstation running PIII Xeons. My computer rarely breaks down. The only problem I had was that the SCSI card stopped working a while back. I threw in an IDE hard drive(which I found in my garage) and I've never had a problem since. I've had 5+ years without any problems other than the SCSI controller. On top of that, I got my machine used so it means its even older. The only real update I had on my machine is again the video card b/c I have a workstation for buisness and they are not built for gaming.

 

well I know this from talking to some of my profs is that older programs were designed w/ a single core, then adapted for threads(multi-threaded) its the whole scenario here w/ various apps working, you could in theory have 16 cores but all the programs are trying to access 1 specific core which is in use all the time.
XP doesn't manage more than 1 core great, don't get me wrong it can deal with 2 and 4, but unless you are running a newer program it will usually only try to use one core only.

don't believe me watch your task manager in windows while running older programs.

Also don't forget Macs handle RAM usage better than windows does, so needlessly throwing more and more RAM at a mac will not nessicarily make it faster(ya might as well throw stickers on your mac).

and to note, remember intel Xeons are usually server/industry grade, not consumer... consumer grade hardware is crap in comparison. industy hardware is intended to last for years and years with minimal replacement which IMO is closer to what Mac hardware is, granted the cheaper macs are more consuper grade(think of the Compaqs and HPs you can buy at staples).

and if the original poster is still in the dark on what they will be getting, remember this, if you are doing school work(ie papers, reports, emails, meetings, facebook, etc.) then it really doesn't matter what laptop you go for, just get something that will suit your personal need, ie size, portability, power usage. and go from there. I say this because essentially it doesn't really matter wither you get windows or mac, its all the same stuff, just different piles. Both can run office(wither MS or open) use browsers, play solitaire, soduko, etc. just get something your comfortable with.

and to the person who is toting that the iMacs come with a fully movable scrolly ball thingy... yeah they had something like that for PCs, t'was called a trackball mouse... funny how it died but macs figured out a different way to use em. not tryin to nit-pic but how many times do you use the side scrolling feature other than to have quick keys, or just to say you can. cause if you really wanna be wow'ed then you should see my friends mouse which holds 4GB of storage, and last i heard it has Gentoo linux on it. IMO thats a much better idea than having more button on a mouse.

 

The difference between Xeon and the regular Core 2 Duo processor is that the Xeon has more internal cache so it can run faster. I've never heard anything about Xeons that they actually last longer than other Intel processors. Xeons are generally used in servers because the servers need the extra internal processor memory so they can multitask better. Also, the only Macs that come with the Xeon are the Mac Pros. Its not like the Mac Pros are teh only consumer machines to use Xeon processor. I've had 2 PC workstations that ran on Xeons. They are out there, but you will pay a premium. Remember, the Mac Pro starts at $2500 which is almost $1000 more than the machines myself and pheonix priced out. XP came out before multi core processors were main stream. Vista can use multiple cores more effeciently. There are also other advantages of multiple cores other than having proformace of oen program. With multiple cores you can run a couple processor intensive tasks at once.

 

I plan on on getting a motherboard that can support 2 diffrent proccessors and run 2 quad-cores (so it will be an octa-core) and runninig some SLI GFX cards, and it maybe cost me $1000

 

2 Quad Core processors are going to run you $600 alone (~$300 a piece). $200-$300 for the motherboard. SLI cards are expensive too. You will probably need a server tower as well because most dual processor mobos are server motherboards. Which is why they might not all be compatable with SLI. You will need to raise your budget if you want to build that machine. Although if you do build a dual quad core motherboard, you won't have problems for many years.