>I guess I should have qualified my question. If >you're pushing less than 100Kb/s then there's >really no reason to spend 3X the dollars on a >multi-core system. So the only real value of an
>As of NOW, the price differential between a >single core 2.6ghz Opteron and a dual-core one is >about 120%. I can't think of many applications >that are going to push a 2.6Ghz opteron that >justify spending more than twice as much. Of While I'd agree that in general CPUs today are really pretty fast, I think this '3X' and '120%' pitch suggests borked thinking, at least for the case of whether to buy a dual core socket 939 or 940 chip - because while the cost differential is quite steep, its only the CPU and in effect you get a lot more bang for an incremental change in system bucks - you don't even need a pricey mobo. If you're saving pennies, get a cheap Intel D920 system. Can't argue with the amount of grunt you get for 200 bucks (well, 140 quid including VAT). And the D805 is only 85 quid! Might be last year's FSB speed etc and hot compared to AMD, but if you compare the bang you get from a cheap mobo and one of these things with the breakthrough price performance we got from dual PPro systems in their day, its just laughable. Of course, it would be nice if one of the BSDs could actually have a working pthread system that scaled well and had a decent malloc too. How about it guys? ;-) How many do FreeBSD have now? 3? And do any of them work properly? James