I am planning to purchase a new computer with either an Intel 820 2.8GHZ dual-core chip without hyperthreading, or Intel 630 3GHZ single core with hyperthreading. I understand the advantages of a dual core running multiple applications, but because I (sometimes, but usually) do not run more than one application at a time my question is slightly different.
Given two computers with the same RAM, bus speed, cache, etc. etc., will the performance of a single application running along with the usual background utilities (firewall, anti-virus, anti-spyware, etc) be better with a dual core? Or is a single with hyperthreading just as good? I was thinking that with a dual core, one would run the app while the other would handle the utilities? Utilities are probably not a very big issue now, but as they get increasingly intricate in the coming years, that may change.
My typical usage is 40% microsoft office, 40% web, and 20% gaming.
Thanks
