But dual-cpu systems is going to cost a great deal of money once it comes out and the price wont lower for at least a year or 2. The point was to buy a computer that was powerful enough to handle post production programs and the odd game while being at no more than $1700 Canadian. and thats just the system alone...no monitor. The AMD Athlon 64 4000+ 939 Pins 1MB L2 Cache is currently $615.00 while the AMD Athlon 64 FX-55 is $1,043.00. While on the other hand the Intel P4 Processor 660T 3.6GHz LGA 775 2MB Prescott is $777.00 and Intel P4 Processor 650T 3.4GHz LGA 775 2MB Prescott $532.00. (All prices are in Canadian dollers.) Both the Intel cpu's are 64bit ready. Man......there are soo many different options and choices that Im starting to think that it isnt worth the confusion. So many people say AMD is better than Intel but an equal amount of ppl say that Intel is better. Honestly...all i wanted is a computer that was strong enough to handle my requirements, was within a reasonable price ($1600-$1800) and could perform without me needing to do any hardware upgrading for at least 3 or 4 years. (hardware upgrading doesn't include extra hard drives.)

I bought the Intel 650 recently. Im very satisfied with its capabilities. For the performance difference, I didnt want to spend too much more. I would have liked to buy a more powerful 700$ + cpu but computers are not the only thing I have in my life so I opted for 500$ range cpu.
Both Intel and AMD have their flaws so buy want you feel is best for you and your budget.

That 4000+ is $AU725. The 3500+ (Venice core) is $AU405 (or cheaper if you shop around) and is the equivalent performer of the 3.4GHz Pentium you mention, which itself is $AU579

The 4000+ should cream both those Pentiums in just about any task you put it to, because it is a more highly rated chip than the 3.6Ghz Pentium.

You might get a slight performance improvement from the Pentium(s) with rendering, because that task will take advantage of the hyperthreading capability of the Pentium. You'd need to throw a 4GHz Pentium at me before I'd be prepared to concede that it was a better choice for anything really. The Athlon64 chips are considerably better at most tasks, perfectly adequate at the tasks Pentium is reputed to be better at, runs cooler and is cheaper.

My advice would be to get it and save the extra money for the components in your PC that actually do the work. There is FAR too much emphasis placed on the processor in today's PCs. Using finances wisely to maximise the other components in the system brings much more functionality.

First of all...thx (all of u) for taking the time to help out ....secondly...i decided that im going to wait til the end of summer and see if the prices lower and recheck my budget.....i still dont know if im going Intel or AMD but im going to make sure its 64bit ready and just let faith direct me in the right direction......but just to be on the save side...im upgrading to 2GB of RAM just in case. Im pretty sure that in the end its going to be between the AMD Athlon 64 3800+ 939 Pins 512K L2 Cache and the Intel P4 Processor 640T 3.2GHz LGA 775 2MB Prescott. Hopefully it will be able to last for a few years or until dual-cpu is a lot more affortable. :cheesy: