> This is valuable information. There goes the trust I had in the shop as > well :-( I read some articles also in this list about Core 2 duo, so I > want to go for that. I don't care that much about having the cheapest > machine available. I just want a machine capable of addressing 8GB of > memory. > > I notice that server boards seem to have multiple sockets and use quad > core processors. They are capable of handling 16GB easily. I don't need > so many horsepower in parallel. Nice for a mail or web server running > hundreds of threads. I plan to run 1 or 2 heavy jobs in parallel. And I > want the job to be able to acquire >4GB memory if needed. So speed is > important, but it's number two on the list. First the memory size needs > to be OK. > > Anyone has a good advice? AMD X2 processors? Proven solid and has no problems addressing 8GB RAM with Tyan boards. Has anyone actually stress tested a Core 2 Duo box and seen how it handles it? I know of one instance where a large Korean portal had no problems in trials with the Xeon version of the core 2 Duo but hit major stability issues when they went live.