[rescue] Seeking opinions: change my desktop machine?

[John Floren]

On Wed, Feb 24, 2010 at 1:56 PM, Patrick Giagnocavo <patrick at zill.net> wrote:
> John Floren wrote:
>> Right now, my desktop is a 1.8 GHz AMD with 512 MB of RAM. It's a dog,
>> even running Linux. I just rescued a 2x1.2Ghz AMD system; should I
>> take the RAM, hard drive, and video card out of my desktop and stick
>> them in the new machine, making that my new desktop box? I'm wondering
>> what your opinions are on the tradeoff, i.e. 1.8 GHz vs. 2 1.2 GHz
>> processors.
>>
>> John
>
> What is the memory bandwidth of one vs. the other?
>
> Also:
>
> 1. can you add more RAM to the system
> 2. what kind of tasks do you do? B If single-thread tasks like Firefox
> web surfing, keep the 1.8; if you run a lot of stuff at the same time,
> get the 2 CPUs.
>
> --Patrick

I'm not really sure about memory bandwidth on either.

I should be able to grab another 512 MB from a system I've got sitting
around in the lab.

I've been using Chrome as my browser lately, and I also run pidgin +
emacs + xpdf + openoffice + drawterm + mgm on any given day. One
reason I'm leaning toward the 2 processor system is because when
Chrome or OO decide to get retarded (hey guys I'm gonna take 100% of
cycles OK?) I can't do *anything* because my WM can't get a word in
edgewise; I was hoping with 2 processors I'd get a little better
response even when I'm doing something foolish like using Google Wave.


John
--
"Object-oriented design is the roman numerals of computing" -- Rob Pike