Twice as Nice? Are Dual-core Systems Worth the Trouble? North Las Vegas NV

Posted by : Joe DeRouen

Dual-core systems are all the rage this year, and with good reason. The new darlings in the PC world (currently, only AMD and Intel offer this option) have two processors, which means that in theory, one processor will run background tasks while the other is free to execute programs such as your Web browser, art program, or newest 3-D game. I say "in theory," however, because it doesn't always work out that way.

I recently purchased a brand spanking new GatewayGT5034 system from Best Buy. The PC boasts an AMD Athlon 64-bit dual-core processor that runs at 2.2GHz and contains 2GB of RAM. It also contains the nVidia GeForce video card, a TV tuner, and Windows XP Media Center 2005. That last addition is the one that has caused me the most trouble, but more on that later.

The first problem I encountered was with Paint Shop Pro 8 (reviewed in last month's column.) One of the first things I did after setting up the hardware, of course, was to gather up all of my CD-ROMs and install them, and PSP8 was on the very top of the stack. Imagine my surprise, then, when it hung during installation. No problem, I told myself, and tried it again with the same results. Hours later, frustrated and without a clue, I wrote Corel tech support and immediately got an answer.

If your system is dual-core (check) and you happen to have a GeForce 6x or 7x video card(check) then PSP won't load properly. Apparently, it's a driver conflict. It was nVidia's fault--when they relea...

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