Affordable Dual-Core

Future Cores

Intel is working now to address that situation with its next generation of processors. At the Intel Developers Conference in August, the company announced its next mobile, desktop, and server processors, code-named Merom, Conroe, and Woodcrest, respectively. The new chips are expected in the second half of 2006 and will be designed from the ground up as 64-bit, multicore CPUs based largely on the design of the company's current mobile processor, the energy-efficient Pentium M.

Introduced earlier this year, dual-core processors are the "new expression of Moore's Law," says Martin Reynolds, emerging technologies analyst at Gartner. Doubling up on processors offers a way to boost performance and increase the number of transistors per square inch while avoiding design problems and keeping heat-producing clock speeds at manageable levels.

Intel said at IDF that it's currently working on more than 15 multicore CPU projects for the future, and that by the end of 2006 it expects 70 percent of all desktop and mobile shipments to be multicore. AMD echoes the sentiment: Jonathan Seckler, AMD's product marketing manager for Athlon 64, says, "Dual-core processors should fill the mainstream PC market within 12 to 18 months."

Don't expect single-core processors to completely disappear anytime soon, however, says Shagorika Dixit, HP's product manager for consumer desktops. "Single-core processors will have a place in the value PC segment well into the foreseeable future."

High-End vs. Low-End Dual-Core Systems

What do you get by moving to a high-end system? The fastest dual-core PCs we've tested had fast graphics systems and 2GB of RAM, which account for some of the speed boost over our test systems.