Then there's the processor...

AMD may hold the flag for gaming CPUs but Intel is still the workhorse of processors for the business world. (Don't look back, Intel. You never know who's gaining on you.) "Business," for me, is video editing and I've yet to encounter an AMD CPU (I've tried everything up to an FX-55 -yes, I know, that's not quite current, but it will have to do for now and I have revise and consent authority) that can out-power an Intel processor at that task. (By the way, that "business" thing? It's just a very passionate hobby. I don't do it for anyone but myself.)

There's also a bit of snobbery involved here as well. The Pentium 840 Extreme Edition is not only dual core, but it also has HyperThreading enabled. The typical Pentium "D" processor does not. Why is that important? Well, because of things like what you see over on the right there. I admit it, it's pure ego. Nothing more, nothing less. But the thought of having the equivalent of four processors tucked under the hood is something that brings a smile to my face and a twinkle to my eyes. If you can't understand that, there's no way I could adequately explain it. If you do understand it, you're smiling too.

The specs are fairly nice too:

Architecture:          90 nm technology
L2 Cache:              2x1MB
L3 Cache:               NA
Clock Speed:         3.20 GHz
Front Side Bus:      800 MHz
Chipset Intel:           955X Express Chipset
Socket:                    LGA775
Motherboard:          Intel® Desktop Board D955XBK

(Yes, WRM, we've already had the L1 cache size discussion and the integrated memory controller discussion. I concede! AMD has a more elegant design. It's just not as fast as I need it to be for what I want to do. Maybe if AMD ingested some testosterone and shipped me over an FX57 things would be different. Based on what I saw with the FX55, they might -and wouldn't that be a hoot, a single core AMD chip matching a dual core HyperThreading Intel processor... I doubt I'll ever get to find out, not when AMD's concept of what you guys want to see is an Athlon X2 3800+.)