A_Pickel, I don't have any qualms with your opinion - you basicly acknowledge the shortcommings of both parties but continue to prefer on for whatever fanboy reasons you have - and there's nothing wrong with that.
Well, yes and no. Given $600 and a task to buy a processor, I couldn't go and feel right buying a Pentium. I think 3.6 GHz is the "last" speed bump that means anything, 3.8 does nothing and, oddly enough the 3.73 with the 1066 FSB doesn't either.
In all likelihood, I would buy one of the X2's with perhaps some inkling for a Pentium M. But that's it... I don't think high end P4's deliver.
However, given $200 and the same objective, I would buy the 3.2 GHz Pentium 4 in a heartbeat, as I find the lower end P4's are just dynamite performers for the price.
My two cents.
I'd like us to stop talking about the Sixes. They've got nothing to gain from hyperthreading or speeds over 2.0 / 2000+.
In one sense, I agree, in another, I do not. My parents run under 2000 MHz, 1300 and 800, respectively. They do O.K, I suppose, but there is no question but that they utilize exactly what the average computer users do.
Sure, there's a lot of fluff to their CPU ops. Web browsing and finances. An occasional game of solitaire.
Across the same board, my parents DO burn CD's, and they DO use a
hell of a lot of USB. Printers. Kodak EasyShare. The cellphone thingymabobs. USB drives. They also maintain their computers, through antivirus scans, defragmenting their hard drives, antimalware scans, things of that sort.
From experience, that single core 1.3 GHz Athlon XP does not run silky smooth when Norton is scanning, and you're trying to browse the internet. It just doesn't work. Similarly, the 800 MHz Pentium III, bless it's little heart, has a whopping trouble of a time
just scanning for malware. This, in my opinion, is alleviated with hyperthreading.
I dunno. I just think hyperthreading makes for a better user experience. I like it... but I do stuff in 3D Studio Max... so I don't count.
All in all, I love my P4. I'm not going to brag or say it could whip anything into discrete oblivion, but... it's time will come. And I'll buy an A64 then... unless Conroe has come out.