TechnologyCoordinator :
So in terms of smoothness and responsiveness, the conclusion I would come to is that the processor that does better in nearly all benchmarks would provide better smoothness and responsiveness.
In my most humble opinion based on the facts available, of course.
I will try to keep thing simple...
A formula one car is fast and in no way smooth. It is hard on the driver and on the car mechanic.
Same thing happen with cpu. a cpu can be fast, but that doesnt mean it is smooth. It can execute the code really fast, but can be interrupted often if the internal don't have enough registry to store information, or higher latency due to some bus with less bandwidth. Problem is, at the speed where those interrupt happen, you are not likely to feel it. The netburst architecture, with its long pipeline was often interrupted in case of, branch misprediction, in exemple, but that was not something you could actually feel, because the proocessor was running fast(in GHz).
The core2 quad and the Phenom are 2 excellent processor, no matter what others might say. The phenom has strenght and weakness just like the Core2 Quad. The core2 quad has a faster execution compared to the Phenom on a clock by clock comparaison. Especially in single thread. But, when you start to run multithreaded application, the gap between both cpu is closing as soon as the load become more important. because the Phenom has more headroom to move data because of faster HT bus that don't saturate as easily. The Core 2 Quad has less headroom because of its glued core. That's why higher amount of cache is a benefit.
So, what is smoothness? while one application may take longer time to render on a Phenom because it is a bit slower, that do not prevent other application to move data freely. If you are rendering with a fastest CPU, it may be possible than the other app may slowdown because their data are limited in speed by lesser buses. It doesnt mean the CPU is not fast, it is simply that the subsytem is not fast enough for the cpu to work at full capacity. I'm not saying that the Core2 Quad is lagging... I'm just trying to explain why some processor are executing some program faster than another and sometime slower that the other. Because there is not only a cpu core in a computer..
To be put at a slower scale, imagine running 4 instance of Winrar. Each of them is taking data on one slow ATA33 HDD, processing it, and writing it on the same drive. And all the core has it own file to work with. Poor HDD... Do you think that the HDD will be able to hold on and feed the necessary data to each core?
So, to answer your question, yes, the phenom can be smoother when running multiple apps than a Core2, even if it takes more time to process the data internally.
And yes, I do own a Phenom. And yes it is smooth. And no, I did not get bugged by the TLB bug. And yes, even at 2.2 GHz, thing are hapenning faster than my X2 4800+ at 2.4 Ghz. But yes, sometime it fell slower too. Yes, I got an ECS motherboard. And no, I did not have any problem having it recognize my 4 gigs of RAM. And no, I did not reinstall Vista (same chipset upgrade). it started right on, installed new driver and keep up running strong since 7 days now.