Yipsl,
That is more than a fair reply. I like that you are taking a stance that is well defined and well presented. I also very much appreciate the fact that you are forthright with your stance.
You have given a rational statement that is well supported by you, and is at no time a backdoor approach. Many here could learn from that (but I will not mention any names).
Kudos to you for a good representation of the AMD camp.
I almost did consider a C2D this weekend. Fry's had an Intel C2D 4300 bundle, but I was told the ECS board it came with needed a bios flash. I didn't have an LGA 775 processor to go that route and didn't want to pay for it. Friends have had bad experiences with ECS boards from Fry's in the past, but I've heard nothing bad about their MSI, Gigabyte, Intel etc. boards. The only thing I've seen bundled in their weekly ads that was worse than the usual reconditioned ECS were a few (ugh) PC Chips boards.
With K8L and AM2+ coming out, I think AMD will be viable again in the server market, which is all the stock analysts care about. They should do even better in the gaming, enthusiast market., though I think 4x4 makes them look too desperate.
Eventually , Intel will play leapfrog with Penryn and I hope to see the sort of viable competition that we saw from ATI and Nvidia for the past few years. For budget gaming, budget modding, unlicensed anime fansub torrents etc. both AMD and Intel budget dual core X2 and C2D products are good, but I may stick with AMD because of their presence in the local Austin economy, and because their business practices aren't as bad as Intel's.
On Friday, I ordered an MSI MBOX K8N6SGM-V from Newegg, a 400 gig Seagate SATA 3.0gbs, an external 500 gigabyte USB 2.0 by LaCie (shaped like a Lego brick), and an MSI X1650XT. That board has trouble with the Xxxx series, but no mention of a problem with the X1xxx series, so I'll see how it goes.
I got a Fry's bundle today with a low voltage X2 3800+ and another K8NSGM-V board. I think I'll go X2 3800+ with the second board, to replace the Northwood. That way, my Morrowind and Oblivion modding wife and I will have virtually identical PCs.
If the X1650XT doesn't work, I'll go 7600GS until $150-225 DX 10 cards arrive. I'll replace the stock APEX SolyTech SL-400TF ATX12V 400W with a better PSU later on too. I have a Cooler Master Real Power 450 in my Northwood box, but it doesn't have PCIe connectors.
Wolverinero79, I've heard two things about fusion; one is that the GPU core will be tied to the CPU such that high end processors will have high end GPUs, and budget processors will have budget GPUs; the other thing I've heard is that they will work alongside a discreet ATI graphics card for increased performance, either a poor man's Crossfire or ATI physics.
I've always read about CPU vs. GPU bottlenecks in games and if they're part of the same multicore, then they'd be paired perfectly. True, an upgrade without discreet graphics cards would require a new CPU, but I can't see fusion replacing gaming, 3D animation GPUs. I can see it working alongside torrenza, even if actual PCIe cards disappear.
One thing that needs to be done with GPUs is to get their thermals in check. All the time people have complained about Prescott/Smithfield/Pressler space heaters, and now complaints against 4x4, everyone seemed to tolerate heat issues with performance to enthusiast GPUs. Integration could solve the 'lousy onboard graphics' issue while alleviating cooling issues due to high end graphics cards.
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