I just picked up the new Maximum PC mag from the store today and they have a great article comparing different hardware setups in real world applications, It had some surprising results, I am not ging to go into details as it will only spure more arguments....lol

They compare dual verse single cpu's, raid verse single hard drive setups, different ram performance (rdram, ddr, sdram), 8mb vs 2mb hard drive buffers, different AMD motherboard chipsets, I think their is another one or two but the mag is not here in front of me and I do suffer from CRS desease...lol

I have always liked Maximum PC as when something is a dog, they call it a dog, their evaluations have always been right on in my experience.

If you get a chance, pick it up, some very interesting results, as it turns out I am glad I have made the choices I have over the last few months when it came to upgrading, but it really only worked out that way, like I said, some of the results surprised me.