Last Time i started working with XNA, I had a semi-old PC! with Pentium 4 3ghz,512 Ram, Radeon 9200

I Remember my Graphics Card was an issue, but since then my PC broke (time #4!) after Warrenty
If your wondering, but probably useless - 1 - Graphics Card *Updated Driver Fixed* 2- Motherboard 3- Power supply 4- motherboard :P

anyway I'm Buying a New PC soon but i have a few questions with the Components:
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1 - How do those Multi Core Processors Work? My Option was a 2.3 Quad Core *Intel*, now say for example I get Crysis and i think that needs about a 3GHz Processor. Would My Processor Work? -The only thing is that someone Said that it's 4 Processors at 2.3GHz.

2 - If I Develop apps with an x86 (32bit) Processor would my apps run on 64-bit (x64)? Could i Cross Compile if i need to?

3 - ATI Radeon HD .... (HD 3xxx series) - with 256 VRAM Should be good on all Games Right?

4 - *Software Based:* I Have Office 2003 Student Edition, can i upgrade (with the Upgrade Discs), to Small Business

5 - (personal choice) - Which is Better? Vista or XP? I would get an XP PC just because it was so freaking Awesome when i was little :P And Most My PCs were XP. and Vista's just a real pain :P, from what i hear, and the little i experienced fixing my neighbor's Vista Machine :P I Feel More Comfortable with XP and Games need less Resources, so it lightens the cost of my PC in the long run

Yes, a quad-core is quite similar to a motherboard with four single CPUs on it. Right down to the bottlenecks of all those cores having to fight for the same memory bandwidth...

If your main target is games, then I suggest getting a dual-core 3.0 GHz CPU instead of a quad-core 2.3 GHz CPU. Current games typically use only one or two cores, so the four cores wouldn't be able to help out enough to compensate for the lower clock frequency. Some games will scale up on four-core CPUs, and some other tasks (like building large projects, or ray-tracing) will also scale pretty well to four-core CPUs, and if those are your main concern, then a quad-core is the better choice.


256 MB VRAM is not enough for modern games -- especially if you're thinking things like Crysis. If you want to play games, you want a real graphics card, which means 512 MB RAM or more, and a graphics card where the third digit from the right is 8 or 9 (so it's a 256-bit card with good fill rate). Thus, ATI 3800, or GeForce 8800 or 9800, are what you should be looking at. Personally, I go with NVIDIA, because I find their drivers to be more stable, but it's a personal preference kind of choice.

Yes, 32-bit programs run on 64-bit OSes, by and large.

I would go with Windows Vista, especially now that SP1 is out. In fact, I'm running 64-bit Windows Vista on my dual-core, 3.0 GHz machine with a 512 MB graphics card (I was in the same situation as you a while back :-) and it's great!

No, I don't think the educational version allows you to upgrade to small business Office. There is, however, a "home user" version of office, which is fairly affordable -- on the order of $150. You can typically find it at places like Costco. Also, if you're going to do a lot of development, it might be worth getting a MSDN subscription. The cost is higher (four digits) but you get free access to almost everything MS does, for development and testing purposes. This includes office, operating systems, servers, etc.

1.- they work fantastic .. its not like 4 cpus at 2.3 ghz.. but more like you can load four times the apps at the same speed without chocking..not that the apps will run 4 times faster

2.- absolutely all modern 32 bits apps works with no problems in 64 windows with no performance issues of any kind

3.-go for the 512mb models if you can like hd 3850 or the hd3870 if not go for the 3600

4.- i dont have idea

5.- go with vista, with the latest updates and the sp1 runs very good , i have already like 6 months running vista 64 bits and everything runs super fine

hope this helps

Just adding my two cents, I don't even have a dual core computer and Vista runs flawlessly for me. I've had Vista since the release and I haven't had any problems with it.

Crysis has steep requirements, even the best computers can have trouble running it at max.

 

Here is what I have on my development desktop:

Intel Q6600 (Quad Core) 2.4ghz OC'd to 2.8ghz - $199

Gigabyte D3SL - $100

4gb DDR2 800 - $120

NVidia EVGA 8600GT - ~$150? (Love this card, such a great middle range card. Get a good EVGA around this price point)

320gb 7200rpm with 16mb cache

 

I love this PC to death. HL2 games run flawlessly at max res, AoEIII, CivIV and SimCity 4 all run extremely well too. I can max out all four cores when compiling Singularity which takes ~10-30 minutes (didn't time it, just a rough guestimate). PC only cost me ~$800 with a case and power supply.

8600 is junk in my opinion if you plan on running any high end games. Minimum I feel comfortable recommending from nVidia is the 8800GT with a g92 core, I'm very happy with my two 8800GTS 512mbs, one of those cards would be fine for most. I wouldn't waste your money on a 9xxx series card, they're basically refined g92-based cards. But if you insist on a mid-range card, at least go with the 9600 over the 8600, it is DX10, and can reach much better speeds, especially if you plan to overclock your card.