There was a time when dual-core processors were out of the reach of quite a few people. However, things have moved on as it's now possible to get a dual core processor for under £80. But till now, the only processors available in this price range were the Pentium D 805 and the newly releaded D 915. Unfortunately, these processors are based on the ancient netburst architecture and are hence plauged with high power consumption and heat output.

AMD has just released a new dual core CPU to compete with the above mentioned offerings from Intel. Dubbed the 3600+ X2, it retains the 2.0 GHz clock frequency of the 3800+ X2, but has had the amount of L2 cache axed from 512 kB to 256 kB.

This new chip is expected to retail at the $135 mark, which makes it one of the best price/perfomance offerings on the market today.