I don't know why the author placed such emphasis on SSE3, and HT. The most SSE3 can offer is about 10%, and that is a best case scenario..

HT will offer much less, as it's really for multitasking. Even if the game were multithreaded, I doubt it would offer a big boost.

I'm sure Valve optimized the game for SSE2 though, as that has been out for ages..

An interesting question is, how much of a performance boost would going to AMD64 give HL2?

The extra registers would definitely help out alot, plus using SSE2 solely instead of the archaic x87..

This is the fourth review I see and the second I read about this matter (CPUs in HL2) and I also find it quite useless because it is only done with the most powerfulls VGAs.

HL2 is quite CPU dependant with new high end VGAs but not so with lower level ones. And not all people is arranged to buy these cards because of the cost or because they already did to play D3 (for example). But a lot of people can afford 100-300$ for a new CPU (that wont get outdated as fast as a GPU) and can be used for other things.

Thats what I think. I like Xbit articles and I usually read them, including this but not in depth, but if this one is made to make user have an easier decission about what CPU buy I think is not completed.

Athlon64 3500+ no doubt

guys i have a Intel Core 2 Duo CPU at 2.53 Ghz , 2 GB RAM , ATI RADEON 5670 1 gb GDDR5 and i run it maxed out at 225 fps ..but the point is my friend has a Athlon 28 at 1.8 Ghz , 448 mb ram , and a Nvidia GeForce 6100 256 MB and he run it on mediu-low at around 25-30 fps wich is very good i guess