<<And I'm betting that you can still use your computer while doing all that right...>>
If the software has an option to limit the use of threads. For example, with TMPEnc Pro you can use up to 8 threads (probably even more), but in the options menu you can choose the max number of threads. Why? That way you can always choose one less than the number of threads your computer has. So you can surf, listen to MP3s, burn CDs, etc... using that available single thread.
Sadly Microsoft WMV Encoder does not have this option! So when using Advanced Profile compression it uses 4 threads and my Dual Xeon is useless for anything else! If I could limit it so that it used only 3 threads, then the encode would take a bit longer BUT I would be able to use my computer for other stuff, while the encode was going on.
So as threads mutlipy all multi-threaded apps will hopefully able to let you choose the number of threads to allocate to that app when it runs. Most already do, just MS WMV Enc does not...
