cpu lifetime...

ive been wanting to know, in everyone elses opinion, how long dual cores like e8400,e7500,e5300 would last until their performance is so low compared to everything else that they become absolete. how long would each last? also, what is the MINIMUM cpu to have today and have decent performance?

Obsolete.

This is a pretty open ended question as it really depends on your use. If you game and such it will probably still be viable a couple years down the road, especially the full flavor e84/85/8600. If its on an internet/email box, a few years. Again depends on your usage.

Well, duo cores will still work, especially if duo cores with HT. But as EarthDog stated along the road in a few years they will become obsolete. If you were to buy a new processor, better make it a quadcore. Even if one wasn't going to game I'd still advise the person to get an i3. Apart from it being extremely fast compared to the older CPU's. It has a GPU in it so one wouldn't even have to buy a GPU..

I agree with Earth. It depends on what the box is used for.

If it is used for playing a game that isn't optimized for multiple cores, a highly clocked dual core will last another year or two.

If its common use is multiple excel sheets open, browsing the internet, listening to some music, a game, and a few other tasks all at the same time, a dual core will do it, but a 3+ core cpu is probably a wise investment.

If you do graphics design or lots of encoding of video/audio, then you should probably have got a 3+ core cpu yesterday

depends if overclocking is factored in the equation...

I just updated my system. I was running a P4 478 @ 3.0GHz and HT in a GX270 and it ran everything I wanted (COD4 MW, COD5 WaW, AutoCAD, Solidworks, even COD6 MW2). My AGP Radeon x1600 didn't have the shaders to read the text in COD6 but the CPU kept up with the game just fine. This is a 10 year old CPU.

More like seven years, but the point is still valid.
Ten years would be a P3.

I was using a 2.4ghz northwood for quite a while, i only recently dragged myself into the modern age of computers. That was a work box, so just email/web browsing essentially.