Haven't we missed the point. Set the profile to use 1 processor instead of the default of 16 and only 1 WU runs on the computer. Doesn't it?

It does. But that doesn't make it run that workunit any faster, since the workunit can use only one processor at a time.

Above W98/ME the ThreadMaster GUI for any windows answers that. As many cores and sciences managed/throttled independently.

Intel QuadCore processors are nowadays faster than AMD's quad core models, so I suggest you get a Intel QuadCore processor.

The cheapest Intel quadcore model is Q6600 which costs around 170 dollars, and is about 50 dollars cheaper than the next model, Q9300. In BOINC case, Q9300 is about 4 % faster per work unit than the Q6600 and consumes a little less power. Model after Q9300 is Q9450 which is, again, about 50 dollars more expensive and, again, a little bit more faster.

It is very easy for anyone that is not highly technical to get lost or confused trying to understand differences between one computer and another. So, try to look at it in simple terms. I will work with round numbers to keep it easy too. You have a P4 that I will say runs at 3GHz. That is slightly slower that actual but again it makes for nice round numbers. You want to compare that to a 2GHz quad core machine. As others have said in so many words, the computer operating systems and software out today does not really exploit multiple core CPUs like they should. Running one WU on a quad core, you would like to thing the computer will take pieces of the work to do and spread it across the four CPUs and work on the pieces at the same time. That is not possible with the software as it is written. So if you tell BOINC to only use one core and do nothing else on the machine, BOINC will use that one core (CPU) and the other three will sit idle. In that situation, a WU that takes two hours to run on your 3GHz P4 will take three hours on your 2GHz quad core. Truth is the quad core and the P4 are different architecture or chip designs and what I just said ignores those differences. The one WU running on the quad core using only one core will in reality take less than three hours to complete our WU we are using for comparasions. However, telling BOINC to run only on one core of a quad core machine is like running your car with a V8 engine on only two cylinders. Ignoring the reality that the engine would would rather rough, my point is that you would be wasting 75 percent of the engine's power. If you tell BOINC to use all four cores on the 2GHz quad core machine, it will complete four of our comparsion WUs in three hours while your P4 would complete one in two hours. In six hours, your P4 will finish three WUs - one every two hours - and your slower, in GHz terms, quad core will finish eight WUs - four every three hours. Eight versus three. That is a lot more work getting done in the same amount of clock time.

Now, trying to work with BOINC when you cannot see the screen is a challenge. Relying on some sort of screen reader, you have to keep that information organized in your head. That can be a challenge even for us sighted folks! With BOINC running four WUs at the same time and not keeping a work buffer of extra WUs, as I suspect you run BOINC without a work buffer now, your screen reader will be giving you information on four WUs instead of one so now it is four times as hard to keep up with what BOINC is doing. I would suggest you consider not trying to maintain as detailed a level of understanding of how BOINC is doing. Some WUs take longer to run than others, even if FAAH is the only project you do. The progress percentage is probably the main thing you will want to listen for. You will just be getting four values instead of one. When BOINC is nearly done with a WU, it will get another WU from the servers, just like it does now on your current machine. There could be times that you could possibly have up to four WUs waiting for the four WUs currently running to finish but it will normally be less than that. Once a WU completes, you have to either check the results status page to get how it completed - valid, error, or such, or you have to switch to the projects tab of BOINC Manager and listen for the new credit amount. It will go up if a WU completes and is valid. It may be difficult to not be able to follow every single detail of what your machine is doing by using all four cores but remember that you will, in simple terms, be doing eight WUs in the same amount of time you were doing three before. Doing two and one half times the amount of work in the same amount of time is a good thing and it what really matters.