Its hard to say. Dual-core, quad-core and any multi-core are very similar to dual cpu, quad cpu setups of today. Basically the software running on them has to be multithreaded or multicpu aware to take advantedge of the additional cores/cpus. 95% of software currently available is not so they wont make any difference at all but as intel and amd are pushing dual/multicore so much this will change drastically over the next 12/24 months.
The only bummer is as also with dual cpu setups dualcore dont offer double the performance for double the cpu. So a dualcore 2gig (2x 2gig cores) wont actually be like having a single 4gig chip, more like 3gig in fact. So you are getting a 50% increase. It gets even less the more cores you add but of course you are still getting a boost and the threads are split among cpus which is less taxing overall.
My new daw system im putting the finishing touches to today (will be up for tomorrow) is dual-cpu but its dual-core ready. So when I finally do upgrade to dualcore cpus it will be like having a quadcpu system which apparently sx3 and nuendo 3 (both of which I will be running, hopefully in 64bit mode by then) can take advantedge of and life will be oh so rosy
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