Nothing but AMD for 9 years now (4 PCs) and absolutely no compatibility problems or anything of that sort, ever. Just make sure the motherboard is not the cheapest POS on the market and you'll be fine. There were some heat issues with early Athlons if I remember correctly which meant that the computer might have needed better cooling than a comparable Intel system but nowadays they're pretty much even. It's actually usually the power fan that makes the most noise and that has nothing to do with the type of processor in the computer.

I second that. I've had one AMD desktop since 2001 (I think?) and it was going fine until I decided to upgrade recently to another AMD. No problems with the processor, though Norton IS2005 has been annoying me. Maybe in the past AMD has had some compatibility issues, these days they are as good as Intel in anything that counts. I suppose they do have an image problem, since Intel is almost synonymous with processors, but their products are as innovative as anyone's. Also, currently, their desktop processors are also cooler running and more energy efficient. For the near future, the price and performance of their desktop processors means that I'll be going AMD for the foreseeable future. Then again, I'll never say never to Intel, that would be for AMD fanboys. But maybe all this "Intel is safer" is the same mentality that sees Toyota as probably the most successful car maker of the current times..

At the moment, processors aren't increasing in speed so much because of excessive heat/inadequate cooling and power consumption, which largely go hand in hand. It's an inefficient way of getting more performance. That said, even the average processor today has enough grunt for most people, who do office things and browse the internet and so forth.

Otherwise, for laptops, due to the proliferation of Intel's Pentium M (as included in the Centrino platform), it's often easier to go Intel. AMD's laptop processor lineup is rather confusing at the moment, with various processor types rated at differing levels of mobility and performance.

That said, Intel are about to go the same way, with a lot of code names for various performance and energy consumption grades. If you're about to buy a laptop, hold off - Intel's new processor core is just about to be released. No longer Pentium M, now it's "Core Duo" - a dual core mobile processor. I think single core (Core Solo - maybe that's Han's brother.. ) will come later, as a value-oriented version.

Link to Anandtech review of the new Intel processor's details and performance, if you're interested.
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so when is that core dou suposed to be comming out because i am trying to decide between a mac laptop which i want but everyone at my school uses pc laptops so i dont no how well that will work. Alot of kids have teh tablet laptops which have been nothing but probems from toshiba almost everyones has gone back and most kids have had to get new ones. i might go for sony though instead of my toshiba laptop now wich is a peace of sh*%

That new processor was publicly released as of just this weekend past, I believe. It should be hitting product ranges within a month, but don't quote me on that. It can fit into existing motherboards and chipsets, so will more or less slot neatly into Intel's existing Centrino platforms. You may see it called Centrino Duo or whatever, which is the platform name as opposed to the processor name itself.

I keep hearing news/rumours that Mac will bring out Intel laptops sooner or later, or Intel desktops. Which they will (Steve Jobs said so himself), one or the other, and nobody knows just which product lines, or, more importantly, when.

Yes Apple has decided to go over to Intel CPU. There are even romours that the first intel ibook or powerbook will be presetend today during the Apple key note. By the end of this year intel CPUs will be under the hood of every Mac.

so will that make them more compatible or what will be the big diference...that may sound stupid but

They will be more powerful than the current Mac but don't expect they to be as powerful as PCs since optimal power = lots of excess heat and that's not anything that Apple want to deal with since they want to keep their products as sleek as possible.

Well, as far as compatibility goes, most of that issue is still dependant on the operating system. I suppose if they go Intel then there will be more likelihood you can have a Windows Mac, but I have also heard of specific technologies to prevent this happening, such as having a hardware lock or some such. We'll have to wait until the actual release before knowing for sure.

I suppose the big difference to Mac end users is that the operating system will be more or less completely different, at least under the hood. Instead of being based on the type of code that Power PC processors run, they will use the x86 instruction set for Intel and AMD processors. And yes, Intel's upcoming processors will be more powerful than the current IBM Power PC ones. Other than that, things can theoretically change little - Intel's CPUs are just another processor, as are AMD, as are Power PC. Stuff like this doesn't necessarily make a whole lot of difference to the casual computer user.

News flash!!! iMac has been updated and is now run by two intel processors. This really marks a new era as far as the PC vs. Mac conflic is concerned. Hackers all over the world are right know grinding their palms against eachother. They will try to install Mac OS X on a Dell computer while others will try to install Windows on an iMac.

Also, there are no longer the Powerbook notebooks - they have been replaced by the Core Duo powered MacBook Pro.