XP shows two processors, but it only has one!

Hey all. I have an interesting problem related to my new Dell Dimension 4600 at the office (XP Pro SP1/P-4, 2.8ghz, 800mhz bus, 512kb cache, hyperthreading on/512mb ram/38gb hdd).

XP is recognizing *two* processors (of same above specs), but the PC physically only has *one*, i.e., duplicate regonition of the same proc. I've opened the case to visually verify that Dell didn't accidentally send me a dual proc PC. Note that it doesn't just show up in Device Manager (Processors node), but also under Task Manager, System Info, etc. I've tried uninstalling the 2nd instance of the processor in Device Manager, but it reappears after reboot. I've tried this solution several ways: uninstal 2nd instance and reboot, it reappears; uninstall 1st instance and reboot, it reappears; uninstall both and reboot, both reappear).

Another possibly related item - Under Device Manager (IDE ATA/ATAPI Controllers node), I'm showing *two* instances of my Intel 8280 1EB ultra ATA storage controller, along with my primary and secondary IDE channels.

I called Dell tech supp yesterday to ask them what the deal was with this and, after an hour on the phone and trying the above uninstall process both on and off my LAN and also in safe mode, their solution was for me to wipe the hard drive and do a clean reinstall.

Truthfully, this is mostly an academic, non-problem kind of problem. I'm not experiencing any preformance drain (as far as I know - I don't have a basis for comparison) and am not experiencing any out-of-the-ordinary application errors, nor any crashes.

Any ideas??

 

NEVER MIND. XP treats PCs with hyperthreading as multiprocessor machines. I should have checked into this further. Here's the summary from the Microsoft Knowledge Base Article #810231:

"Both Windows XP Home Edition and Windows XP Professional treat a Hyper-Threading enabled computer as a multiple processor computer. You can verify this by looking in Device Manager, under the Computer and Processors nodes:
-In Computer, you can expect the computer to be described as a multiprocessor PC.
-In Processors, you can expect multiple processors to appear installed. "

Here's the link to the KB article:
http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;810231

 

Hmmm. Thanks for finding that and posting it.

 

De nada. The interesting thing here is that Dell's tech supp people didn't know this, or at least that was the case with the tech I spoke to on the phone. Then again, it's not a "problem" at all, but rather a poorly-known Windows behavior that looks like a problem at first.

Still not sure why I'm showing two Ultra ATA controllers. If anyone has a thought on that point, please let me know.

Best.
-CF