[ubuntu-uk] Do I have a quad-core netbook (surely not?!)

[Ross Mounce]

Dear list,

I recently bought a fairly new Samsung N150 Plus netbook off a friend.
Dumped the windows crippleware 'Starter' OS, and installed Ubuntu 64-bit
11.04
which works very nicely/speedily.

Rather curiously the GUI system monitor shows it as having 4 CPUs (?)

This appears to be confirmed by the CLI output (at the bottom of the msg for
clarity-sake).

I believe the processor is a dual core Atom N550
http://ark.intel.com/Product.aspx?id=50154

Two questions: A) Why does it show as 4 processors? Are these all real? Have
I somehow 'unlocked' another couple *hopes*?
                       B) If it's just 4 threads, can I optimally run 4
separate instances of a 32-bit program one each on each thread/core without
losing overall efficiency? (The program I have in mind is a bit
technical/obscure, and no, it doesn't have a 64-bit version)


Rather curious...

Ross


$ cat /proc/cpuinfo
processor : 0
vendor_id : GenuineIntel
cpu family : 6
model : 28
model name : Intel(R) Atom(TM) CPU N550   @ 1.50GHz
stepping : 10
cpu MHz : 1000.000
cache size : 512 KB
physical id : 0
siblings : 4
core id : 0
cpu cores : 2
apicid : 0
initial apicid : 0
fpu : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 10
wp : yes
flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat
clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss ht tm pbe syscall nx lm constant_tsc
arch_perfmon pebs bts rep_good nopl aperfmperf pni dtes64 monitor ds_cpl est
tm2 ssse3 cx16 xtpr pdcm movbe lahf_lm dts
bogomips : 2992.53
clflush size : 64
cache_alignment : 64
address sizes : 32 bits physical, 48 bits virtual
power management:

processor : 1
vendor_id : GenuineIntel
cpu family : 6
model : 28
model name : Intel(R) Atom(TM) CPU N550   @ 1.50GHz
stepping : 10
cpu MHz : 1500.000
cache size : 512 KB
physical id : 0
siblings : 4
core id : 1
cpu cores : 2
apicid : 2
initial apicid : 2
fpu : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 10
wp : yes
flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat
clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss ht tm pbe syscall nx lm constant_tsc
arch_perfmon pebs bts rep_good nopl aperfmperf pni dtes64 monitor ds_cpl est
tm2 ssse3 cx16 xtpr pdcm movbe lahf_lm dts
bogomips : 2992.56
clflush size : 64
cache_alignment : 64
address sizes : 32 bits physical, 48 bits virtual
power management:

processor : 2
vendor_id : GenuineIntel
cpu family : 6
model : 28
model name : Intel(R) Atom(TM) CPU N550   @ 1.50GHz
stepping : 10
cpu MHz : 1500.000
cache size : 512 KB
physical id : 0
siblings : 4
core id : 0
cpu cores : 2
apicid : 1
initial apicid : 1
fpu : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 10
wp : yes
flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat
clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss ht tm pbe syscall nx lm constant_tsc
arch_perfmon pebs bts rep_good nopl aperfmperf pni dtes64 monitor ds_cpl est
tm2 ssse3 cx16 xtpr pdcm movbe lahf_lm dts
bogomips : 2992.52
clflush size : 64
cache_alignment : 64
address sizes : 32 bits physical, 48 bits virtual
power management:

processor : 3
vendor_id : GenuineIntel
cpu family : 6
model : 28
model name : Intel(R) Atom(TM) CPU N550   @ 1.50GHz
stepping : 10
cpu MHz : 1000.000
cache size : 512 KB
physical id : 0
siblings : 4
core id : 1
cpu cores : 2
apicid : 3
initial apicid : 3
fpu : yes
fpu_exception : yes
cpuid level : 10
wp : yes
flags : fpu vme de pse tsc msr pae mce cx8 apic sep mtrr pge mca cmov pat
clflush dts acpi mmx fxsr sse sse2 ss ht tm pbe syscall nx lm constant_tsc
arch_perfmon pebs bts rep_good nopl aperfmperf pni dtes64 monitor ds_cpl est
tm2 ssse3 cx16 xtpr pdcm movbe lahf_lm dts
bogomips : 2992.54
clflush size : 64
cache_alignment : 64
address sizes : 32 bits physical, 48 bits virtual
power management:
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