How will i3, i5, i7 benefit me?

[Faith and Grace]

if I need to buy a notebook for internet searching, music, business, quickbooks, documents and excel type things then how will the new processors benefit me? I am ignorant in this area so please be patient.
I guess the only thing you gain is speed and being able to run more applications at once?
Do the new processors have anything to do with being able to use Microsoft platforms? For example, I have a 36 camera DVR security camera system that I can access remotely foam any PC computer except from Mac's. I was told this about 1.5-2 years ago but things have changed since then. The word Linux comes to mind.
The one big thing that keeps me from getting a MBP over a PC notebook is because I can not see my place of business from a Mac supposedly.

 

[chas_m]

if I need to buy a notebook for internet searching, music, business, quickbooks, documents and excel type things then how will the new processors benefit me?

A bit faster.

I guess the only thing you gain is speed and being able to run more applications at once?

Running "more" applications at once is a function more of RAM than of processor.

Do the new processors have anything to do with being able to use Microsoft platforms?

No, Macs have been able to run Windows for many years now. Again, newer processors will make things a bit faster/smoother, that's basically it.

For example, I have a 36 camera DVR security camera system that I can access remotely foam any PC computer except from Mac's. I was told this about 1.5-2 years ago but things have changed since then.

It was probably not true to begin with. The way you phrase this suggests that you access the camera through a web browser, in which case Macs are likely to be compatible as well (unless the camera uses ActiveX controls). But even if Macs cannot access the camera, Macs running Windows can.

The one big thing that keeps me from getting a MBP over a PC notebook is because I can not see my place of business from a Mac supposedly.

Given that Macs can run Windows in a fully-native mode (often called "Boot Camp" after the utility that enables this) or in a windowed Virtual Environment (via products such as Parallels, VMWare's Fusion, and Sun's VirtualBox), this isn't really an issue.

If the camera can be accessed by using ActiveX within Internet Explorer, there's even another solution: CrossOver by Codeweavers. Cheaper than most of the aforementioned solutions since it doesn't require Windows (it uses WINE to imitate the Windows APIs, effectively "fooling" a select number of programs into thinking they are running on Windows when they aren't). IE 6 and 7 (haven't tried 8) work fine under Crossover.