Is this possible?

[compdoc]

> Fast is good, but do you think my idea of going 
>parallel for many simultaneous tasks is a good approach?

I don't open as many tabs as you, but I have 4 browsers installed and
sometimes have them all open with several tabs each.

With enough ram, you should be able to do what you want, but it never hurts
to have as many cores as possible that run as fast as possible. 

AMD cpus aren't horrible at processing once the data gets to the cpu, but as
you can see from those memtest86 pictures, the data takes a lot longer to
get there.

There have been several advances in technology, one being the SSD. They are
several times faster than a hard drive, and will breathe new life into old
systems. It's quite amazing. 

However, to take full advantage of the speed and to protect the life of the
SSD, you want Sata3 ports and the newest AHCI protocol in the motherboard. 



>memtest sees 24G and crashes very quickly when
>run with the 32G. Could this be a memtest problem?


I've never seen memtest86 crash. However, I don't think they update that
old, dos-looking version anymore. Instead they produce a new version that
runs only if you boot it using UEFI.

This new version better reports the type of ram, but the reported speeds of
the caches and ram are very close to the same as the old version. 

Also, I think the UEFI version is memtest86+, and not memtest86 which comes
from a different website. 



> Again, if multitasking, would more cores be a significant advantage?

Well, there's slow multitasking and fast multitasking. The preference is up
to you and your pocketbook. Four cores allows the system to spread the load,
so each core is used less until needed. 

I think the speed of a new dual-core Pentium or an i3 compared to your old
system would open your eyes. 

My own desktop has a four-core i5, but with only 16G of DDR4-2400 ram. I
could have installed more ram but have never found the need...