&gt; Well multi core is not one CORE but rather an integrated distributed system of cores linked with buses that are probably built with chips very similar to switch&#x2F;commuters without all the KPEX poured in optimizing network equipments.<p>Not really.  Multi-core chips share processor execution resources and L2 cache between them.  The on-die cores are directly tied to each other in a way that off-die components, including cores in another socket on the same board, are not.  They <i>are</i> a single computer.<p>Now, you can carry the network abstraction down to that level.  Problem is, as an EE I can carry the network abstraction down below the register level.  A register bit is a network of transistors and resistors, after all.  At what point do we call something a computer?  I personally think any clustering of tightly-coupled, on-die computational blocks is a &quot;computer&quot;, which means the milti-core chips certainly count as one computer with multiple execution pipelines.