>   I don't really understand why not. Why in windows it's ok for povray
> to automatically use all available CPUs but in linux it's not?

	The following points were considered when deciding to not make
the Linux version able to detect the available number of cpus/cores:

1) Portability: there is no Linux-specific version per se, but a Unix one
(for now).  Making the Linux executable detect the number of cores is surely
possible, but there will be many operating systems for which we won't be able
to do the same (nor even to test whether the detection does work).  Instead,
a well-defined, documented behavior for all unix-based systems is IMHO
preferred.  The default of 2 threads, easily changed at the command-line
or INI level, is probably good enough for most SMP (including dual-core)
as well as non-SMP machines available nowadays.

2) Unix (Linux) machines may generally be used by several people at once:
resource sharing is a concern that should not be left alone to a single
application, especially with the upcoming multi-core machines.

3) Nothing says (yet) that 2 threads per core are always optimal.

	- NC

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