yea, it does push some pretty good numbers. trying to break 12000 today. and also alienware uses that "game optimizer" as a marketing scheme. it doesnt do crap.
Not at all ... I think what is hurting you the most is your processor, obviously while not a flagship video card, your video card is still really powerful IMO!
Yeah, surprisingly I noticed that duel-core CPUs perform really well in 3DMark. Is it optimised to use both cores? Even the X2 3800+ outperforms the 3700+.