Sockets, Cores, Hyperthreads and Affinity

     A real example.  I have a two cpu server, each cpu has 6 core, hyperthreaded, so its a total of 24 processors, sort of.   Each hyperthread may look like a stand alone processor, but in fact it actually shares resources with the other hyperthread.  So, each "logical processor" can be specified by socket, core, thread.   First,  in VMware 5, I specify sockets,core.   Is there any difference between a virtual machine with 4 sockets and 4 core from a vm with 8 sockets and 2 core, or 1 socket and 16 core (you get the issue).  Second, processor affinity is specified by cpu number, how does that map to socket,core,thread.

Thanks