my 2yr old pc's starting to feel its age a bit.
and was thinking of a new cpu, and maybe some ram to freshen it up, untill upgrading the whole rig in a few years time
at the mo i have a core 2 duo, clock'd @ 2.4 with 2 gig ddr2 pc2-6400 ram with a geforce 8800 gts 512 on a asus p5b mobo
first thoughts were to go for the best quad that i can afford, and that works with my mobo
but have since read that the dual cores perform better in games than the quad.
" its better to have a larger clock speed on the 2 core than a lower clock speed on 4" :g:
memory is pretty much dictated by my mobo (2 gig per slot, 4 slots) and windows xp (3.5gig) so i remember reading somewhere .
so my dilemma is.....
with my £200+ budget do i go for say a Core 2 Duo E8600 3.33GHz (http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CP-232-IN&groupid=701&catid=6&subcat=793) with the higher clock speed
or something like the Core 2 Quad Q9550 2.83GHz (http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CP-260-IN&groupid=701&catid=6&subcat=567) with the extra cores ?
your thoughts pls :)
This page (http://support.asus.com/cpusupport/cpusupport.aspx?SLanguage=en-us&model=P5B&product=1) says that both CPUs are supported but that you will need to ensure your BIOS is 2001 or newer.
So that sorts that part.
For the rest I would say go for the higher clock speeds of the dual core since you are going to upgrade in a couple of years anyway.
i would go for the quad, reason, its going to last you longer and with new games like GTA3,fallout 3,crysis ect ect which are quad inhanced.
Q6600, you can easy oc to 3.4 on air plus only £130ish from overclockers:yahoo:
Go for the Q9550 tbh, more and more applications and games utilizes quads these days, and this will without doubt increase to most of all apps and games in the near future :) especially with windows 7's awsome core balacing :D
But as he has already said, he is upgrading the whole thing in 2 years so he might as well get the benefit of the higher clock speeds.
just browsed through a few charts at tomshardware and other review sites :)
the Q9550 actually beats the E8600 in something like 90% tests, even single thread applications..
im guessing that is due to the core being newer and more optimized :)
And we all know that 1 mhz on one cpu isnt as fast as 1mhz on another cpu anymore.. So the sentence im going for that cpu as it got more mhz cannot really justify much anymore :)
So the only benefit he would actually get from getting the E8600 is lower power usage and a tiny performance (1-4%) gain in a very limited amount of games /application :)
I only checked 2 sites; Tom's and Anandtech. In apps the 9550 wins pretty much all the time. In gaming the 8600 tends to win.
TB H why doesn't he just buy the cheapest?
Quote from: BlueBall;260791I only checked 2 sites; Tom's and Anandtech. In apps the 9550 wins pretty much all the time. In gaming the 8600 tends to win.
TB H why doesn't he just buy the cheapest?
Well im not really sure why he wants to upgrade, he already has a C2D, so so towards the E8600 im guessing he isnt really gonna gain that awsome much, he could go for the Quad just to get on the wagon :)
i would honestly suggest that you wait and save for a better rig when you decide to go a for a full rig upgrade
the main reason i was thinking of upgrade was getting the most out of the rig i've got .
The cpu was a cheap buy, enabling me to spend more on other parts.
The chip i have is fairly stable clock'd at 2.4 mhz but does have its moments and was always the plan to upgrade it as soon as i could afford.
With it only having 2mb cache and the newer chips going up to 12mb thought it could be worth splashing some cash, Especially
since intel are dropping there prices.
Did orginally think of upgrading the 8800 gts for something with a bit more grunt, then looked at the prices and thought better of it :)
Cheers for your thoughts, think i'm leaning towards a quad
but will let ya know what i decide :)
Quote from: kregoron;260792i would honestly suggest that you wait and save for a better rig when you decide to go a for a full rig upgrade
totally agree
Quote from: delankster;260821the main reason i was thinking of upgrade was getting the most out of the rig i've got .
The cpu was a cheap buy, enabling me to spend more on other parts.
The chip i have is fairly stable clock'd at 2.4 mhz but does have its moments and was always the plan to upgrade it as soon as i could afford.
With it only having 2mb cache and the newer chips going up to 12mb thought it could be worth splashing some cash, Especially
since intel are dropping there prices.
Did orginally think of upgrading the 8800 gts for something with a bit more grunt, then looked at the prices and thought better of it :)
Cheers for your thoughts, think i'm leaning towards a quad
but will let ya know what i decide :)
Well yes you will see a slight performance gain, but not really anything that can justify buying a new cpu now, if you upgrading everything with a near period anyway. as the upgrade you will probably be doing is a mean machine with i7, ddr3 and so on.. so the cpu will be rendered useless again..
But okay if you are gonna get a new cpu now, id still suggest a Quad..
There are just more transistors for the money (no one can deni that fact :D)
What C2D do you have at the moment? If you are having a few moments with reliability with your rig and you have not done much house cleaning in the case I would be inclined to do a good clean and even remove heatsink clean up cpu and heatsink and reseat with new thermal material. Good hoover remove all dust. Reboot cross fingers all goes well. As for your present cpu the lack of L2 cache will make very little difference in most games. Clock speed is what you want and a lot of the smaller cache'd C2D overclock very well with a little voltage. Even getting a new CPU cooler like a xigmatech or the like will let you get some more MHZ for not much outlay. Depending on the chip i would imagine 3.2 - 3.4 being fairly easy. I have my Q9550 running at 3.9 but I don't think it makes a huge difference in my gaming over my old E8400 at the same speed. Looking at task manager most games seem to use all cores on both chips but in reality it uses the same amount of CPU cycles on both chips but the Q each has less work to do but neither is maxed out. I would go with the clean and spruce up for less than £35 first before going for an upgrade you will be surprised how much more can be squeezed out of your CPU.
Magnus
Quote from: '[BIGmagnus;260845'] As for your present cpu the lack of L2 cache will make very little difference in most games. Clock speed is what you want
Magnus
what?
Bigger caches actually have troumendous amount affect on performance, and honestly clock speeds arent that big a fuzz anymore.. mhz difference helps a lot in stuff like video encoding, databases, and certain rendering scenarios..
Games arent really that solely depending on CPU speed anymore, its a delicate balance between CPU speed/cache/instruction sets..
i thought Intel / AMD showed 1 mhz cant be compared to 1mhz on another cpu anymore.. in the old Athlon 64 vs p4 war..
c2d is a E6300 1.86 ghz under an artic-cooler freezer 7 pro.
house cleaning..... i wouldn't say its a state in there, but its worth a try
will have a spring clean this wkend and see if it makes a difference :thumbsup2:
Quote from: delankster;260868c2d is a E6300 1.86 ghz under an artic-cooler freezer 7 pro.
house cleaning..... i wouldn't say its a state in there, but its worth a try
will have a spring clean this wkend and see if it makes a difference :thumbsup2:
well its always a good idea to give it a nice good cleaning, could give you a tiny bit more headroom to oc it a little :)
I just realised i might have a Q9650 up for sale, as its just collecting dust, got a offer from a m8 tho, so ill have to hear him if he still wants it (he hasnt asked for it in a while or you could give me a offer in a pm and get back to you over the weekend.
There are some games that will get some fps from a bigger cache. Alot of games it makes almost no difference. I agree that clock speed of the cpu has a small effect on fps as well but that depends on the rest of the system. If your cpu is limiting the amount of information that is being sent to the gfx card then an overclock will obviously help. If your gfx card is limiting the system then no overclock will make any difference. If i run my cpu at default clocks it limits the rest of my system in gaming. I have a 4870 x2, 4 gig of ram 2 velo raptors in raid. I gain quite a jump overclocking from standard to 4 ghz when gaming in both fps and load times. The ram also gets overclocked from standard as well. I was pointing out that the increase in a chache size would no next to nothing for the cost of a new cpu compared to a spring clean. Thermal material also degrades over and temps slowly increase, this normally occurs with the stuff applied to the bottom of a cooler when bought. On the other hand a Q9650 gathering dust is always a bad thing so if the price is right get a good cooler and go for it. They are very nice chips. :D Sorry if my last post looked like a you will get no benefit from larger cache new chip. You will but you will also get a boost from ocing present one.
Have at look at this article. It is a little old due to the age of the chip but gives you an idea of what a little oc can do. It also shows well what the cache can do for some games and not others.
http://www.legionhardware.com/document.php?id=606&p=8
Magnus
Quote from: '[BIGmagnus;260975']There are some games that will get some fps from a bigger cache. Alot of games it makes almost no difference. I agree that clock speed of the cpu has a small effect on fps as well but that depends on the rest of the system. If your cpu is limiting the amount of information that is being sent to the gfx card then an overclock will obviously help. If your gfx card is limiting the system then no overclock will make any difference. If i run my cpu at default clocks it limits the rest of my system in gaming. I have a 4870 x2, 4 gig of ram 2 velo raptors in raid. I gain quite a jump overclocking from standard to 4 ghz when gaming in both fps and load times. The ram also gets overclocked from standard as well. I was pointing out that the increase in a chache size would no next to nothing for the cost of a new cpu compared to a spring clean. Thermal material also degrades over and temps slowly increase, this normally occurs with the stuff applied to the bottom of a cooler when bought. On the other hand a Q9650 gathering dust is always a bad thing so if the price is right get a good cooler and go for it. They are very nice chips. :D Sorry if my last post looked like a you will get no benefit from larger cache new chip. You will but you will also get a boost from ocing present one.
Have at look at this article. It is a little old due to the age of the chip but gives you an idea of what a little oc can do. It also shows well what the cache can do for some games and not others.
http://www.legionhardware.com/document.php?id=606&p=8
Magnus
Yes ofc a cpu gains performance from higher mhz, mhz just isnt everything anymore :)
Well actually you know what a CPU gains most from when overclocking, higher fsb clocks = über performance :)
It increases access time and overall bandwith in the CPU..
I can clock my CPU to 3.5Ghz as a FSB overclock or as a multiplier overclock and trust me the fsb overclock is what matters..
I got nice AMD dev tool from k|ngp|n which is a old OC guru, it enables me to shut down sections of the cache on AMD Phenom II cpu's so ill do a little Benchmark with it..
Super PI / mod 1.5XS
32M calculation
4x512kb mode = 23m 57.537s
4x256kb mode = 28m 21.821s
-----------------------------
3dmark 06
4x512kb mode = 20271
4x256kb mode = 17981
Im not trying to play a know it all or bashing anything, i just find it odd that people are still going on with the mhz is everything concept..
a huge variety of factors play in when you think what makes a CPU do more performance :) sadly cache is just so expensive building into a chip...
Ye my m8 is stopping by tomorrow then we can discuss if he still wants that Q9650 or if i need to find another seller ;)
Just a note, there isnt any warranty on the Q9650..
I agree my 12mb of cache makes an improvement. For gaming though it does make any difference in some games and a large in others. I also know that MHZ is not the only system performance boost. I was advising on the OP questions on upgrading. Synthetic benchmarks are great for working out chips but does not always equate to real life gains or losses. Please correct me but do phenom ii chips make better use of their cache than c2d? Also the overall architecture of the chip has more than anything to do with overall performance. Look at I7 lower cache but higher performance per cpu cycle, even when excluding the huge memory bandwidth that it has but in gaming (so far and excluding multiple card setups) not much different to c2d. I am sure that will change if programmers start to use the extra power and cores.
Well the difference in how the CPU utilizes the Caches is found in the calculation pipeline..
A long pipeline degrase the performance of cache therefore a higher cache is needed..
AMD and intel has different approaches on this issue and has had for a long time..
This was the main reason why the Athlon 64 performed so good compared to intels P4 prescott...
The A64 has a short pipeline of only some 28 steps, where the p4 pressy was at 72 steps (insane) longer pipeline is one of the factors that increase the max Mhz they can get a CPU to perform at.. but sadly has a huge impact on cache performance..
With the later chips Phenoms/C2D&C2Q/i7 the gap in pipeline is smaller, but still noticeable in the cache size, intel is down to a pipelenght of some 58 steps where AMD has some 42 i think with the Phenom II..
So yes the Phenom II us utilizing the Cache more offective then the i7/C2X, but intel just adds more cache to make up for it..
Sadly the cache is probably the most of expensive part of making a CPU as it takes so much of the die..
I guess the reason for this long pipeline impact on performance is that the CPU utilizes the cache as as EXTREMELY fast temp storage along the pipeline, so more steps more cache is needed, else the cpu needs to empty out the cache to often and it impacts the performance..
Im hoping im not babling to much.. this is getting techy i guess :)
Well you are right in a sence, games / apps with loads of math like rendering, and physics really love cache.. where more simple based games doesnt really care.. but in the future we are gonna see a higher degree of cache loving apps and games..
Thanks!! I always forget who uses the cache best!! I do remember reading (many moons ago) That cache was 100 times expensive per meg than HD's but must be still around 5 x the cost of ddr2. Nice and fast and rather small!
:D
Quote from: kregoron;260875well its always a good idea to give it a nice good cleaning, could give you a tiny bit more headroom to oc it a little :)
I just realised i might have a Q9650 up for sale, as its just collecting dust, got a offer from a m8 tho, so ill have to hear him if he still wants it (he hasnt asked for it in a while or you could give me a offer in a pm and get back to you over the weekend.
Just got the hold of my m8, and im sorry to inform hes bought it now..
But i might have a i7 rig up for sale soon if interested..
I'm reading this thread just get more looks at Magnus' avatar. :norty:
TL.
Quote from: kregoron;262418Just got the hold of my m8, and im sorry to inform hes bought it now..
But i might have a i7 rig up for sale soon if interested..
np kreg,:thumbsup2: thanks anyway
let me know on the i7 rig but as i said earlier it was my plan to hold off for a few years before a full rig update.......
but if the price is right i might be tempted :flirty:
Quote from: TeaLeaf;262424I'm reading this thread just get more looks at Magnus' avatar. :norty:
TL.
Same, keep posting Magnus! One little tweak of animation would send me over the edge :norty:
I am interested in the technical discussions too as I'll be buying new PC in a few weeks (honest) :blink:
Just need to find out if the missus wants to buy it...
She claims her old x2400+ 2Gig ddr1 radeon 9800Pro cant run The Sims 3 but she doesnt wanna pay for a new puter -.-
Just found this thread.
Delan what did you choose in the end as you pretty much have the same system as me.
I am thinking of a new cpu in the summer with a bit more ram as mines only 2gb.
Also Kreg did you find a buyer for your i7 system?
in the end i decided to hold off on the cpu change as recommended .
have ordered some additional Ram to boost peformance and was thinking of maybe upgrading my 8800gts to a gf 280/295 with the mind of transfering into a new rig in a few years time. but as my mobo is only pci e x16 and the new cards are pci e 2.0 (allthought they are backward compatable) i'm not sure if i'll gain alot.
so basically saving me penny's for a new rig :sad:
Quote from: delankster;267819in the end i decided to hold off on the cpu change as recommended .
have ordered some additional Ram to boost peformance and was thinking of maybe upgrading my 8800gts to a gf 280/295 with the mind of transfering into a new rig in a few years time. but as my mobo is only pci e x16 and the new cards are pci e 2.0 (allthought they are backward compatable) i'm not sure if i'll gain alot.
so basically saving me penny's for a new rig :sad:
New cards are just on the steps..
ATI with their 4890 series and nVIDIA with their GTX275 series so prices is due to change across the board :)
Quote from: kregoron;267933New cards are just on the steps..
ATI with their 4890 series and nVIDIA with their GTX275 series so prices is due to change across the board :)
:yahoo: cool will keep an eye out
http://www.powerc.com/uk/ps/Gaming%20Intel%20Base%20Unit/1/code/cs-game-eli/act/gpage
My current PC went bust so i just got this ....Quad core 4 GIG ram and 21" TFT
update:
got my hands on a E6600 2.4 mhz 4mb cache c2d this week
it clocked straight up to 3 mhz and seems to be running stable :D
should see me ok for a while and give me enough time to save up some dollar for an i7 system,
and by that time might be more quad supported games.
thanks for you help guys :thumbsup2:
Just to clarify you went from a e6300 to a e6600?
Did you see a leap in power?
I am thinking of doing a semi upgrade so q6600 and more memory then clearing out the system and getting a i7 system next year. However, if the first lot of i7's decrease heavily during the summer i will early adopt.
Quote from: GhostMjr;269493Just to clarify you went from a e6300 to a e6600?
Did you see a leap in power?
after clocking it i have been able to up the resolution on cod4:)
so deffinatley been worth while.
its not as big a leap as i would have liked, but can't complain as i didn't pay for the chip :norty:
so as said, it will do as a stop gap :)