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Was buying a E6850 over the Q6600 the right choice?

EffBee said:
I don't overclock. Period (sorry folks).
I play a lot of older games.

My decision is based mainly on a comparison of individual core specs at stock. Whether four cores will make any difference to me over two NOW is doubtful.

In making a decision like this it is necessary to look at where you are coming from, as well as where you are going. Starting from my current XP2400+ based system I am not really going wrong with either choice. My current gut feeling is that for now I want the most powerful core I can get for my money which points me towards a dual with a more powerful set of cores. With the right Mobo I will have the option of maybe putting in a quad core later when prices drop. And they will!
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Why is it? This has nothing to do with it. And more fool you for refusing to overclock :p. It's free and practically risk free performance.

There are good reasons why people are saying that the quad offers better value than the 6750s and especially 6850. You say you play older games but I presume you will be playing newer games otherwise why are you upgrading - so when games like Crysis and Alan Wake come out with genuine multi-core support, your quad would come into its own. The Q6600 will last a long time.
 
Robbie G said:
Why is it? This has nothing to do with it. And more fool you for refusing to overclock :p. It's free and practically risk free performance.

There are good reasons why people are saying that the quad offers better value than the 6750s and especially 6850. You say you play older games but I presume you will be playing newer games otherwise why are you upgrading - so when games like Crysis and Alan Wake come out with genuine multi-core support, your quad would come into its own. The Q6600 will last a long time.
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I used to have a Dragon 32 micro back in the early '80s which I could overclock with a "Poke" but the downside was I lost the screen display. I haven't overclocked since. Can't be bothered to be honest. PC stuff is so fast at clock I can't see the point. Of course I understand that many people get a buzz out of building the fastest machine possible, for the least money possible, by any and all tricks possible, but I'm not one of them.

For me the point of ugrading is to see a very major step increase in functionality. My current rig has served me extraordinarily well but as you say I can't touch the latest games. An upgrade will therefore give me complete access to all the latest and newest stuff. The old apps will fly compared to now. I will be very happy. If the newest stuff which isn't even out yet won't quite run at silly fps with everything maxed out on my new rig that doesn't matter to me. I am used to playing oblivion maxed out at 8 - 38fps. :eek:

Edit: PS I did look at the top end quad cores processor from intel but I can't bring myself to spend that much money. I would rather spend the surplus on a stonking video card and Lian Li case.
 
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EffBee said:
For me the point of ugrading is to see a very major step increase in functionality
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So you want an increase in functionality by paying hundreds of pounds but not extra functionality for free? Overclocking will make it do stuff faster. Period. But hey each to their own and I totally respect your desire not to overclock.











[fool] ;):p
 
Robbie G said:
So you want an increase in functionality by paying hundreds of pounds but not extra functionality for free? Overclocking will make it do stuff faster. Period. But hey each to their own and I totally respect your desire not to overclock.











[fool] ;):p
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Is it free? I would rather pay a few hundred more every few years and run components cooler, unstressed, and (very) stable for a longer life. There is also the peace of mind of knowing that the exceedingly rare problems I have with my PC are not related to overclocking. I'm afraid I'm a sad old fart these days who just wants to occasionally build a customised PC then use it for years without thinking about it too much.

Besides, I believe Murphy's Law governs the universe.
 
Edit: Apologies to OP for thread hijack - this shouldn't be about "To overclock or not" I'll probably stop now unless mightily provoked :)
 
EffBee said:
Is it free? I would rather pay a few hundred more every few years and run components cooler, unstressed, and (very) stable for a longer life. There is also the peace of mind of knowing that the exceedingly rare problems I have with my PC are not related to overclocking. I'm afraid I'm a sad old fart these days who just wants to occasionally build a customised PC then use it for years without thinking about it too much.

Besides, I believe Murphy's Law governs the universe.
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only people who refuse to overclock say that, funnily enough. components dont automatically run hotter because they are overclocked, no more stressed, no less stable if tested and set up correctly....thats just misinformation on your part im afraid:) sure you can push a component to its limits but that isnt the only reason we overclock.


let me put it another way, by increasing the fsb on my 1.8ghz e2160 (~£45) from 200mhz to 333mhz, i just turned it in to something very close to 3ghz e6850 (~£175). all i had to do, was change one setting. didnt mess with voltages, nothing else. still runs cool thanks to the great heatsink im using.

and with a small bump in voltage, its running at 3.2ghz. honestly this overclocking lark is too easy these days.
 
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EffBee said:
OP, interesting thread for me. I am about to build a new rig for myself and am deciding between the E6850 and the Q6600. I am moving towards the E6850.

I don't overclock. Period (sorry folks).
I play a lot of older games.
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What are you getting an e6850 for if you're going to be playing mostly old games? Old games -> Cheap components, so e2160 for you.

e6850 is intel taking the e6x50 range, clocking it to the max for you, and you paying for the privilege!
 
Robbie G said:
Why would you be provoked? Are you incapable of adult discussion?
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LoL - Too much time in WoW and Lotro forums.

Keep expecting to be be flamed :D

I'm not used to the civil polite intelligent grown up people we have here. This is how forums were meant to be.

______________________

In response to an earlier posting - for £45 even I might experiment with overclocking. Thats disposable component prices.
 
@ Kirth Gersen - a fellow wankher I see! First time I've met a Vance fan outside of a Vance forum in nearly ten years of noodling around online.

@mods: wankher is not a rude word, it's a literary reference! :p
 
I've been considering the same options myself recently but at the end of the day I decided to go the quad core route, thing is while most games dont currently support quad core it does make a difference even to games that dont support it. Primarily because older games that only support single threads or dual core get 100% of that core/core's on a quad cpu, if you ran the same game on a dual core for instance a percentage of the cpu time would still be used for background tasks for the OS.

Also in the case of the OP while a E6850 might be faster clock for clock than a Q6600 when it comes to single thread or dual thread applications the moment you go into tri/quad thread applications your almost doubling the speed.

I think for current day systems anything other than quad core isnt worth the time or money because not even a £45 cpu running at 3Ghz can match the raw power of a quad core cpu with a combined speed of 15ghz+. It might not have a huge impact now but give it 6 months and you will certainly notice the difference.

Also one thing I've not seen mentioned is that the cheapo E21xx cpu's while indeed cheap and they can overclock quiet well the reduced cache makes a pretty large impact on performance in modern games, UT3 for instance see's a massive 20% difference in frame rates at the same clock speed as the E6600 range. For an E21xx to match the frame rates of a E6600 it would need to be clocked atleast 35% higher.

Source: UT3 CPU/GPU Comparison on AnandTech
 
MadMossy said:
I think for current day systems anything other than quad core isnt worth the time or money because not even a £45 cpu running at 3Ghz can match the raw power of a quad core cpu with a combined speed of 15ghz+. It might not have a huge impact now but give it 6 months and you will certainly notice the difference.
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imo 21xx series cpus win again .. u can get 1 now for £45 and be happy with its performance untill penryn arrives and good 'old' q6600 are for cheap ..
 
1) Whats use its for.

2) How long you want to keep it.


" Parallel Processing, Part 1: CPU Cores, Single, Dual Or Quad Core? "



" As we see, there are considerable performance differences between a Core 2 processor running on one, two or four cores. You'll experience the least differences with popular games such as Quake IV, Prey or Call of Duty 2, as these haven't been optimized much for multi-core processors. The newer the game title, the better your chances to benefit from dual or quad core processors. At this time, a dual core at high clock speeds is the best (and most reasonable) choice for gaming.



" Overall, the current quad core processor generation does provide the performance reserves that Intel promised. However, there are still many applications that do not yet take much advantage of more than two cores. Our conclusion is thus simple: if you can get a quad core of similar clock speed for only a little premium over the dual core, go for it; if not, stick to a reasonably priced dual core. "



http://www.tomshardware.com/2007/10/08/parallel_processing/index.html
 
Anandtech has been testing Unreal Tournament 3 on various CPUs and GPUs here:
http://www.anandtech.com/video/showdoc.aspx?i=3127

Here's some graphs comparing 1, 2 and 4 core CPUs:
15797.png

15798.png

15799.png


Here's what was said about the Intel CPUs:
"On the Intel side, the sweet spot for performance looks to be the Core 2 Duo E6550, or if you want to go cheaper, the E4500. Remember what we discovered about the impact of L2 cache on performance: you need around 20% more clocks to make up for a 2MB L2 deficit on Intel's CPUs, and about 35% to make up for a 3MB deficit."
 
At stock it was the better choice for "now". It outperforms the Q6600 in that case...

But a 3.6ghz quad... sounds nice. and i'm sure is nice :P

Not that i would know. Atleast you are in the same socket as this generation :p
 
I got a Q6600 go a month ago asked on these forums if to get a 6550 or a Q6600 and everyone said get the quad and i am glad i did, sitting at 3 gig, tested at 3.3 all fine but i don't see any point in it, current temps with a Freezer 64 pro on, started prime about 30 mins ago 4 cores going are currenlty 45-49c this using core temp more than happy myself.
 
The anandtech ut3 bechies are from a flyby demos if i remember right so maybe once the bot ai has been included or your in a big ctf match with loads of player we might see the quads pull ahead a bit more ?
 
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