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Which CPU to buy?

Vidar

Vidar

Vidar

Soldato
Joined
18 Dec 2008
Posts
6,715
Location
Liverpool
Hello Guys,

Im going to be building a new system in the next couple of weeks and have an upwards budget of about £700. Im going to be using the system for mainly Gaming and Internet usage, moving it towards a full gaming machine over the up comming months.

My question is, value for money/ performance wise is there a treamendous amount of difference between Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 LGA775 'Wolfdale' 3.00GHz and the Intel Core 2 Duo E8600 LGA775 'Wolfdale' "Overclocking E0 Stepping" 3.33GHz other than the cost? As money saved here means it can be put towards GPU, ram etc.

You help is greatly appreciated!
 
As the E8400 is know to usually clock passed 4Ghz its a good choice, the E8600 would obviously clock a little higher due to its higher multi but probably not worth it unless your chasing every last Mhz you can get.
 
mr_x_plosion said:
As the E8400 is know to usually clock passed 4Ghz its a good choice, the E8600 would obviously clock a little higher due to its higher multi but probably not worth it unless your chasing every last Mhz you can get.
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+1 for the 8400, tis a great chip and there's loads here who use it and should be able to assist with OC'ing it!
 
With that budget though have you considered looking at AM3? better bet if youre buying now as socket 775 is dead technology, the AM3 is slightly better and offers more chance of future upgrade. Id look at an AM3 mobo, AM3 720 Tricore CPU and DDR3 RAM if I were you
 
The E8600 is a total waste of money. £90 for an extra 333mhz. As if that's going to make any difference to performance. The "overclocking E0 stepping" is very misleading and is aimed at tricking people not in "the know" into spending more money. All of the Wolfdales should be E0 steppings by now. 4Ghz is more or less a certainty with a E8400 as these Wolfdales overclock like crazy.
 
+1 for the E8400, 3.0ghz is plenty for the games you'll play and on that budget the graphics card will be the thing holding your system back.
I like intel, but as 95thrifles said the socket 775 has been replaced by the i7 so future upgrades will be limited, maybe the AMD route would work well.
 
FaceplantSi said:
+1 for the 8400, tis a great chip and there's loads here who use it and should be able to assist with OC'ing it!
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I'll stick with the E8400 for now then I think, After about a year I will make the jump to I7 so id rather save a little now to be honest.

Thanks guys, but one other thing ive never done overclocking, without tackling anything like Watercooling what considerations do I need to take to get the increased performance.
 
Thanks... its been a while since I built a system, something tells me im gonna be picking all of your brains very often
 
For a £700 system get the E8400. Should be able to oc to 4ghz, though it varies by chip.

The E8600 is worth it on a higher budget system though ^ ^
 
Thanks, eventually plan on jumping to I7 after about a year... odd question but is there much of a market for 2nd hand processors etc? Would seem a waste scrapping the E8400 after a year.
 
Excellent its always good to know one can make a little bit of money back and help the community at the same time... :)
 
NW_SKINHEAD said:
Thanks, eventually plan on jumping to I7 after about a year... odd question but is there much of a market for 2nd hand processors etc? Would seem a waste scrapping the E8400 after a year.
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Prices actually seem to have risen for used cpu's on the bay. As 775 is coming to the end of it's life there's every chance that prices will go through the roof as we saw with socket 754 and 939. People will always need an upgrade.
 
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