• Competitor rules

    Please remember that any mention of competitors, hinting at competitors or offering to provide details of competitors will result in an account suspension. The full rules can be found under the 'Terms and Rules' link in the bottom right corner of your screen. Just don't mention competitors in any way, shape or form and you'll be OK.

Intel Core 2 Duo E6320 VS AMD Phenom II X2 Dual Core 550

Dancer

Dancer

Dancer

Associate
Joined
17 Mar 2003
Posts
351
Location
London
Ok I'm upgrading two PCs and in one I have a PC with Intel Core 2 Duo E6320 "LGA775 Conroe" 1.86GHz which I'm either going to try to overclock, or sell and get a AMD Phenom II X2 Dual Core 550 3.10GHz Black Edition to replace it (its affordable but seems good). Is it worth it?

Consider that this is paired with BFG GeForce 8800 GT? Is that money better spent on getting a better graphic card rather than the AMD and motherboard+DDR3 RAM (i.e. not sure where the bottleneck might be and not enough money to upgrade everything)?

Main use of PC: World of Warcraft, Left 4 Dead, Sims 2, Photo Editing and Web Surfing.
 
I went from a e6420 @3.2ghz to a phenom II 550 and I noticed a difference even at the same speed. The best thing is it unlocked to become a quad core which made the upgrade worth it in every way. If you can try and go for a phenom II 555 as they seem to have a much higher unlocking rate and overclock further.
 
Well I think the choice has been pretty much made for me as my overclock attempt was an abysmal failure. Increased the CPU FSB Frequence from 266 to 306 to go from 1.875 GHz to 2.142 GHz and increased the voltage slightly by +0.0125V (smallest increment). Hit save and restarted... or not. :eek: Refused to get even to bios. Just wouldn't start. Pulled the power for a few minutes and tried again, nothing. :( Reset the bios and after setting time and date it booted fine. :cool:

I know I jumped a bit more than maybe I should have (and yes I read the guide... just didn't follow it exactly) and maybe I should have left the voltage alone on the first go but it was a very, very small change and the bios flagged it as safe (it shows things in white which are "safe", yellow if risky and red if bad...). Frankly if I can't even get that tiny increase then I don't see much point. Feel free to point out my overclocking incompetence so that I can learn from it.
 
Did you drop the ram speed when you increased the fsb? Your ram may have been running over it's rated speed which would account for the non start. I would expect your cpu to hit at least 3Ghz in a half decent board.
 
pastymuncher said:
Did you drop the ram speed when you increased the fsb? Your ram may have been running over it's rated speed which would account for the non start. I would expect your cpu to hit at least 3Ghz in a half decent board.
Click to expand...

No, I left the DRAM Frequency alone. It was set to Auto and the current frequency was 800. I didn't realise that increasing the CPU would affect the RAM speed, but reading the guide again I see that this is implied. Maybe I'll give it another go. Thanks.
 
If you can get your current CPU to around 3ghz it should do fine with GPU upgrade.
If you can't hit 3ghz mark it might be a good idea to upgrade platform or try to sorce out cheap second hand Q6600 if your motherboard supports it they go for around 60-70 if you search.

Either way, 555BE is excellent choice. That or the x3 435 if you're on very tight budget.
 
PhoenixUK said:
If you can get your current CPU to around 3ghz it should do fine with GPU upgrade.
If you can't hit 3ghz mark it might be a good idea to upgrade platform or try to sorce out cheap second hand Q6600 if your motherboard supports it they go for around 60-70 if you search.

Either way, 555BE is excellent choice. That or the x3 435 if you're on very tight budget.
Click to expand...

Thanks, I'll try again today.
 
Ok I found some guides by googling and by lowering my ram to 666 I have now overclocked the CPU by 10 GHz. Woohoo. Baby steps. :) Is it safe to set the RAM to 800 as long as I don't leave it on Auto?
 
Dancer said:
Ok I found some guides by googling and by lowering my ram to 666 I have now overclocked the CPU by 10 GHz. Woohoo. Baby steps. :) Is it safe to set the RAM to 800 as long as I don't leave it on Auto?
Click to expand...
I would say leave the RAM at low for now...that way it would be easier to work out your max stable overclock for CPU, as when system become unstable, you would know it's the CPU, not the RAM. When you are happy with the overclock you get for the CPU, THEN you can put the RAM back up.

Oh, and DO pay attention to your CPU's temperature when testing your overclock.
 
Last edited:
Marine-RX179 said:
I would say leave the RAM at low for now...that way it would be easier to work out your max stable overclock for CPU, as when system become unstable, you would know it's the CPU, not the RAM. When you are happy with the overclock you get for the CPU, THEN you can put the RAM back up.

Oh, and DO pay attention to your CPU's temperature when testing your overclock.
Click to expand...

Well, I ran Prime95 for ten minutes after doing the 10 MHz increase (not GHz :o) and the temps under stress went from 39 to around fifty. I then tried increasing it another 20 MHz (yes, I'm not patient, but I had to leave for work and wanted to push it a bit) and Windows starts booting but suddenly reboots and keeps cycling. I had to stop there, but my plan is to upgrade the bios, lower the RAM to 533mhz and if that makes no difference then maybe try to increase the voltage. I'll also look at increase the NB voltage to 1.51 and disable the spread spectrum purely because this is what others with the same motherboard suggest (I'm not even sure what those things mean).
 
puma luke said:
look on ebay. i know there's an x2 550 on there atm for around £45.
Click to expand...

Good suggestion, but I'm a bit sceptical about buying a used CPU unless it is from a seller I trust and there seems to be a bit of a bidding war so I doubt the final price will be £45.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom