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E6600 to Core i7 - worth it?

dudload

dudload

dudload

Associate
Joined
19 Feb 2009
Posts
64
Hi All,

Have been thinking about upgrading my rig for a while now, but have so far managed to hold off pressing the button. Just looking to get some views on whether its worth me upgrading soon, as i hear the new intels are coming at the end of this year?? My current setup is:

Core2Duo E6600 @3GHZ
4 GB RAM
Corsair 550W PSU (or thereabouts)
ATI 4870

and ive been thinking of going to a Core I7 860, with around 8GB of RAM coupled with an Intel SSD. Is it worth it, or should i wait a little longer (half a year?)

Dudload
 
Well 2 things.

1. Is it urgent, 'cause there's a price slash of some of the existing CPU's from intel happening in august, and new ones are being added.

2. Why do you want to upgrade; as in, what applications do you use?
 
The real improvement is not so much in the architecture (although it is about 10-20% faster at same speeds) but in the overclockability. My i7-860 got to 4gb with little effort whereas my previous Q9450 struggled above 3.2-3.3. So you'd probably get an overall 33% from the 3 to 4ghz hop and another 10-20 for the change in CPU architecture. A few % more for the switch from DDR2 to DDR3

There's a full bundle in MM now (not mine) or just the chip (mine) in there now ;)
 
Methanoid said:
Does anyone really believe AMD are in the game, performance wise now?
Click to expand...

Can they compete with Intel at the top end? No. Do they still offer affordable alternatives that are great for gaming and other applications? Yes. Even for video rendering the AMD 6 core chips do very well against the similarly priced Intel chips. If I were doing a lot of rendering and the choice was between the 1090T at £237 or the 930 at £237 (retail) then I'd go for the AMD option.
 
thingemajib said:
i think we have a bit of a fanboi here :P

i would hold off a bit. 1) because of the aforementioned pricedrops, and 2) new things are coming shortly = further pricedrops on last gen hardware
Click to expand...

Hardly. I've owned a good half dozen AMD systems. Some were good. In P3 days the Athlon kicked butt. In p4 days it sorta held its own but sorry, FACT, since Core2Duo AMD has been in trouble.

Nothing to do with being a fanboi. Just cos I disagree with people doesnt make me a fanboi.
 
No hotlinking please.

Doesn't take into account overclocking ofc but a lot of people doing rendering/encoding won't be overclockers anyway.
 
I moved from an E6600 @ 3.2ghz 4Gb ram and an ati 4870 to PC in my sig last summer. For me it was worth it, a very noticable bump in performance and it has paved the way for a screen upgrade from 1650 x 1080 to 1900 x 1200 without sacrificing gfx goodness.

A new pc is an expensive purchase, but sometimes when the upgrade bug bites you just have to act....

As to which specific cpu/socket that is your choice, I would suggest a i7 920 (if you can get one) and overclock it to 3.8-4ghz, the 930s appear to run hotter and want more volts (this is my impression from peoples posts) but which ever way you go, just make sure you buy that ssd.

Til you buy, happy virtual shopping ;)
 
Well I went from an e8400 to i5 750 and it was worth it. I wanted to get a q9550 but they were about £190 I think. They might be cheaper now, haven't looked for months.
 
Depends what your doing... gaming wise for a single GPU (or anything upto an ATI5770 nVidia 285) a E6600 @ 3gig (which 99.9% of them will do on stock voltage) is still perfectly capable in all but the most multi-thread capable games, for general desktop useage you won't notice a jot of difference between an E6600 and i7 980 even unless your doing intensive multi-tasking. Where it really shines is video encoding (which can be more than 4x faster) or high-end multi GPU gaming.
 
minicle said:
As to which specific cpu/socket that is your choice, I would suggest a i7 920 (if you can get one) and overclock it to 3.8-4ghz, the 930s appear to run hotter and want more volts (this is my impression from peoples posts) but which ever way you go, just make sure you buy that ssd.
Click to expand...

******!! He wants an S1156 cos dual channel kits cheaper, mobo much cheaper and then he can buy my cpu :D

Actually he can't cos he has not got access to MM :(
 
As already suggested, I would hold off for a few weeks until the Intel price cut kicks in and whatever new is released...as regards will you see a performance improvement, yes, you will especially in the likes of video encoding...the 750/860 (and 920/930) also o/c well, so that 4.0GHz is quite easily obtainable with decent cooling etc.
 
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