Q6600 to P2 X6 or i5/i7

MeatLoaf · 18 Jan 2011 at 00:14

Current rig in my sig. Runs great and does everything i want, but i have the upgrade itch. I had intended to go for Sandybridge but im put off by reports of them dying and being rather fragile even at stock. Can anyone recommend a decent alternative the the asus board for sandybride? Ive always had asus boards but am put off by the problems ive seen with them

So im looking at either an i5/i7 1155/6 setup or an X6 setup. I already have a set of the Geil 1.5v RAM, its the only thing i could decide on

danewesley · 18 Jan 2011 at 00:25

whats the budget? so you want mobo cpu and ram?

MeatLoaf · 18 Jan 2011 at 00:27

£350 at the very most. Im tempted by the bundle deal with the Asus P67 and the 2500k but im not convinced the asus boards decent yet.

If i went the X6 route the Crosshair 3 and the 1055T would costme about £260 from here.

Just mobo and cpu needed as ive got the RAM.

Cookeh · 18 Jan 2011 at 12:25

MeatLoaf said:
£350 at the very most. Im tempted by the bundle deal with the Asus P67 and the 2500k but im not convinced the asus boards decent yet.

If i went the X6 route the Crosshair 3 and the 1055T would costme about £260 from here.

Just mobo and cpu needed as ive got the RAM.

SB i5-2500k + Foxconn P67A-S is around £280.

Board lets you do 8x/8x Crossfire is a very solid stable overclocker - and much cheaper than alternatives despite having a good name and history.

Chuck in a cpu cooler - such as a Akasa Venom for ~£40 overclock to 4.8GHz and it will out-perform everything you specced above by a long way.

(Sorry for no links or exact prices, doing this from memory as overclockers.co.uk is filtered at school

)

MeatLoaf · 18 Jan 2011 at 12:36

Cookeh said:
SB i5-2500k + Foxconn P67A-S is around £280.

Board lets you do 8x/8x Crossfire is a very solid stable overclocker - and much cheaper than alternatives despite having a good name and history.

Chuck in a cpu cooler - such as a Akasa Venom for ~£40 overclock to 4.8GHz and it will out-perform everything you specced above by a long way.

(Sorry for no links or exact prices, doing this from memory as overclockers.co.uk is filtered at school )

Id looked at the foxconn board but wasnt sure if it was any good. I'll be using my H50 for cooling

Cookeh · 18 Jan 2011 at 14:07

MeatLoaf said:
Id looked at the foxconn board but wasnt sure if it was any good. I'll be using my H50 for cooling

Oh its very good.

Foxconn make specialist boards for gamers/enthusiasts.

Brilliant overclocking boards, and, as an added bonus it can do Crossfire properly - cheapest alternative is a good £40 more!

MikeHiow · 18 Jan 2011 at 14:27

I don't think the SB chips are nearly as fragile as the initial posts at release would suggest, but rather teething problems.

Marine-RX179 · 18 Jan 2011 at 14:40

The frame rate increase going from as Q6600 at 3.6GHz to a Phenom II X6 would not worth it, as Phenom II is only around the same performace as Core2Quad clock for clock for gaming, and having 2 extra cores don't really benefit gaming, as 99% of the games are not written to use the extra cores.

If you MUST upgrade CPU, go for a 2500K build...

But considering that you only got a GTX460 1GB, while you would see noticable increase in minimum frame rate with the 2500K (overclocked), the overall performance increase won't be as huge as grabbing another GTX460 1GB to SLI (probably would need the crack for running SLI on the P5Q Deluxe board).

Cookeh · 18 Jan 2011 at 14:57

Marine-RX179 said:
The frame rate increase going from as Q6600 at 3.6GHz to a Phenom II X6 would not worth it, as Phenom II is only around the same performace as Core2Quad clock for clock for gaming, and having 2 extra cores don't benefit really gaming as 99% of the games are not written to use the extra core.

If you MUST upgrade CPU, go for a 2500K build...

But consider you only get a GTX460 1GB, while you would see noticable increase in minimum frame rate, the overall performance increase would to be as huge as grabbing another GTX460 1GB to SLI (probably would need the crack for running SLI on the P5Q Deluxe board).

+1

And SB isn't fragile, there are just bafoons doing what they've been told not to do resulting in cpu death!

Marine-RX179 · 18 Jan 2011 at 15:04

Just realise I had loads of typo in my last post....corrected them now

Cookeh · 18 Jan 2011 at 15:41

Marine-RX179 said:
Just realise I had loads of typo in my last post....corrected them now

I can still see 5 or 6

jamesfreddie · 19 Jan 2011 at 17:10

MeatLoaf said:
£350 at the very most. Im tempted by the bundle deal with the Asus P67 and the 2500k but im not convinced the asus boards decent yet.

If i went the X6 route the Crosshair 3 and the 1055T would costme about £260 from here.

Just mobo and cpu needed as ive got the RAM.

Go with this setup add a aftermarket cooler and overclock.

MeatLoaf · 19 Jan 2011 at 17:48

Still cant decide, i keep thinking that i can go X58, 6Gb RAM and a i7 950 but for the same price i can go Sandybridge. My heads gonna explode

Cookeh · 19 Jan 2011 at 17:58

jamesfreddie said:
Go with this setup add a aftermarket cooler and overclock.

Or not....

SB system, voila:

Intel Core i5-2500K 3.30GHz (Sandybridge) Socket LGA1155 Processor with FREE Lost Planet 2 PC Game - Retail
(£166.66) £199.99

Foxconn P67A-S Intel P67 (Socket 1155) DDR3 Motherboard - (Sandybridge)
(£83.32) £99.98

Arctic Cooling MX-4 Thermal Compound (4g)
(£5.95) £7.14

Sub Total: £255.93
Shipping cost assumes delivery to UK Mainland with:
DPD Next Day Parcel
(This can be changed during checkout) Shipping : £9.50
VAT is being charged at 20.00% VAT : £53.09
Total: £318.52

Ofc, as mentioned a few posts up, best bet for gaming would be swapping the GTX460 for something with a bit more bite - like a HD6950 (and flashing it to a HD6970, one of the fastest cards around!)