Best bang for buck CPU for modern games

[easyrider]

why does everyone <3 the Q6600 so much? i had one at 3.2GHz for a while, and it was pretty good, but it put a lot of strain on the motherboard. you really need a good motherboard & good cooling to get one above 3.0GHz and have it still working a year later. also, it may struggle on games that only make use of 2 cores, especially if it is not overclocked.

at the moment, the i3 for £75ish is pretty good, a lot of games still don't benefit from having more than 2 cores, and it is easy as hell to overclock to 4GHz with pretty much any setup.

or the i5 for £150 or i9 for £200 are good too if you got the money to spare.

This post makes no sense. Read the OP

 

[hybrid572]

I'd be tempted to go with Big.Wayne's overclocking tips. Q6600s are cracking chips, and the quad core is useful for gaming now, but I'd save the money and put it towards a Sandy Bridge system if you can.

 

[lollox]

Yet another +1 for a second hand q6600 or q6700. But only after you have at least tried to OC the current set up.

I paid around £70 with shipping a few months back if I recall correctly from a well known auction site and have got it running 3.4 at the moment, albeit with a better cooler.

 

[Lysander]

Sorry to hijack the thread a bit, but I have a Q8400 and very much plan on playing The Witcher 2. Will I get good fps esp with those NPC heavy environs?

 

[Dark_Angel]

It's not released yet? How do we know?

 

[snowdog]

why does everyone <3 the Q6600 so much? i had one at 3.2GHz for a while, and it was pretty good, but it put a lot of strain on the motherboard. you really need a good motherboard & good cooling to get one above 3.0GHz

Rubbish, my p5b deluxe does it fine, the OP's board has the same chipset, the OP doesn't want to change his mainboard. A simple AC Freezer 7 Pro is fine. If you want silence something like a Scythe Mugen is great and will keep it cool easily at this OC.

and have it still working a year later.

Rubbish, mine is fine after YEARS of use at 3.2...

also, it may struggle on games that only make use of 2 cores, especially if it is not overclocked.
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A q6600 @ 3+ ghz struggle in games? Right . I've not noticed any problems. Dual core is crap too when you want to game while doing something else cpu intensive at the meantime, I would never go back to a dual core, even a 4ghz e8xxx or an i3...

 

[r3loaded]

a lot of games still don't benefit from having more than 2 cores

Not true anymore nowadays, a lot of modern games benefit from having at least 3 cores, preferably 4. Nothing yet takes advantage of more than 4 cores though.