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Can't decide on CPU upgrade

Jumping

Jumping

Jumping

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1 Jan 2007
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Scotland - Wishaw
Right boys (n girls) I was thinking of treating myself to a nice new shiny CPU, so browsed into the CPU area of the store and starts looking...sorting on price right hmm two weekly offers for about the same money...

This Week Only Offer
Intel Core 2 Quad Pro Q6600 "Energy Efficient SLACR 95W Edition" 2.40GHz (1066FSB) - OEM£129.99 £125.99 (£148.04)

Intel Core 2 Duo E8400 LGA775 'Wolfdale' 3.00GHz (1333FSB) - Retail This £129.99 £124.99 (£146.86)

...arrrgh I don't know which one to pick so help me decide please.

Some info on my current system Asus P5N-e SLi mobo Ram OCZ 4GB (2x2GB) PC2-6400C5 Dual Channel Vista Gold Series DDR2 (OCZ2G8004GK)

Thanks for all your help guys.
 
Yeah I guess the quad and pump the fsb up a notch would be nice. With a quad is almost tempting to start doing some distributed crunching again :)
 
Ultimately it depends what you use your computer for.

Unless you are going to be encoding, i would go for the E8400. It's a newer processor, uses less power and you can overclock the nuts off it.
 
If you use applications that are likely to gain a boost with the quad, such as rendering or encoding, buy it. Otherwise stick with the E8400.
 
I will go with the E8400 as I don't use much that would take advantge of 2 extra cores.

Thanks for all your help.
 
I am having a similar problem. Though I want to watercool my new build so I guess the Quad would gain more from that. They are exactly the same price as well. Its as if they want us to have a problem choosing.
 
Personally I'd get a Q6600, just such a great chip with loads of time left in it, with flexability of 4 cores, but what do I know :P
 
InkZ said:
Personally I'd get a Q6600, just such a great chip with loads of time left in it, with flexability of 4 cores
Click to expand...
Yes thats all true, the only downside to the Kentsfield Quad Core compared to the newer tech Wolfdale/Yorkfields is that the older 65nm chip guzzles more fuel compared to those manufactured on the 45nm processs.
 
Big.Wayne said:
Yes thats all true, the only downside to the Kentsfield Quad Core compared to the newer tech Wolfdale/Yorkfields is that the older 65nm chip guzzles more fuel compared to those manufactured on the 45nm processs.
Click to expand...

shouldnt the 45nm be cooler also?, PS: would a 45 chip fit work on my mobo?, have to flash the bios right?
 
Well yeah as far as I know as the silicon gets thinner it uses less voltage and runs cooler, however once you start pumping voltage and extra MHz through it they start to consumer a lot more electric and appear to run quite hot.

The 45nm chips are appealing to me more and more, I'm not seeking extra MHz particularly but the power-savings are helpful to my wallet and the planet.

I wouldn't advise buying a new 65nm chip now, if your in the market for a new CPU its gotta be one based on the fresh 45nm process. If you want a older style quad then pickup a used one for as good as price as possible.
 
I'm going with the Q6600 and I'm aiming for a 3.6ghz overclock. Which would be lovely.

Skipped dual core completely :D Going from Single core opty to Quad Core, Awesome :p
 
Clock for clock the new 45nm cpu's are faster than their 65nm counterparts.

Why go for quad core when your not going to use the extra cores? He'll get much more performance from a higher clocked dual core.

In fact the only reason I am holding onto my Q6600 is because i occassionally encode, otherwise i'd def sell up and get one of the new wolfdale cpu's.
 
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