E6300/E6400/E6600??

Arthur_Jay · 21 Jan 2007 at 23:54

Hey guys..

There have probably been a couple of threads similar to this, so thank you for giving it the time

Basically just about to start my new build, this will be the first one I have gone for Intel with. And here I am, wondering which chip to go for. Obviously I want to keep costs low if possible, but will spend If I have to. The pc will be used for day to day tasks, music production, photoshop work, and a little bit of gaming...but nothing that will be too heavy, probably Tiger Woods at max lol.

So how much difference will I see between the 6300 and the 6400??

And what about between the 6400 and the 6600...I know the 6600 has the 4mb cache, but what difference does this make? and how important is it? and how important for my set-up?

Any help would be muchly appreciated

Scoobie Dave · 22 Jan 2007 at 00:25

Arthur_Jay said:
Hey guys..

There have probably been a couple of threads similar to this, so thank you for giving it the time

Basically just about to start my new build, this will be the first one I have gone for Intel with. And here I am, wondering which chip to go for. Obviously I want to keep costs low if possible, but will spend If I have to. The pc will be used for day to day tasks, music production, photoshop work, and a little bit of gaming...but nothing that will be too heavy, probably Tiger Woods at max lol.

So how much difference will I see between the 6300 and the 6400??

And what about between the 6400 and the 6600...I know the 6600 has the 4mb cache, but what difference does this make? and how important is it? and how important for my set-up?

Any help would be muchly appreciated

Just get the 6300 overclocks the same as the 6400 and offers best bang for buck.

As for the extra cache I think it only gives a slight boost when video encoding, but for the extra money not really worth it IMO.

Hades · 22 Jan 2007 at 00:26

Get an E4300

Dyson · 22 Jan 2007 at 00:30

An E4300? Not heard of that one.

Spotted this post, saved me a job! Was going to go for 6300, but will look into 4300 now...

Arthur_Jay · 22 Jan 2007 at 00:32

Well I wont be overclocking I dont think...so in that case is it best to go for the 6400?

I wont be doing any video encoding, so so far thats ruling the 6600 out...

Also, why the 4300? obviously the price is nice, but surely Ill see an enhanced performance with the 63/64?

Justintime · 22 Jan 2007 at 00:44

If not overclocking the the E4300 is'nt a great choice, the 6400 is a good one.

eracer2006 · 22 Jan 2007 at 00:58

get the best one you can if not overclocking.

kind of wish id gone for 6600 now that i dont overclock.

fumbles · 22 Jan 2007 at 01:04

Justintime said:
If not overclocking the the E4300 is'nt a great choice, the 6400 is a good one.

The E4300 has a higher multiplier, which usually means a better OCer.

Hades · 22 Jan 2007 at 01:20

If not overclocking then get the E6600 if you can afford it. If not then get the E6300.

Justintime · 22 Jan 2007 at 01:26

fumbles said:
The E4300 has a higher multiplier, which usually means a better OCer.

Ahem.

Justintime said:
If not overclocking the the E4300 is'nt a great choice, the 6400 is a good one.

Arthur_Jay · 22 Jan 2007 at 01:45

Hades said:
If not overclocking then get the E6600 if you can afford it. If not then get the E6300.

Whats wrong witht he 6400 then?

Hades · 22 Jan 2007 at 01:49

Arthur_Jay said:
Whats wrong witht he 6400 then?

Nothing. But the 6600 is faster and has more cache, and the 6300 is cheaper. The 6300 and 6600 just look better value to me. But there is no denying the stock 6400 is faster than a stock 6300.

Arthur_Jay · 22 Jan 2007 at 01:57

Oh ok...Well thanks for that mate...I do see where youre coming from

Although the 6400 is obviously a higher spec...Will there be much difference if I went for the cheaper 6300?

fumbles · 22 Jan 2007 at 05:23

Justintime said:
Ahem.

Whoops.... Not the first time today either, i need to get better sleeping patterns.

Dmack · 22 Jan 2007 at 05:45

got my 6300 to 3 ghz

harris1986 · 22 Jan 2007 at 08:17

my 6400 does 3.4ghz on stock volts

, and chose the 64 over the 63 due to the multiplier (i also had 5300ram to start with so needed the higer multi)

WJA96 · 22 Jan 2007 at 08:59

Pretty much all the E6x00 processors clock up to 3.2-3.6GHz. The difference is in how much effort it takes to get them there.

With a 6600, you are only runing an FSB of 400 to get 3.6GHz, which most motherboards can do comfortably and DDR2 PC6400 RAM isn't overclocked at that.

With an E6400, to hit 3.6GHz you need 450MHz, which is again in the reach of most motherboards but you will be applying a 12% overclock to the PC-6400 RAM, which will mean loosening off the timings and potential system instability.

With an E6300, to hit 3.6GHz you need to be pulling 515MHz which a lot of motherboard can't do and you really need special RAM. The CPU is morte than capable, but the money you saved by buying and E6300 has to be spent on a better clocking motherboard and RAM.

I like the E6400/OcUK Value RAM PC6400/ASUS P5N-E Sli combination. For just under £400 delivered you get an almost guaranteed 3.2GHz overclock (with 3.6GHz definitely possible) and a fully featured motherboard that has oodles of multimedia and gaming potential.

The E4300 has the same 9x multiplier as the E6600, so it should be possible to clock it very high indeed.

hardc0re_tid · 22 Jan 2007 at 09:35

eracer2006 said:
kind of wish id gone for 6600 now that i dont overclock.

yet you have the 6300 at 3.2 lol, wish my stock speed was that

go for the 6400, 6600 if your budget will allow

Dyson · 23 Jan 2007 at 14:25

From what i've read the 43 looks very similar to the the 63, both having 2mb cache.

But, I see the E6320 is coming out in the 2nd Q this year, with 4mb cache. Do you wait, or is it not worth it???

Wish I hadn't decided on building one now, too many options to think about...

Cartho · 23 Jan 2007 at 15:47

The E6300 is still very powerful - even when not overclocked it can compare nicely with an Athlon X2 5000+