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E6850 or Q6600 for Gaming

Fair point in the E6850 v Q6600 but there should be no others in the thread, the topic is about them 2 CPU's and for games I prefer the MHZ be it stock or OC'd that the E6850 can do, I can always buy a new gen Native Quad in 2008.
 
I ended up in the same situation of having to decide between the E6850 and Q6600. I made up my mind more than once switching back and forth between the two. I'd come up with an absolute reason why I needed one... until I came up with another absolute reason why I needed the other.

I figure (and this is my opinion only) that by the time enough apps and games take full advantage of quad to ensure that the extra two cores aren't just sitting there using electricity, I figure it'll be pretty close to upgrade again anyway.

In the end, it's a really tough choice but one I don't think will really matter too much to most people. They're both great processors that should do anything you want them to.

[I currently have two E6850's and all the kit required for two systems sitting on the floor beside me. I still hope I made the right choice but regardless as I mentioned above, they're both great processors. It's kind of hard to go wrong with one or the other.]
 
i'll be buying a new system in September (with Intel X38 chipset) and i chose Q6600.

im totally a gamer, but why did i choose q6600?

main reason is that i don't plan to upgrade for another 3 years. so a good processor have to be 3-year proof.

looking at the current dual cores, which are not even 3 year old. and yet they've been considered mainstream. so my bet is, in less than another 3 years, quad cores will be mainstream.

also, Crysis is coming out in 2 months will need quad core to make it perform better.

other people's reasoning about clock speed is also absolutely correct. 2x4GHz vs 4x3Ghz......... as long as a game has more than 3 threads, 4 cores will be better than dual cores.
 
I predict games won't be multicore or even dual core
mainstream until next summer remember they have to program games to
cater for lower end systems too.
As for getting a quad now simply no point as far as i have seen they are
running way too hot for my liking and thus don't overclock as well
as dual core by the time x38 is here there will be better quads than the 6600
for it's current price not to mention cooler running.
As far as i know there's 2 games that take advantage of dual core
supreme commander and half life 2 correct me if i am wrong though.
If you upgrade as you go along the loss is quite minimal.
 
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People keep missing the point. The more cores you have the more things you can run synchronously without apps slowing down. Open task manager and look how many background applications and services you have running - do you not think it would be nice to have what is in effect another dual core cpu to deal with them tasks while you have another dual core to cope with your gaming needs? The game dosn't have to be multi threaded to reap the benifits of quad core imo.

I have had 2 x 4ghz capable core2duos now and can honestly say I didn't notice any difference from running them at 3ghz to running them at 4ghz. Sure there would be some benefit in FPS but nothing major and certainly not enough to warrant changing a decent clocking e6600 for a 6850 unless benchmarks are your thing. Quadcore however is the logical upgrade path for me.
 
Again you dont have real Quads, they are 2 Dual cores stuck on a wafer as 1 CPU and that timescale of 3 years you use will put these current CPU's in the stoneage mainly as the non Native part.

The task manager has nothing to do with how many things are running in that the Games and APPS do not fully support Quad, most have bad Dual core support right now.

Anyone getting the E6850 for gaming made a good choice IMO.

So there is no point to miss, fact is these current CPU's are about to be replaced very soon by newer tech from both camps, this will inc REAL Native Quads.
 
C64 said:
As far as i know there's 2 games that take advantage of dual core
supreme commander and half life 2 correct me if i am wrong though.
If you upgrade as you go along the loss is quite minimal.
Click to expand...

Quake 4 :D

Infact, there's a list of quite a few games that use dual core... but i don't believe there is even 1 game out there that properly uses dual core..
 
helmutcheese said:
Again you dont have real Quads, they are 2 Dual cores stuck on a wafer as 1 CPU and that timescale of 3 years you use will put these current CPU's in the stoneage mainly as the non Native part..
Click to expand...

'Real' quads or not, there is still 4 cores

helmutcheese said:
The task manager has nothing to do with how many things are running in that the Games and APPS do not fully support Quad, most have bad Dual core support right now...
Click to expand...
Of course it has EVERYTHING to do with it. If it was not then there would be no benifit of using dual core over single core. The more you have running in the background the more cpu cycles will be stolen and as such there will be less performance. A game does not have to be multithreaded to benifit from having extra cores. Sure you may not have any extra performance but the risk of slowdown due to a progrma being run in the background is going to be minimzed the more processors you have. Most people, know it or not, are 'multitasking' in one form or another with all the tasks being performed simultaneously in a modern day PC. Run 3dmark06 and then run it again with non essential services and programs running and you will get a better grasp of what I am saying.

Of course once games become multithreaded, of which the major players (Source, Cry engine, doom engine) all have games that are nearing the release date that will be multithreaded, the performance gains of going quad will speak for themselves be it the current crop of quads or future native ones.

helmutcheese said:
Anyone getting the E6850 for gaming made a good choice IMO.
Click to expand...

I agree, an excellent choice if upgrading from a low clocking or last generation CPU. IF upgrading from a current decent C2D (3ghz+) then I'm afraid those who did make the jump to a 6850 will be dissappointed in any potential performance gains as they will be small. I know because like I said I have done the 4ghz thing and it aint all its cracked up to be - great for E-peen and benchmarking but the differences in gaming are minimal at best.

helmutcheese said:
So there is no point to miss, fact is these current CPU's are about to be replaced very soon by newer tech from both camps, this will inc REAL Native Quads.
Click to expand...

I think my replies have shown that the point has indeed been missed;). The fact the the current quads are going to be replaced very soon is irrelevent - The native quads will be replaced by octo's and so on and so on. Do you think the 6850 will be around forever? An upgrade is an upgrade and 6 months(or more before we see desktop native quads) is a very long time to wait in CPU terms.

Either CPU will be a great performer no doubt and I guess any point of view is dependent on what you are planning on upgrading from.
 
A Native Quad will perform better than these half breeds, and the APPS and GAMES need support for Dual or Quad support, just because you have 50 processes instead someone with 20 in Task Manager dont mean the Quad is going to be better.

Hmm, I also would not try convince anyone on a current high CPU to buy either of these, they can get by till new CPU from AMD and Intel are out.

We have no idea what he is coming from as he dont say, but he does ask what one of 2 certain CPU's is beter for gaming, I still say the E6850, this thread is his and its going offtopic to a Dual v Quad thread and I'm jsut as much to blame for that as others but I gave him inout based on topic orginally. ;)
 
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...but surely the more cores you have dealing with background tasks the better no even if a game is single threaded? I know I noticed a difference going from single to dual core so I dont see why going from dual to quad should be any different - especially with vista being the resource hog it is.
 
Most will tell you the extra cores just sit wasting away power and making heat.
I guess thats why AMD made the Dual Core Optimiser APP, so Windows 32bit would use the core more efficiently not sure if in normal apps though but it was said to help in games.

If you encode video etc great, get APP that supports multi cores and cut down on time, anyhow as I said this is the OP's thread so I'm out as I have inputed really early on in thread.
 
helmutcheese said:
A Native Quad will perform better than these half breeds,
Click to expand...

When will these be out and will they cost £168? Penryn is still a half breed and initially will be socket 771. Socket 775 won't be out until next year.

As they both currently cost the same, quad core is the better choice IMO, if the OP wants to buy now and keep it for a while. There may only be a handful of apps / games that utilize all four cores right now, but that will change soon. When that happens, you will enjoy the benefits without changing a thing. The alternative is 6850 now, sell at a loss when it starts to struggle, buy a Penryn.
 
Purely for gaming the E6850 is the better choice as you will not be doing much overclocking.

Personally I can't see many games benefiting greatly from quad-core compared to dual-core. One of the reasons is that you simply start running out of truly demanding threads so things get less and less efficient.

In fact it's entirely possible that a DC@3ghz could beat a [email protected] even in games with multicore support, simply because there won't be 4 seperate threads all using the same power, there will be like one or two main ones (rendering, physics) needing 80% of the power compared to the rest doing AI, input, networking etc.
 
What cpu is best i think it depends on how long you will have it, if you need to upgrade now and intend to keep it for a few years then i think the quad is better and really if they the same prices why not get a quad.
To me 4 is better then 2 maybe you lose a few frames beening at a lower clock speed with the quad.

If i were not pushing the cpu i think i would go for the quad but again if and whaen i get one i will keep it for a 18 months or more.
To be honest if people upgraded when they only needed to we wouldn't buy half the things for our pc's we do.
Get what ever you want and be happy with it, it is your money :)
 
C64 said:
I predict games won't be multicore or even dual core
mainstream until next summer remember they have to program games to
cater for lower end systems too.
As for getting a quad now simply no point as far as i have seen they are
running way too hot for my liking and thus don't overclock as well
as dual core by the time x38 is here there will be better quads than the 6600
for it's current price not to mention cooler running.
As far as i know there's 2 games that take advantage of dual core
supreme commander and half life 2 correct me if i am wrong though.
If you upgrade as you go along the loss is quite minimal.
Click to expand...

basically all the games that use the source engine. DOD, CSS, ep2 etc.. will benefit from multi cores come October.
 
Doesn't the E6600 do near 3.6GHZ??? The difference between that and 4GHZ in games should be minimal and the price is significant.

Waste of money. I want to get the Q6600 and everyone keeps trying to put them down. The truth is a game that was not even properly encoded for quad cores gave twice the benifit in frame rates. Lost planet is a crap game i know. But it shows the difference. You all keep saying ooo games dont run quads properly. Well lost planet doesn't and it gave twice as many frames on quads. Many people on the forum have seen the graphs showing it.

If a game like that which is a crap game can do it. Then crysis and alike should show similar results with superiour encoding. Why are you putting the Quads down when they may totaly destroy the duels when these games come out?
 
get the quad, the dual will be slightly better in apps which dont take advantage of all the cores, but the difference will be unnoticable pretty much, and in programs where they are all used the quad is 2x as good. you wont notice ~500mhz in programs which use 1 or 2 cores. youll notice the speed (theoretically) doubling in programs which use 4 cores though.
 
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Just gone from a 3.4ghz e6600 to a 3ghz q6600 and the difference is very noticeable. The quad is really the only way to go if your board supports it.

It's been more than a worthwhile investment - i'd even considered getting one for £300 when they initially dropped but when i saw one for £160 there really was no reason not to! :)

gt
 
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