Gaming wise, the real difference? (6300 vs 4200 x2)

Paramount · 22 Oct 2006 at 23:24

Hi all

All I use my processor for really is games, not overclocking, not ripping 2 DVDs at a time, no video encoding, just games.

At the moment I'm using a Barton 2500 at stock with 2 gig of ram and an x800xtpe. For everyday tasks like web surfing, a little photoshop, watching movies and listening to music its fine, but for gaming it's starting to show it's age and I'd like to upgrade asap.

I know the options, I know conroe is the best thing since casual unprotected sex with your flatmates, but upgrading for me means a total overhaul because my current system is so old, that means new ram, new motherboard, new gfx. Going the x2 route means I can reuse my ram saving a potential 160 quid, part of which will be used for 939 processor.

I'll cut to the main question, if I had 2 identical mid-high end systems, one with a stock C2D 6300, and one with a stock 4200 X2, would I notice a difference playing todays latest games (BF2, Fear, CoH, Oblivion, Dark Messiah etc)? Not with fraps running, not 3dmark points, a real difference to the eye. (I'd be running at 1680x1050 btw)

I'd really appreciate if someone who has made a similar transition could answer and put my mind at rest once and for all

Thanks very much.

Edit - I'm 1337! <<

Mr Paul · 22 Oct 2006 at 23:25

I don't think you'll notice jack.

Fars · 23 Oct 2006 at 00:01

Not sure if I missed it, but if keeping the x800 I'd say a few frames at most if any.

Either of those CPU's should feed that card and system to the max of their ability.

However something like a 6300 is probably the smart buy, if you upgrade GPU this gen or next (dx10) it will still be feeding the system and then some, especially as they clock nicely to 2.8 and beyond it seems.

Personally I'm of the opinion that the 6300 will last longer while being faster. I'm thoroughly converted from AMD with an fx57 and several x2's in the last 18 months upgrade path.

Paramount · 23 Oct 2006 at 08:40

Fars said:
Not sure if I missed it, but if keeping the x800 I'd say a few frames at most if any.

Thanks for the replies. I'd be using a 7950gt for a while, then dx10 card sometime next year, would this make a difference to how the processor performs (bottlenecking?)? A few frames doesn't count, I wouldn't beable to tell them. Stuttering however does, something I'm starting to get a lot of with my current setup in modern games and its driving me mad.

And I know getting a 775 socket is is a little better future secure wise, but by the time I upgrade again there will probably be a whole new socket.

Darg · 23 Oct 2006 at 09:04

Paramount if you go for the Asrock DUAL-VSTA LGA775 board then you'll be able to keep your old DDR RAM until you have the cash to upgrade. The board supports board DDR1 and DDR2 RAM as well as AGP and PCI-E so you won't necessarily have to upgrade your graphics at the same time. The board itself is only around £50 most places and with the E6300 on special offer at OCUK atm then it would cost you about £150 in total for the upgrade. After that you can spend money on a graphics card then RAM, HDDs etc...

I bought the board and the E6300 myself and it's a fantastic combination. While you can't overclock the board past the 300FSB you're still getting much better performance for a very cheap price and it will let me upgrade slowly over time. I plan on keeping my gfx card until I buy a DX10 card next year. Hopefully I'll get a chance to upgrade my RAM and HDDs by then.

Uriel · 23 Oct 2006 at 10:05

Darg said:
Paramount if you go for the Asrock DUAL-VSTA LGA775 board then you'll be able to keep your old DDR RAM until you have the cash to upgrade. The board supports board DDR1 and DDR2 RAM as well as AGP and PCI-E so you won't necessarily have to upgrade your graphics at the same time.

Yeah - but it's only a x4 PCI'E slot. Fine for mid-range cards but the higher end ones are going to be bottlenecked.

Paramount · 23 Oct 2006 at 14:30

Uriel said:
Yeah - but it's only a x4 PCI'E slot. Fine for mid-range cards but the higher end ones are going to be bottlenecked.

Yeah, I'd like to stay away from that board if possible. If I was going to do it, I'd go the whole hog.

I'm kinda swaying towards the AMD, and more towards a 4600+ now as well. Just as long as it will last me a year or 2s gaming with a few gfx card upgrades I'll be happy.

galadial · 23 Oct 2006 at 21:19

Darg said:
Paramount if you go for the Asrock DUAL-VSTA LGA775 board then you'll be able to keep your old DDR RAM until you have the cash to upgrade. The board supports board DDR1 and DDR2 RAM as well as AGP and PCI-E so you won't necessarily have to upgrade your graphics at the same time. The board itself is only around £50 most places and with the E6300 on special offer at OCUK atm then it would cost you about £150 in total for the upgrade. After that you can spend money on a graphics card then RAM, HDDs etc...

I bought the board and the E6300 myself and it's a fantastic combination. While you can't overclock the board past the 300FSB you're still getting much better performance for a very cheap price and it will let me upgrade slowly over time. I plan on keeping my gfx card until I buy a DX10 card next year. Hopefully I'll get a chance to upgrade my RAM and HDDs by then.

This sounds like a sensible plan to me. Will the AMD x2 work with my outdated RAM?

G

Leporello · 24 Oct 2006 at 11:48

Darg said:
Paramount if you go for the Asrock DUAL-VSTA LGA775 board then you'll be able to keep your old DDR RAM until you have the cash to upgrade. The board supports board DDR1 and DDR2 RAM as well as AGP and PCI-E so you won't necessarily have to upgrade your graphics at the same time. The board itself is only around £50 most places and with the E6300 on special offer at OCUK atm then it would cost you about £150 in total for the upgrade. After that you can spend money on a graphics card then RAM, HDDs etc...

I bought the board and the E6300 myself and it's a fantastic combination. While you can't overclock the board past the 300FSB you're still getting much better performance for a very cheap price and it will let me upgrade slowly over time. I plan on keeping my gfx card until I buy a DX10 card next year. Hopefully I'll get a chance to upgrade my RAM and HDDs by then.

Please don't be offended by my comment on this motherboard, but it looks like a complete dog's dinner to me. I've found from bitter past experiences that motherboards which seek to be compatible with old and new components tend to work like the kludges they are. I think you've been given some good advice on this thread. If I were in your position I'd wait until you can "go the whole hog" and move over to Intel with a new CPU, mobo and memory.

I have an Athlon 4000+, 2Gb RAM and a Geforce 7800 GT OC and have found that Microsoft Flight Simulator X struggles a bit for decent frame rates at the settings I want. I've been thinking of an upgrade but at present I'm not prepared to spend £580 on the Intel components I want. I'm mulling over the pro's and cons of spending around £300 on an Athlon FX60 X2 that I've been offered. But Vista and DX10 are imminent and I'm not sure whether the FX 60 will fly well enough for the outlay.

The very last thing I would do in this situation would be to build a system around a collection of kludges lashed together on a very cheap motherboard. Personally, I'd stick to the casual unprotected sex with your flatmates if I were you. In fact I'd rather have casual unprotected sex with myself than buy this motherboard. But as the saying goes, different strokes, etc.

Uriel · 24 Oct 2006 at 12:06

Slow down... FX60? Even if you can lay hands on one for £300 - for that much you could get a Core 2 Duo, RAM and motherboard and have a heck of a lot more headroom than an FX60.

If you must stick with a 939, the Opteron 185s can be had for a little over £200. I've seen Opteron 180s for well under £200 now. Below that the Opteron and X2 lines are pretty much on par price-performance wise. Even a 2nd hand FX60 is off the scale just now.

Paramount · 24 Oct 2006 at 12:24

Leporello said:
In fact I'd rather have casual unprotected sex with myself than buy this motherboard.

Haha, I lol'ed at that.

I've gone for an x2 4600+. Yes the smart decision would be conroe but I've saved 200 quid and I'm sure this will do just as much for me as a conroe would.

oweneades · 24 Oct 2006 at 12:52

Leporello said:
Please don't be offended by my comment on this motherboard, but it looks like a complete dog's dinner to me. I've found from bitter past experiences that motherboards which seek to be compatible with old and new components tend to work like the kludges they are. I think you've been given some good advice on this thread. If I were in your position I'd wait until you can "go the whole hog" and move over to Intel with a new CPU, mobo and memory.

I have an Athlon 4000+, 2Gb RAM and a Geforce 7800 GT OC and have found that Microsoft Flight Simulator X struggles a bit for decent frame rates at the settings I want. I've been thinking of an upgrade but at present I'm not prepared to spend £580 on the Intel components I want. I'm mulling over the pro's and cons of spending around £300 on an Athlon FX60 X2 that I've been offered. But Vista and DX10 are imminent and I'm not sure whether the FX 60 will fly well enough for the outlay.

Judging by your setup changing your cpu for flight simulator X will improve your framerates but not by as much as getting a faster GPU would.

Leporello · 24 Oct 2006 at 15:33

oweneades said:
Judging by your setup changing your cpu for flight simulator X will improve your framerates but not by as much as getting a faster GPU would.

OK, so given a price of £300 or so which GFX card would you buy to bump up the framerates of Flightsim X with my set up? Would that card be DX10 compatible?

Hope this isn't seen as hijacking Paramount's thread.

Leporello · 24 Oct 2006 at 15:44

Uriel said:
Slow down... FX60? Even if you can lay hands on one for £300 - for that much you could get a Core 2 Duo, RAM and motherboard and have a heck of a lot more headroom than an FX60.

If you must stick with a 939, the Opteron 185s can be had for a little over £200. I've seen Opteron 180s for well under £200 now. Below that the Opteron and X2 lines are pretty much on par price-performance wise. Even a 2nd hand FX60 is off the scale just now.

I'd be interested in to know which Conroe, motherboard and ram combination costing £300 in total would give me substantially improved framerates in FS X over an FX60 X2 in my current set up. A friend has offered me an FX60 for £300 cash.

I should also mention that I don't overclock, would an Opteron 185 give me a substantial performance boost without my needing to tinker with overclocking and worrying about cooling?

Uriel · 24 Oct 2006 at 16:14

An opteron 185 is essentially a multiplier-locked FX60. If you don't want to overclock there's no reason to pay the extra for the FX60. At stock they will perform exactly the same.

As for the Core 2 Duo combo - if you're not overclocking you'll need a 6400 to beat an FX60 in most benchmarks and games. Unfortunately I didn't take into account your 2GB RAM. A quick browse of the OCUK site would get you a 6400 Core 2 duo, RAM and Motherboard for about £380.

And if you did get an FX60 - not overclocking it would be a waste. The multiplier's unlocked for a reason.

Leporello · 24 Oct 2006 at 16:48

Thanks for the helpful reply. I know very little about AMD CPUs, my current 4000+ is the first I've owned. I've used Intel CPUs for years and will be happy to eventually return to the fold.

I note that the Opteron 185 is rated at 2.6 Mhz as compared to the 2.4Mhz of my current CPU. This, plus the fact that the Opteron 185 is a dual processor should give me a noticeable boost in my FS X framerates?

I've done a bit of browsing on the Opteron 185 and have found it for under £300 inc postage. However, I've been unable to find any relevant comparative reviews or reports of its performance.

Thanks for your continued interest.

Uriel · 24 Oct 2006 at 17:27

Benchmark wise - the 185 should perform exactly the same as the FX60 at stock. It's the same architecture and same speed. The lack of multiplier cap on the FX60 means that you can overclock the CPU without also overclocking your RAM. That's the only difference.

As for performance in flight Simulator X - as far as I know the game doesn't improve that much for dual core CPUs. This means the only benefit you'll get due to the second core is from the multi-threaded driver optimisations: about a 5-15% improvement. It's possible that Microsoft may release a patch that allows the game to take more advantage of the dual core CPU - Quake 4 showed up to 80% improvement once patched - but I wouldn't count on it.

I've not seen many articles on FSX performance yet. This is about the most informative thing I've spotted so far http://jonpatch.wordpress.com/2006/10/06/should-you-buy-fsx-now/

Leporello · 24 Oct 2006 at 19:37

Thanks again Uriel. So how about an Opteron 185 for £226 inc? I'm very tempted as apart from my attempts to complete Microsoft Flightsim in record time, I often watch TV via my on board DigiTV card whilst browsing or word processing. I'm very tempted to invest a couple of hundred quid on this pro tem upgrade. Go on persuade me.

Uriel · 24 Oct 2006 at 21:05

I've not seen any 185s for significantly less than the price you've mentioned. It's a shame OCUK isn't offering them at the moment. Both the 180 and the 185 can be found for less than the equivalent X2 or FX.

I'm thinking of a CPU upgrade myself soon. Will have to evaluate how much I have to spend after the next payday (and how much I can justify to the wife). At current best prices I'd be looking at an X2 4600+ (4400+ seems overpriced by comparison), or the two opterons I've mentioned.

Bear in mind - how long do you want the CPU to last? Chances are you'll see an improvement in FSX but it won't be perfect. I tend to get twitchy as soon as I start noticing missed frames in a game I'm playing. Once you get the upgrade bug it's difficult to put the brakes on.

With that in mind - make sure you don't spend too much on anything you can't move onto a new motherboard (I'm thinking CPU and RAM). At the higher end, Core 2 Duo systems offer much better price / performance. At current prices I'd certainly hesitate on a 4800+ and wouldn't go near an FX60 with a barge pole unless it came much closer to the 185.

Edit: For you - I wouldn't go for anything with a lower clock speed than the 4000+. You might see a performance drop in a few single threaded apps, or anything not well optimised for multithreading - including FSX at the moment.

Noufas · 24 Oct 2006 at 22:02

so would the opteron 185 be a good upgrade for a 939 socket user ? i dont want to spend money on a socket that its gonna get replaced next year...
i have a winchester 3000+ 2gigs of ram and an epox mobo, will the opteron be good enough for games?