Old P4 vs New Q6600...no difference in speed or performance

neo36uk

neo36uk

neo36uk

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Hello folks

I have just ditched my old p4 3.2ghz for a new Intel Q6600, I was under the Impression I was going to see a huge difference in performance but so far there is very little. The Q6600 is 2.4 but I have manages to set it to 3.01 (any faster and my system crashes)

Any idea what I should do to improve my performance? I have read the overclocking guide on this forum but still stuck. I have been told it maybe my ram that needs setting but I don’t know what I am messing with when it come to the ram timings etc

My speck is:
Abit IP35-Pro.
2Gig Crucial Ballistix (2x1Gig) in dual channel mode.
Intel Q6600 (1066fsb version)

Hope someone can help
 
Sorry, I forgot to mention the performance issues.

1, Well, ok, there is no difference what so ever in boot up time, the old p4 was taking about 3/4mins to fully load, that is the same with the new Q6600

2, My system is now turning off slightly faster but not much difference there either.

3, Also, once my system has loaded the harddrive activity seems to go an and on, some times this is worse than other boot ups

4, when I double click to load a program there is sometimes a 2/3 second delay to start loading…this was the same as the old P4

5, (the good news) The only thing I am impressed with is now when I run cubase sx3 I hardly see any cpu activity, on the old P4 it was quite high, so that is loads better.

I am going to get me the overclocking book, they use the same speck as mine except the ram make is different but the same speed PC2 8500
 
neo36uk said:
I have just ditched my old p4 3.2ghz for a new Intel Q6600, I was under the Impression I was going to see a huge difference in performance but so far there is very little.
Click to expand...

Even at stock the Q6600 is at least several times faster.

Of course windows won't suddently run faster because it depends on the overall system speed (how much ram you have and how fast your hard drive is) and all those you mentioned about booting up and turning off windows depends very heavily on your hard drive's performance and CPU has nothing much to do with it. But once you started playing games/encode audio/video that are CPU intensive you'll notice a huge difference.

Even if you have the Q6600 at 4Ghz windows will still load slowly if the hard drive's performance is slow.
 
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Thanks for the reply:)

My first hardrive, (which is plugged into SATA Port 1 on the mobo) is this one
Seagate Barracuda 7200.11 500GB SATA-II 32MB Cache - OEM (ST3500320AS)

My second drive in SATA port 2 is this one
Western Digital Caviar SE16 500GB SATA-II 16MB Cache - OEM (WD5000AAKS)

Both drives are now defragmented

The reason I have 2 different makes is because I originally bought the Western digital, but I thought it was way to noisy, so I went out and got the Seagate which in my opinion is loads quieter
 
sounds like its time for a reformat if you can manage it.

startup times are largely limited by the hdd not the cpu.

maybe you have a virus? you say you have 2gb ram but then you also describe what i would usually put down to not enough ram so it having to cache to the pagefile.
 
If you have 2 physical hard drives put the page file on a partition on the opposite hard drive from where windows is installed. Also what speed is your ram running at? Have you set it to the correct speed in the BIOS?

When i upgraded from a 3800 X2 to a Q6600 i noticed a difference all over the place from windows load time to program opening times. If i was you might want to consider a reinstall of windows as if its loading that slowly there must be a lot of junk getting loaded on start up. You could do this or selectively choose what loads on start up by going Run -> Msconfig and in the start up tab you can choose.
 
Setting up the memory is completely new to me, I have only just figured out how to overclock the cpu, what should I set it to?

I have Crucial Ballistix PC2-8500

Cheers
 
What OS are you running? If you are running Vista then I would be running with 4gb for extra speed and smoothness :)

From what has been said so far I would start by looking to your hard drives and if its not them test the memory. Try HDTune & HDTach to see if theres any problems, also a clean windows install with fresh drivers for your new kit would probably help too, but do the HD tests first :) Post the pics of the HD tests here so we can see if its them?


Peace :)

[edit] Did you actually reformat your hard drive and re-install windows when you changed processor, mobo etc?
 
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Neo

I'm running pretty much the same setup as you, but you might want to check if you can get the speeds the Crucial Ballistix are supposed to be able to achieve

i.e. 1066 MHz at timings of 5.5.5.15

with the CPU clocked down or at default (multimplier at 8 and FSB at 266.266)

i.e changed the CPU:RAM divider in the BIOS to 1:2 instead

Just worth checking to ensure that you are not being limited to a 3.01 GHz OC due to the RAM and not the CPU.

At present I'm having issues with my Ballistix Tracer's and they will be returned to OC'ers tomorrow for a set of either Corsair's or a set of the 6400 Crucial memory (2 x 2 GB Ballistix Tracer Red PC 6400) and this could be your bottleneck.
 
I'm on a 6 month old vista build and I'm booting within 30 seconds easy, I bet you've got about 30 progs in your startup routine. Even my laptop manages it within a minute.
 
Old P4 install
new mobo and processor and drivers

same install?

Start fresh is best when doing big upgrades. It will be faster in the long run than fiddling around and scratching head. New install and SP, latest mobo chipset and gfx drivers and all will be sweet......only then worry about overclocking and tweaking IMO.
 
i have recently upgraded my P4 3 GHz to Q6600 and just at stock levels its WAY faster, i see no reason to OC it, the only issue i get it hot running :( under load i get temps over 60'C :eek: yesturday i encoded a DivX into DVD TS format 15 Minutes!!!

i agree with previous posts, you need a fresh install of windows (consider XP) personnally i find xp is better as it uses less resources making overall performance better + 2 gb aint enough to keep vista happy :D

EDIT: i need help with my Temp issue :) is 60'c under load normal for a stock Q6600?
 
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Thanks for all the info there guys, it's very much appreciated.

I should confess that when I installed the new Q6600 I did not do a fresh install of XP Pro, I just removed the old P4 and replaced it with the Q6600 and rebooted windows. No difference in speed what so ever, surely it should a slightly faster even by doing it this way!

I will have to do a reformat...but am I doing it right?
What I mean is I have a 500gig SATA2 Seagate HD, at the moment I am using the entire drive for windows/program files/docs/pictures etc.

do you think I should partition the drive? My idea is set up one 10gig partition (C drive) just for Windows, then say 200gig for program files (D drive) and possibly 200 gig for video etc (E drive)

the above is just an idea, just have a feeling it would run much better like that

as for setting up my memory timing I am not sure what I am messing with there, I am scared of blowing something, I am totally now to overcooking ram but any advice would be much appreciated.

Thanks again folks:)
 
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