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Opteron 165 (stock) to Intel Quad Core

BeatMaster

BeatMaster

BeatMaster

Soldato
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I'm just wondering before I make the switch from AMD to Intel whether its a worthy upgrade. I currently have:

AMD Opteron 165 @ stock
DFI Ultra-D Motherboard
2x512MB Corsair PC3200LL
256Mb GeForce 7800GT

Would be looking to go quad core when the price drops arrrive, along with 2/4Gb DDR2 and possibly an 8800 graphics card :) The question is whether it is actually worth it or maybe more bang for buck sticking to dual core on the C2D chips and overclocking it up to 3Ghz?

Anyone with a quad core who has gone from a dual core? I haven't heard any real life benchmarks with regards to performance of the new quad cores yet.

Thanks,

BeatMaster :D
 
You'd be doing that CPU an injustice if you don't overclock it. You could upgrade in stages as well, as a shiny new 8800 would work perfectly well in that board, and you can upgrade to quad core when the price is right.
 
I went from an O/Ced Operton 170 to a Q6600 which I have overclocked to 3ghz.
The difference in performance, especially gaming performance is huge.
My 3dmark 2006 score has gone from 8000 to 13000. I can encode four divx movies at once, each one taking on 12mins to encode whereas before it work take 25mins and I could only do one at a time.
Colin McRae Dirt was jerkovision when running at max detail at 1900x1200 but now it is as smooth as silk using the same settings.
I highly recommend you upgrade when you can, especially if you are a gamer or if you do a lot of encoding.
 
I'm prolly gunna look to do something similar to Headrat - in that if I can scrounge a decent clocking dual core opty of some kind then i'll just nab an 8800 GTX and stay with that for another year or so before moving intel !

*Native quad core an all that coming up :)

Anyone know if the current opty 170's OcUK have are good clockers ? - £88 doesn't seem to bad !
 
morpheus9394 said:
The difference in performance, especially gaming performance is huge
Click to expand...

GTX on Conroe

GTX on A64's


But that simply isn't the case in real world gaming e.g. :-

Battlefield 2142 1600x1200x32 4xAA 8xAF

8800GTX C26000 99.6 FPS
8800GTX X4600+ 96.4 FPS

COH 1600x1200x32 4xAA 8xAF

8800GTX C26000 111.6 FPS
8800GTX X4600+ 80.4 FPS

7900gsstalker1280.gif


The lower the resolution the more difference the CPU makes, the higher the res. it's all down to the GPU, I run all my games in 1080p ;)

hardly any games support quad core ATM so two of your cores will be doing nothing but I agree for encoding the quad core will be better.

HEADRAT
 
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That's prefect for me as I run at 1600 x 1200 and don't really fancy a complete upgrade - I think i'll nab one of the opty 170's OcUK have at the mo and o/c the hell out of it and then pick up an 8800 GTX - should sort me for another year or more ...
 
I'm tempted by a quad core as I do some re-encoding as well us using VMWARE, for your average gamer that doesn't want to make the jump to Intel there is nothing wrong with your S939/AMD rig TBH, invest your money in a mighty GPU ;)

morpheus9394 said:
Colin McRae Dirt was jerkovision when running at max detail at 1900x1200 but now it is as smooth as silk
Click to expand...

That's because it just coded badly (ported), I'm pretty sure that Dirt doesn't even use quad core but I do think it's one of those few games that does like lots of horse power.

HEADRAT
 
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Thats what I'm thinking !

I haven't been able to get this 165 past 2.46Ghz - literally hit a brick wall there :/

Had a sandy 4000+ @ 3.1Ghz in the same mobo for nearly 7 months prior to getting the opty to I know its good for a decent fsb - just need a good stepping - which I'm hoping the 170's are !!
 
HEADRAT said:
I'm tempted by a quad core as I do some re-encoding as well us using VMWARE, for your average gamer that doesn't want to make the jump to Intel there is nothing wrong with your S939/AMD rig TBH, invest your money in a mighty GPU ;)



That's because it just coded badly (ported), I'm pretty sure that Dirt doesn't even use quad core.

HEADRAT
Click to expand...

I am using Vista which has naive support for multi-core processors, so even if your application does not support multi-core, vista automatically spreads the load across each core which improves performance.
But you have to really be pushing your machine hard. It is not worth getting a quad core if you are going to be running games at 1280x1024.
You really need a 8800GTX running at 1920x1200 to really notice the difference.
 
morpheus9394 said:
You really need a 8800GTX running at 1920x1200 to really notice the difference.
Click to expand...

At high res it's all about the GPU not the CPU, at these resolutions there is very little between a C2D6400 and a C2DEX6800, a couple of FPS

morpheus9394 said:
I am using Vista which has naive support for multi-core processors, so even if your application does not support multi-core, vista automatically spreads the load across each core which improves performance.
Click to expand...

The OS will use all four cores, the game probably won't, check you task manager, 2 of the cores will be doing nowt. The game has to be written to take advantage of the 4 cores e.g. Supreme Commander.

Just to correct myself it appears that Dirt will use all the cores hence the improvement you've encountered.

http://www.nvnews.net/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=1295397&postcount=122

don't get me wrong more cores is the way forward but today there aren't too many games which support them.

Even when you have lots of cores you have to worry about the I/O for each application, there is no point having four cores all tryinig to use the same disc if you are using different applications for example. Even with my dual core I try and have a seperate physical disc for each core to use otherwise things can start to bog down.

HEADRAT
 
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HEADRAT said:
At high res it's all about the GPU not the CPU.

HEADRAT
Click to expand...

At high res it is about both, you are not going to get good framerates if you are running a slow CPU with a fast GPU or if you are running a slow GPU with a fast CPU.
In fact 8800GTX have so much raw power that they are only really limited by the speed of your CPU.

Check this out, it is a CPU chart showing the top multi-core processors plus some AMD FX CPUs for good measure.
The top two CPUs are..........both Quad-core beating the E6600 by a good margin, showing the extra cores does improve preformance.
http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/chart...7,598,599,603,610,609,613,614,615,616,617,619
 
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HEADRAT said:
All of those examples are @ low resolutions (1280x1024), synthetic benchmarks such as 3DMARK mean nothing, I'm more worried about real gaming.

Please see the high res 1920 x 1200 graphs here:-

GTX on Conroe

GTX on A64's

and you will see that CPU doesn't make that much difference.

HEADRAT
Click to expand...

I know that was coming so I found this very good article from Hardocp which has realworld comparisons AMD vs Intel running at ultra high Res (2560 x 1600) using two 8800gtx in SLi mode.
There is a quote from the conclusion
"With today’s fastest video cards, we certainly saw more differences between our AMD and Intel processors than we did at the launch of the Core 2 Duo, and certainly more differences than we saw in March of last year. Undoubtedly, the Core 2 Duo allowed us a better gaming experience overall. Also we saw some examples where we were again GPU bottlenecked in games even with these massively fast BFGTech 8800 GTX cards.


There is undoubtedly a world where the Intel Core 2 Duo reigns supreme, but in the world of gaming that power is not near as apparent. We again see games remain very GPU dependent, but the GeForce 8800 series of GPU is allowing us to begin to see the Core 2 Duo flex its muscle. One thing is for sure. If you are building a gaming system, your big money is better spent on your video cards than your processor as you are never likely to see any true differences in your gaming experiences without a hugely powerful GPU. If you do however have the alpha-male of video card(s), Intel’s Core 2 Duo can provide you with a better gaming experience."

Link - http://hardocp.com/article.html?art=MTI2MiwsLGhlbnRodXNpYXN0
 
morpheus9394 said:
One thing is for sure. If you are building a gaming system, your big money is better spent on your video cards than your processor as you are never likely to see any true differences in your gaming experiences without a hugely powerful GPU.
Click to expand...

Obviously with 2 GTX's in SLI they are going to need all of geometry they can lay there mits on, but please see the above ;)

Even then if a game doesn't use quad core there will be almost no benefit to using dual core, if you're using a single GTX then there will be little real world difference if your using a decent dual core AMD/Intel.

HEADRAT
 
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Looking at the FiringSquad Links you posted I saw something interesting with the Obilivon benchmarks. Remember Obilivon is probably the most resource hungry game out, much more so than Battlefield:

AMD 64 - Highest score 38.7fps for a X2 5000+
http://www.firingsquad.com/hardware/geforce_8800_gtx_gts_amd_cpu_scaling/page12.asp

Intel Dual Core - Highest score 48.5 for a E6600
http://www.firingsquad.com/hardware/geforce_8800_gtx_gts_core_2_performance/page7.asp

Older games rely on the raw clock speed of the CPU for performance but more recent games work better on multi-core.
If you want a future proof PC then there is no harm with going quad-core, especially as the price is going be very sweet next week.
 
Yeah but I wouldn't exactly be throwing my S939 in the bin for the want of 10 fps, both framerates are pretty acceptable TBH.

HEADRAT
 
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HEADRAT said:
Obviously with 2 GTX's in SLI they are going to need all of geometry they can lay there mits on, but please see the above ;)

Even then if a game doesn't use quad core there will be almost no benefit to using dual core, if you're using a single GTX then there will be little real world difference if your using a decent dual core AMD/Intel.

HEADRAT
Click to expand...

I agree but if you already have a fat graphic card, then you need a fat cpu to push it hard.
In my case I went from a dual core Operton [email protected] to a Q6600 @ 3.0ghz and the improvement all round is incredible. Even at stock the Quad was much faster in every respect. Encoding, file transfer, gaming, winrar.... you name it, it was faster. And the best thing is the ability to multitask.
Colin Mcrae Dirt maybe a port but the improvement on my Quad using the same 8800gtx as before when huge. The game was only playable at 1280x1024 with max details and AAx4 AFx8 but now it is playable at 1920x1200 AAx8 AFx16. Now tell me that is not a marked improvement!!
 
For most people the move up to an Intel rig is going to mean binning their Mobo and CPU and I'm just not sure it's worth it over buying a decent GPU.

I have a 8800GTX in my rig and for the games I play I can do so at 1920 x 1200 mostly at MAX, spending £250/300 of a new mobo and CPU just ain't worth it for a few FPS.

I agree that more cores are the way forward and I'm more than likely going to be buying one next week, but that's mainly for stuff other than gaming. Obviously where the games utilises all 4 cores (DIRT) it's gonna wipe the floor with a game that is CPU bound, if the game is GPU bound it won't make hardly any difference.

Also I'm not sure quad core would help much in terms of file transfers :confused:

HEADRAT
 
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