Q6600 to I5/7 worth it?

Dark_Angel

Dark_Angel

Dark_Angel

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Early in the new years I'm considering it.

I've got 4GB of ram, and a OC'ed Q6600.

I play games, but mostly the reason is for Photoshop work, and considering it might be worth the upgrade.

My system currently doesn't feel slow so much, but ya know... I figure if something is faster then it might be worth it. I've been toying with the idea for a while, I could sell my old parts I guess to help to pay for the upgrade, but since the CPU / MB market is so weird (with Sata 3 coming out, and everyone working on the new killer tech) I'm not sure if it's worth coming from something that's pretty fast?

Off topic to the worth it question, but would a 520W Corsair HX PSU be okay for the job, I've done some research and everywhere is telling me yes it will be but I just wanted to make sure.
 
I had 2b ram and a Q6600 at stock, and that was fine.

But now I upgraded with 6gb OCZ Ram (7-7-7-20) timings, and an i7 (at stock).

Everything is done about 3 to 4 times faster.

Your PSU should be fine too.

=PLUS=
My photoshop 7.0 loads in about 6 seconds from about 10-15, so thats a big improvement too :)

I would recommend it!
 
Ryan-3 said:
I had 2b ram and a Q6600 at stock, and that was fine.

But now I upgraded with 6gb OCZ Ram (7-7-7-20) timings, and an i7 (at stock).

Everything is done about 3 to 4 times faster.

Your PSU should be fine too.

=PLUS=
My photoshop 7.0 loads in about 6 seconds from about 10-15, so thats a big improvement too :)

I would recommend it!
Click to expand...


So for between 4-9 seconds improvement you would recommend building a whole new rig?

Man yo crazy! :)

I still think the Q6600 is a great chip, I don't see any reason upgrading yet unless you are into heavy video encoding and such and need those "vital" seconds.
 
What's the rest of your spec and how much of an overclock do you have? Maybe you could try to squeeze a few extra MHz out of it. Also for photoshop/video editing it might be worthwhile adding another 4 gigs RAM so that you know you're using that pesky pagefile as little as possible (That is assuming you're running a 64-bit OS).
 
I'm in pretty much the same boat as the op. I have a Q6600 and I can't honestly say it's struggling with anything atm. Still doesn't stop me from looking enviously at an i5/i7 build though
 
Well, I'm at 3GHZ overclock.

My BM isn't the best for OC'ing so I can't really push anymore out of it. I was considering more RAM, but then I feel like I may as well spend that money for a new rig if I upgrade -.-

*EDIT*

OR, I could go with a cheap I5 build now... basically save my cash? O.o
 
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You will notice a difference but to be honest I think that more RAM would help you a lot, especially given that photoshop is rather memory-intensive and not using the pagefile will dramatically improve performance.
 
The q6600 is still a good chip however if you're looking for more power i wouldn't look at anything other than i7 as the HT will help a lot. i5 is great for gaming, but you wont see the benefits over your q6600 due to the lack of HT.

If you're just looking to play with some newer tech AM3 looks a good route. You could get a new 965 and overclock to 3.8GHz (hopefully 4GHz even) and have the prospect of a six core upgrade in the future if you need it?
 
Just stick with what you've got mate, it's fine. If you're using more RAM then you've currently got (you can check using the taskmanager) installed then I'd also suggest adding some more ram.
 
I have pretty much the same set up as you,also looking to upgrade, but not sure its worth it at the moment, cant see you getting much of a increase in photo shop that you will notice, I use it as well so gonna hold till after Xmas and see
 
I'm in the same boat, Q6600 (@3.2GHz), 8GB DDR3, 2x 5770's. I keep thinking to myself that I've had this Q6600 since their original release, and due to its age surely I should be contemplating an upgrade by now?

I can't see anything being that much of an "upgrade" though, unless I spend stupid amounts (I'd only buy the 920 due to price/performance of the rest of the i7 range).
 
Once again I've got the same setup as you and I was thinking about this.

But like mentioned before you'd be senile to upgrade for 3-5 second increase.
Perhaps hold out for a little longer let SATA 3 become really mainstream then pounce on an i7 build

that 6600 is sure to be the best ever CPU manufactured by Intel
so show it some faith and loving
 
Last week saw me move from an IP35/8GB/Q6600 @ 3.8GHz to an i7 @ 4.2GHz ... I was skeptical to be honest as the upgrade will cost me approx £350 overall when I get another 6GB of Ram. But I do believe it was worth the move as I use my PC for software development with a few VMs on the go usually and it certainly 'feels' a lot snappier to me. I spent 2 whole days last week actually using it in anger and I am satisfied .. for now (6 cores would be better!) :D

Other reasons I did it are to get more RAM and to help feed the 5970 a bit better (when it gets here of course!). Nothing was slow in the first place but the Q6600 lasted me 2 years which is my normal time with a system it seems!
 
Considered cheap AM3 setup with the possibility of cheap 6core upgrade in the future?
3.6-4ghz phenomII with decent DDR3 will give you that extra bit of performance if you really need it (and a new toy to play with) and allow you for cheap ugprade in the future for more.

But then personally I wouldn't bother with upgrading unless you really need that extra time and have a lot of cash to spend. Why not get 8 or 16 core mac instead for graphics? So much better for that job.
 
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