SD3700 Vs. x2 4600

[MarkyMark]

Ok, so her's my boggle. Like a lot of you on here i'm considering taking advantage of AMD's price drops. I've currently got an SD 3700 running at stock and was pondering whether to upgrade to the x2 4600.

My question is will there be much of a gain? I know that the extra core will help in multi threaded applications but I was worrying about the L2 cache being half what I have already (512k opposed to 1mb on my 3700).

So what do you think? Should I do it or not

 

[Big Bernard]

Have a look at http://tomshardware.co.uk/cpu/charts.html and compare the two.

 

[MarkyMark]

Have a look at http://tomshardware.co.uk/cpu/charts.html and compare the two.

ohhhh thanks very much

EDIT: Sold..........will be spending shy of 200 nikka by the end of the day now I feel lol

 

[young lad]

I would say get a 2x3800+ then clock it saves a few quid to spend on the cooler?

 

[easyrider]

yeah the x 2 3800 is the cpu to get when looking at the 512kb versions.All the others the 4200,4600 are a waste of money imo as they will almost likely clock the same.

 

[MarkyMark]

but according to the link above the 4600 trounces the 3800 in stock form. Never really been into overclocking stuff. Might seem like a waste to people that clock stuff but I like to just plug stuff in, have it work and be stable. Can't be arsed tinkering with steppings and voltages etc

EDIT: And since i'm not really into the clocking scene am I still right in saying that the gains are not guaranteed i.e. it may clock high it might not?

 

[luminous]

Interesting charts,in multi tasking/encoding the x2 3800/4600 shines yet on gaming benchmarks the 3.7 san diego is better or at least equal to it.
Which benchies do you give credance too?

 

[Unforgiven]

Encoding will make use of the extra core on a processor such as the X2 3800+ due to being multithreaded, whereas most games are still only single threaded and so the greater stock speed of the 3700+ means it will do better.

 

[easyrider]

but according to the link above the 4600 trounces the 3800 in stock form. Never really been into overclocking stuff. Might seem like a waste to people that clock stuff but I like to just plug stuff in, have it work and be stable. Can't be arsed tinkering with steppings and voltages etc

EDIT: And since i'm not really into the clocking scene am I still right in saying that the gains are not guaranteed i.e. it may clock high it might not?

its a faster cpu.

you cant tinker with steppings and a x2 3800 will do 4600 speeds on stock volts lol