SSD v Q9450

suomi · 22 May 2010 at 20:01

After a slightly bumply last year. I have a little bit of money to spend on a small upgrade on the present machine. I am not going to down the i5 route, makes most sense to keep what I have.

The budget is £150 may strech to £200 for the right kit.

I mostly do surfing, video playback and some encoding (mp3 and video).

What you reckon makes most sense a SSD around 80gb with the old HD used to store data. Or a chip upgrade to Q9450?

Comment most welcome, as I can decide. :confused:

cmndr_andi · 22 May 2010 at 20:08

How much are you getting the Q9450 for?

It might be worth considering getting going for a second-hand Q6600 - these can usually be had for £80-90. For encoding, a Quad core CPU would give you a bigger performance boost than an SSD, and your other uses will not be accelerated by an SSD (you would be mad to put videos on an SSD). However, an SSD does make general computer usage much snappier - so going for a cheaper CPU upgrade like a Q6600 would leave a good chuck of budget left for an SSD.

The remaining budget would not be enough to buy a good SSD like this or this, however you would be well on your way.

Redmint · 22 May 2010 at 20:19

Quick note, if you do go for the Q6600 option, make sure it's a G0 chip and if possible try and find out the VID and how well it overclocks before you buy.

suomi · 22 May 2010 at 20:20

Reckoning on £130 to £150 for used Q9450 and £180 for a new one.

Redmint · 22 May 2010 at 20:23

The bay prices for Q9X50 chips are very high atm sadly as there's not many being sold and lots of people wanting the best socket 775 CPUs, the price for new chips is even more insane. Andi's idea of going for a Q6600 might be the best value for money upgrade atm unless you can pick up a used Q9450 for closer to £100-110.

pastymuncher · 22 May 2010 at 22:07

Personally i don't think that SSD's are worth the money yet. Yes they may be faster than a normal hard drive but with a stingy capacity and a whopping cost. They would need to come down a lot in price before i would consider one.

You should be able to get a second hand Q6600 for around £75.

suomi · 22 May 2010 at 23:30

Thanks for this guys. Looks like I will be parking the idea of SSD. And getting a quad instead. As an aside it seems that from looking around there is more of a chance of getting a cheaper Q9550 than a Q9450. But will also looking to Q6600 as well.

McstylisT · 22 May 2010 at 23:43

Cheaper option here is Q9450 + 2x Samsung F3 in a Raid 0.

SSD will be the future but its still not soaring out of the ground. With the current system and decent quad core and a nice speedy Raid 0 would do wonders in all areas.

McT