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Upgrade to Quad Core Recommendations?

Hessian

Hessian

Hessian

Associate
Joined
6 Jul 2007
Posts
674
Location
Sussex, UK
Hey OcUK'ers, I'm in need of some more recommendations for a CPU Upgrade.

Atm I've got a Core2Duo E6750 with an Asus P5KC mobo (But I'm looking to upgrade that as well though). An nVidia GTX 260 OC and 4gb of Ram (not sure if that matters).

Ideally I'd like to spend no more than £200 on a CPU. Do a lot of gaming and a lot of Video Work, Rendering, etc.
 
I've been browsing through the lower end CPU's on the site and it seems the Q6600 has a LOT of reviews AND it's the cheapest one? Is that just because everyone's poor or is it actually a good CPU?
 
Hessian said:
I've been browsing through the lower end CPU's on the site and it seems the Q6600 has a LOT of reviews AND it's the cheapest one? Is that just because everyone's poor or is it actually a good CPU?
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The Q6600 about 12 months ago was pretty much unbeatable in both performance (a lot will overclock very happily) and price, there are better chips out now but for the cash it still provides a great bang/buck.
 
Hessian said:
Hey OcUK'ers
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Hey Hessian,

If I may just chip in my suggestion, buy a new E8400, clock it to 4GHz, sell your old E6750 and I reckon you will have a faster system and most of your cash still in the pocket.

Do you really need quad core for your video editing? like do you find yourself often sitting waiting for a project to complete? if so then maybe a used quad could be an easy move, having said that if you want a phat Quad for rendering then the new INTEL Core i7 seems to really deliver in that department although this kinde rendering power comes at a price!

The Asus P5KC is still a pretty decent board and I'm not sure if the newer INTEL boards really bring anything major to the table for you, one of the newer P45 chipset boards could be something to play with if that interests you but I doubt you will see any jaw dropping changes unless you are an utter geek! :p
 
If he does a lot of video editing and rendering, then there's really no choice other than a quad. The 'do you really need quad' argument doesn't really hold up because a Q6600 will cost him no more than a decent dual would. Encoding and rendering can take a long time - we're talking about hours saved, not just a few minutes!
 
Hey, I'm still new to this, but OC'uk are doing a Core i7, 2.66ghz I think, for 200 pound + vat. That will be 30 quid over your budget, but you could always sell your E6750, and still be able to spend a little extra on a new motherboard :)
 
HamZaDaG said:
Hey, I'm still new to this, but OC'uk are doing a Core i7, 2.66ghz I think, for 200 pound + vat. That will be 30 quid over your budget, but you could always sell your E6750, and still be able to spend a little extra on a new motherboard :)
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Core i7 is socket 1366 to 775 :)
 
Mattus said:
If he does a lot of video editing and rendering, then there's really no choice other than a quad. The 'do you really need quad' argument doesn't really hold up because a Q6600 will cost him no more than a decent dual would
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That's true!

However an overclocked Dual (like 4GHz +) is certainly no slouch at encoding and although not as fast as an overclocked quad core the dual would be faster at most non-encoding tasks, horses for courses I guess!

Talking about encoding, does anyone have any good linkies comparing 65nm quad to 45nm quad with it's enhanced CPU instructions and extra cache, I'm wondering how much difference that would make for a serious encoder?

It was all pretty clear before Core i7 came out . . . now it seems if you are really a serious encoder/3D artist that the newer INTEL platform holds a lot of appeal!
 
Hessian said:
Ideally I'd like to spend no more than £200 on a CPU. Do a lot of gaming and a lot of Video Work, Rendering, etc.
Click to expand...
Either get a Q6600 or get hold of a Q9450 second hand as a quad core is more suited for your PC use.

Personally I just browse the net, watch dvds, listen to music, office work, play games so a dual core is enough for me.
 
Well Im doing a degree in Moving Image so rendering time, etc. is important to me and as people will know it does take a looong time, depending on the footage! I've got a birthday coming up in a couple of weeks so I may hold off and see if I can scavange a little extra cash from someone, instead of a gift :p Thanks for all the help so far though!

Edit: As an extra thought, woud it be better off to get one of the bundled deals, even though I don't particularly need the RAM!?
 
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