X6800 or QX6700 for gaming?

danyjr · 17 Jul 2007 at 13:05

Hello,

I'm willing to buy PC parts very soon to setup a gaming PC as a present for my younger brother.

Basically I'm stuck in choosing between these two CPUs:

Intel® Core® 2 Duo Quad-Core Extreme. (QX6700 (2.66GHz, 4X2MB, 1066FSB)

Intel® Core® 2 Duo. (X6800 (2.93GHz 4X4MB, 1066FSB)

PS: I am not doing any overclocking (don't shoot me!).

Thanks in advance

stickroad · 17 Jul 2007 at 13:17

Neither, them Quads are a waste of money.

Personally if you or your brother isn't going to overclock the system the E6850 will be the best choice. The higher rated GHZ will be much more useful in games than the extra cores at this point in time.

How old is your brother?

Posty · 17 Jul 2007 at 13:21

personally i would never get a x or extreme version as they are way over priced, go with a normal Q6700 or Q6600

danyjr · 17 Jul 2007 at 13:24

stickroad said:
Neither. Go for the E6850.

Hmmm...you're saying E6850 is better than X6800? :confused:

Them Quads are a waste of money.

Money isn't an issue for me tbh, performance on the other hand, is. I want a ZOMGWTF!!1 PC.

How old is your brother?

He is 18.

stickroad · 17 Jul 2007 at 13:26

danyjr said:
Hmmm...you're saying E6850 is better than X6800?

Money isn't an issue for me tbh, performance on the other hand, is. I want a ZOMGWTF!!1 PC.

He is 18.

I didn't say the E6850 was better. Its much better value for money.

If you have that sort of attitude why are you asking on here?

If money isnt a issue go for the faster processor.

spb251272 · 17 Jul 2007 at 13:28

The 6850 runs at 3ghz and the x6800 runs at 2.93ghz, so yes, it is better at stock. You're paying for the unlocked mult with the x6800.

I know you said you won't overclock, but not overclocking a C2D is like never going over 3000rpm in a Ferrari :eek:

They are just so easy to overclock, it would be criminal not to

danyjr · 17 Jul 2007 at 13:34

spb251272 said:
The 6850 runs at 3ghz and the x6800 runs at 2.93ghz, so yes, it is better at stock.

How about the Quad? I remember someone told me it was a waste of money, but what about the performance?

V|per · 17 Jul 2007 at 13:35

spb251272 said:
The 6850 runs at 3ghz and the x6800 runs at 2.93ghz, so yes, it is better at stock. You're paying for the unlocked mult with the x6800.

I know you said you won't overclock, but not overclocking a C2D is like never going over 3000rpm in a Ferrari They are just so easy to overclock, it would be criminal not to

Quoted for absolute truth...

For gaming, you will want sheer clock speed, which, at this point in time, will be the e6850 @ 3ghz so, by far the best choice.. if you were to overclock, it would be a different matter...

EDIT: oops, or you could go for the QX6850... same speed but quad..

drunkenmaster · 17 Jul 2007 at 14:12

well, no ones pointed it out yet, Q6600 in a week or two is dropping to £170ish, its stock speed is MORE THAN ENOUGH for ANY game out there. you want to dump as much money as possible on graphics card. a 6Ghz quad core conroe with a 7900 will not outperform a 2Ghz dual core with a 8800gts, just won't happen.

theres no need to throw money away. in games you will not, just will not see a difference from a 2.4Ghz quad even if only 2 cores are being used in a game, to a 3Ghz conroe. 99.9999999999999999% games are limited by graphics card.

i said in another thread, screen first, then gfx card to match screen resolution, then any old cpu to go with it. but at £170 a quad core Q6600 will not only be fine now, but in the future as games use more and more power and multiple threads the extra two cores will spank the difference a higher clocked dual core could make. afaik most of the games out later in this year can use quad cores, and next year i'd expect pretty much all games from then on to be able to use quad cores, they still won't really "need" quad cores though tbh. but a Q6600 should be fine for any games for a good 2-3 years.

danyjr · 17 Jul 2007 at 16:41

drunkenmaster said:
well, no ones pointed it out yet, Q6600 in a week or two is dropping to £170ish, its stock speed is MORE THAN ENOUGH for ANY game out there. you want to dump as much money as possible on graphics card. a 6Ghz quad core conroe with a 7900 will not outperform a 2Ghz dual core with a 8800gts, just won't happen.

theres no need to throw money away. in games you will not, just will not see a difference from a 2.4Ghz quad even if only 2 cores are being used in a game, to a 3Ghz conroe. 99.9999999999999999% games are limited by graphics card.

i said in another thread, screen first, then gfx card to match screen resolution, then any old cpu to go with it. but at £170 a quad core Q6600 will not only be fine now, but in the future as games use more and more power and multiple threads the extra two cores will spank the difference a higher clocked dual core could make. afaik most of the games out later in this year can use quad cores, and next year i'd expect pretty much all games from then on to be able to use quad cores, they still won't really "need" quad cores though tbh. but a Q6600 should be fine for any games for a good 2-3 years.

Well I'm getting 2x EN8800GTX 768MB (not sure about the RAM). Do you think getting the "Ultra" version of 8800GTX is worth the money or should I just go with the normal version?

MumboJumbo · 17 Jul 2007 at 16:53

danyjr said:
Money isn't an issue for me tbh, performance on the other hand, is. I want a ZOMGWTF!!1 PC.

If you want such a good pc then why wont you overclock? Its easy to learn and youll be getting so much more power. You cant buy even close to the power that could be had via overclocking. Also, if you got money you can get water cooling and then overclock one of those beasts to the max

MumboJumbo · 17 Jul 2007 at 16:54

danyjr said:
Well I'm getting 2x EN8800GTX 768MB (not sure about the RAM). Do you think getting the "Ultra" version of 8800GTX is worth the money or should I just go with the normal version?

Ultras are a waste of money as they offer very little extra. Plus the G90s are ment to hit before xmas and are serposidly 2x the power of a G80.

danyjr · 17 Jul 2007 at 16:59

8igdave said:
If you want such a good pc then why wont you overclock? Its easy to learn and youll be getting so much more power. You cant buy even close to the power that could be had via overclocking. Also, if you got money you can get water cooling and then overclock one of those beasts to the max

Well, this is why people say money goes to the pocket of idiots. Thanks for advice though, I'm really going to put overclocking into consideration

Ultras are a waste of money as they offer very little extra. Plus the G90s are ment to hit before xmas and are serposidly 2x the power of a G80.

Can't wait 5 months really, my bros b'day is on 25th so...

MumboJumbo · 17 Jul 2007 at 17:20

danyjr said:
Well, this is why people say money goes to the pocket of idiots. Thanks for advice though, I'm really going to put overclocking into consideration

Can't wait 5 months really, my bros b'day is on 25th so...

Tell him u ordered it but it got damanged in the post and you had to send it back... only gota do it for 5 months

..... 5 months :O surely not... *starts counting on his fingers* awww man lol.

Your willing to take overclocking into consideration? trust me its easy with the C2Ds and the G80s can be overclocked using some software and you just turn the sliders up to increase the speeds i believe

haha.

Dont get an ultra. Get a water cooled GTX and overclock it to be the same as the ultra

stickroad · 17 Jul 2007 at 17:49

SLI Ultras are a complete waste, actually SLI at this point in time is a waste unless he plans on gaming on a 30inch screen. The cost of two cards dosent justify the performance you will get out of it.

MumboJumbo · 17 Jul 2007 at 17:53

stickroad said:
SLI Ultras are a complete waste, actually SLI is a waste unless he plans on gaming on a 30inch screen.

He never menchened SLI did he?

stickroad · 17 Jul 2007 at 17:54

8igdave said:
He never menchened SLI did he?

danyjr said:
Well I'm getting 2x EN8800GTX 768MB (not sure about the RAM). Do you think getting the "Ultra" version of 8800GTX is worth the money or should I just go with the normal version?

Unless hes just sticking two cards in the system and then when one breaks he just uses the other.

MumboJumbo · 17 Jul 2007 at 18:10

stickroad said:
Unless hes just sticking two cards in the system and then when one breaks he just uses the other.

You never know!!!

Why would you spend this much money on a pc for your bro unless your loaded? and if your loaded then there is still no reason to waste so much money on SLI when a lot of games arnt even working with sli and soon G80s will be old news anyway.

wuyanxu · 17 Jul 2007 at 18:39

drunkenmaster said:
in games you will not, just will not see a difference from a 2.4Ghz quad even if only 2 cores are being used in a game, to a 3Ghz conroe.

quote for the truth been tested.

my friend who's got an E6600 tested this. running E6600 at 3.2Ghz only added ~3FPS to STALKER performance(one of the most CPU intensive FPS)

so overclocking any CPU by only a few point Ghz will only give you 1 or 2% performance increase in games.

this is also true with buying super-sized X series CPU's. just get a balanced system.

queamin · 17 Jul 2007 at 19:15

Get the quad and a gtx no point in sli if you worried about videocard a gtx should be fine until next year you could always drop a new card in a years time if the dx10 games bring the gtx to it knees.
Like someone said matching the screen and videocard is important.