My E8500 vs Q6600

[DJ Tucker]

I want to get a Q6600 as i can't afford a complete system upgrade. So i 'm sticking with my socket 775 MSI P6N SLI V2. Anyway, what would perform better in todays games like bf3, far cry 3 and black ops 2? Bearing in mind my e8500 is at 3.8ghz.

[vbironchef]

I would not bother. Just save your money for a new system.

[Major_A]

I have to agree. You would probably see better performance with an AMD quad core APU. Out of curiosity how much is the Q6600? To answer your question newer games are getting better at using more cores. So the more the merrier.

Just did a quick pricing at Newegg (I know you're in the UK but maybe it will help). With this update you would also get SATA III controllers and USB 3.0.
http://secure.newegg.com/WishList/Publi ... r=29341908

*EDIT* - Important info so take a look.
I remembered reading an editorial about someone in your situation a few months ago but I couldn't remember where I saw it. Lucky for you I remembered.

Core2Duo (E8400) and a modern enthusiast video card.
http://www.ocaholic.ch/xoops/html/modul ... itemid=816

Core2Quad (Q6600) and a modern enthusiast video card.
http://www.ocaholic.ch/xoops/html/modul ... itemid=817

*EDIT 2*
Here's a few computers I have up and running around the house. I did a real quick benchmark so you can get an idea of the speed differences.

Click to enlarge:


Download link to the benchmark:
http://www.truecrypt.org/downloads

[DJ Tucker]

maybe an older post of mine. but i really can't afford a complete upgrade but want a quad core and the q6600 is all i can get with this mobo. if i was to overclock this to 3ghz over my e8500 at 3.8ghz playing bf3 would i see an improvment as i can't find a benchmark to prove it?

[egloeckle]

maybe an older post of mine. but i really can't afford a complete upgrade but want a quad core and the q6600 is all i can get with this mobo. if i was to overclock this to 3ghz over my e8500 at 3.8ghz playing bf3 would i see an improvment as i can't find a benchmark to prove it?

Any improvement will be fairly minimal I would guess. Depending on the cost of the upgrade it may be worth a shot but yeah, beating a dead horse and all.

[skier]

keep in mind overclocking a Q6600 (Kentsfield-Conroe ) would be much different than Q8-9xxx (Yorkfield-Wolfdale).that said I've used a poor revision Q6600 to get to 3.6GHz stable, and am writing from a Q8400 at 3.8GHz though there are a lot of factors at hand to achieving those clocks or higher, overclocking Quads takes a lot more time than dual cores as they generate more heat, and right now I'm on an infamous (in the LGA 775 days) Gigabyte EP45 UD3x based board

either way an overclocked quad would be better than what you have for those particular games, However considering the graphics card you are running- a new board/CPU combo is strongly suggested. Core i5 or a newer architecture AMD (a Phenom II X4 is a step below a C2Q)

[DJ Tucker]

just found a q9550 and an asus p5k premium for a combo price of £170 the same price as a single i5 2500k over here. however would i notice an improvment on that cpu over my current e8500 at 3.8ghz?

[Major_A]

Read this before you make a purchasing decision.

[DJ Tucker]

well rather suprised to see a wolfdale holding up so well in modern games. in that case i'm thinking a better mobo is in order to overclock this cpu higher what 775 sli board do you suggest that is going to break the bank?

[skier]

I think you would still be better served with a Core2Quad, even a Q6600. I got my Q8400 for $140 retail, and with my Memory at 950MHz, Bus at 475MHz (3.8GHz) it is probably better than your E8500 at 3.8 in single thread games/apps, and significantly better in multi-threaded. And with your graphics power it is absolutely crazy not to have a quad.

The E8500 is a nice chip, but compared to the level your graphics are at, it will always be a bottleneck

Overall a Quad with lower clocks will still do you better than higher clocks on the E8500, a new board would be

and if you do go for a quad, shoot for 1066 FSB so you can overclock it higher with your memory (less room to OC if you are already at 333 Bus- the bus is usually the OC stopper). Q6700 would be the best CPU for your setup.

[Major_A]

I still think going socket 775 is a dead end. You don't have SATA III or USB 3.0 and if at all very limited UEFI. I personally think you are better off getting a low end AMD FX and a new motherboard. If you chose so you can sell your parts to cover some of the cost.

[DJ Tucker]

i want to stick with intel and nvidia. the ati drivers are bad and not over keen of the amd cpu's as previous friends and proven to me. however i'm only sticking with 775 due to my budget as the 1155 socket plus say i5 2500k is 2-3 times more than the 775 board and cpu combo

[skier]

I still think going socket 775 is a dead end. You don't have SATA III or USB 3.0 and if at all very limited UEFI.

TBH SATA III wouldn't really be a deal breaker unless he has a large capacity new SSD(Which he only has spindle drives right now..),

USB3 isn't really either but he could get a USB3 controller for $20 to remedy that like I did (and the only reason I went USB 3.0 is because I upgraded my server box to it as well as get a new USB3 cardreader and a SATA-to-USB3 adapter for backups)

Also I prefer BIOS to UEFI because some brands make it way too difficult to navigate and Legacy vs UEFI settings for boot selection make things unnecessarily complicated (All my home computers are Core2 and all the computers I've been dealing with and building at work internally are i5 or i7, with my own work laptop being an Ivybridge i5

just my thoughts. Get and overclock a quad and eat drink and be merry for now