Duo v Quad

[BigJock2005]

Hey Guys, how you all doing?

I'm coming to that time again where I'm gonna have to upgrade. The 939 pin board I bought about 2 years ago can't take a faster processor and the price of some of the higher-end CPUs and RAM has come down quite alot. (Yeah, thanks AMD, the 939 was the "way forward" until you changed your mind and went AM2).

My question is this: does anyone think the the Core 2 Quads are worth the price premium over the Core 2 Duos? I am concerned that there aren't enough games and apps that can really use the quad cores, so it's just wasted money that could be spent on RAM.

A 2.66GHz Duo is cheaper than a 2.4GHz Quad Pro:

Intel Core 2 Duo E6750 "LGA775 Conroe" 2.66GHz (1333FSB) - Retail £119.84
Intel Core 2 Quad Pro Q6600 "Energy Efficient SLACR 95W Edition" 2.40GHz (1066FSB) - Retail £164.49
Intel Core 2 Quad Pro Q6700 "LGA775 Kentsfield" 2.66GHz (1066FSB) - Retail £334.86

[BTW - I have been an AMD die-hard for the last 4 years, but I think the Core2s have stolen the show!]

 

[Me__2001]

get Q6600 with an aftermarket cooler and it will clock to 3Ghz easily

 

[BigJock2005]

Seems other people agree:
"Reviewed by: BK

Mine is running at 3.6ghz on air with a £15 arctic cooler 7 pro. Prime95 stable."

 

[crazylegs]

Seems other people agree:
"Reviewed by: BK

Mine is running at 3.6ghz on air with a £15 arctic cooler 7 pro. Prime95 stable."

Now that was funny...

 

[Ian]

Yep, I'd go for the Q6600 too. Mine did 3.0 ghz without any problem at all, and could no doubt go much higher.

I was in the same situation as you, but Adywebb suggested this CPU in a thread on here a few months back (he did the same thing too):

https://www.pcreview.co.uk/forums/thread-3226366.php
https://www.pcreview.co.uk/forums/thread-3226418.php

 

[BigJock2005]

Gone and done it

After the replies on here and a bit more research I took the plunge and bought a bundle from Overclockers:

Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600 95W 2.4GHz
Asus P5K mobo (didn't go for the WiFi - couldn't justify the extra £50)
2 x 1GB Corsair 6400C5 DDR RAM
LeadTek 8600GT Extreme 256MB GDDR3 PCI-E

£351 the lot. I reckon that'll do me another 2 years with maybe another processor upgrade half way through.

Cheers,
Jock

 

[Adywebb]

Nice upgrade BJ - the Asus P5K board is a goody and you should be able to OC to at least 3GHz with the stock cooler - around 3.4 -3.6GHz with a good quality aftermarket cooler

 

[Alf]

8600 GT? Oh noes, you should have read up on the AMD 3870!!!
better performance and is cheaper

 

[floppybootstomp]

The Leadtek 8600GT is £76.50 and it's available.

The cheapest AMD/ATI 3870 is more than twice that price and isn't yet available in the UK, though it will be very shortly.

The AMD 3870 only seems to come with 512Mb of memory whereas the 8600GT BigJock's buying has 256Mb of memory.

Granted, it is a better card, but at a price.

 

[Alf]

huh, round here they are priced similarly

 

[Alf]

Eerr i think....