Core 2 Duo E6300 vs AMD Athlon 64 X2 3800+

[boostm3]

Im new to this forum, and have to build a new pc. ITs mostly for home office work, but I dont want place limits on what it can do, hence, I think it would be a mistake to go with a Pentium D 945 as I was originally thinking... Id like to go with new, poven components. So, Its going to either be a Core 2 Duo, or an Athlon 64 X2.

From preliminary benchmark tests, it looks like the E6300 pretty well destroys the X2 3800+. Well, at least the E6400 does, as thats all Ive found on the Toms benchmark charts

Would you guys concur with this? The only Athlon that beats it is the Athlon 64 FX-62 Windsor, but thats a $429 processor! Not exactly a fair fight.. From what I could tell, the dual core x2 3800+ competes performance-wise with the Pentium D chips, and against them, their a good value.. But for the performance of the E6300, I havent found any AMD cpus that give me a performance/price advantage.

Would you guys more or less concur with this? After we iron this out, Im going to come back to you with some mobo suggestions to hold it.

thanks much.

 

[m25]

That's more or less right, more or less, because a X2 4400+ matches the E6300 and for the 6400 it takes a 5000+ maybe.
However, the bang/buck goes to the 3800+ because you can find it this dirt cheap:
http://www.ewiz.com/detail.php?name=A64-3800CU
and that is a lot less than an E6300 or even E4300; price/performance on the lower end dual cores is still AMDs domain with both the 3800+ and 3600+.

 

[boostm3]

That's more or less right, more or less, because a X2 4400+ matches the E6300 and for the 6400 it takes a 5000+ maybe.
However, the bang/buck goes to the 3800+ because you can find it this dirt cheap:
http://www.ewiz.com/detail.php?name=A64-3800CU
and that is a lot less than an E6300 or even E4300; price/performance on the lower end dual cores is still AMDs domain with both the 3800+ and 3600+.

Right.. But the dual core it compares with in performance, was the Pent D, not the C2D units I was looking at... So, sure, for $105, the 3800+ is a no brainer if you were planning on going with a Pentium D... But there seems a wide performance gap as well as price gap when comparing those cpus with the E6300 C2D unit. If I want that class of performance, there doesnt seem to be any alternative but going with that unit.. in other words, I havent found an AMD cpu that performs as well, for significantly less money.

 

[papi4baby]

Well price/performance, right now there pretty much even. AMD seems to have somewhat of a better price i think. But if your a gamer all i can say is C2D. A 6300 will do better or as good as a 4800 or 5000 in games.

 

[boostm3]

Well price/performance, right now there pretty much even. AMD seems to have somewhat of a better price i think. But if your a gamer all i can say is C2D. A 6300 will do better or as good as a 4800 or 5000 in games.

Well, thats the thing.. .I cannot find the equivalent AMD unit to the E6300. The FX is performance compatible but more than twice as expensive.. The 3800+ doesnt come close in performance, but is way cheaper.. What is the amd unit YOU are referring to that is the performance equal, but priced better?

 

[qcmadness]

Well price/performance, right now there pretty much even. AMD seems to have somewhat of a better price i think. But if your a gamer all i can say is C2D. A 6300 will do better or as good as a 4800 or 5000 in games.

Well, thats the thing.. .I cannot find the equivalent AMD unit to the E6300. The FX is performance compatible but more than twice as expensive.. The 3800+ doesnt come close in performance, but is way cheaper.. What is the amd unit YOU are referring to that is the performance equal, but priced better?
x2 4600+ or x2 4800+

 

[crackdlr]

if you wanna game, for real, intel is THE choice.

if you're short on money, or don't game too heavy, AMD 3600+ ($105) or 3800+ ($115) is hard to ignore .... a complete build for $550

plus you can overclock the 3600+ to around 2.7 - 2.9 ghz (maybe 3.0) which puts it around a stock e6400 so you could pull off some decent gaming

of course you could aways get an e6400 and overclock that mofo to 3.5ghz and get in some crazy 1800 x 2400, 16x AA, 60 fps in oblivion outdoors

just depends on what you do with it

 

[boostm3]

if you wanna game, for real, intel is THE choice.

if you're short on money, or don't game too heavy, AMD 3600+ ($105) or 3800+ ($115) is hard to ignore .... a complete build for $550

Ok.. Good point.. Games.. I dont do much of it.. What I do most of is Home Office, and tons of internet work, dvd/cd copying, basically, everything else.

So, I figure the price dif between a 3800+ dual core, and a core 2 duo E6300 is about 80 bucks give or take.. Is it worth it? If not, I dont supose theres any reason to get a Pentium D over a 3800+. So, are you saying, if its for games, get the core 2 duo; if not, get the 3800+ x2? Would the E6300 provide Any advantages for not gaming use over the 3800+?

 

[qcmadness]

if you wanna game, for real, intel is THE choice.

if you're short on money, or don't game too heavy, AMD 3600+ ($105) or 3800+ ($115) is hard to ignore .... a complete build for $550

Ok.. Good point.. Games.. I dont do much of it.. What I do most of is Home Office, and tons of internet work, dvd/cd copying, basically, everything else.

So, I figure the price dif between a 3800+ dual core, and a core 2 duo E6300 is about 80 bucks give or take.. Is it worth it? If not, I dont supose theres any reason to get a Pentium D over a 3800+. So, are you saying, if its for games, get the core 2 duo; if not, get the 3800+ x2? Would the E6300 provide Any advantages for not gaming use over the 3800+?

Mainly for encoding and decoding (including zip and upzip, DVD-encoding).
If you only use office applications, you may just use Sempron / Celeron-D.

 

[boostm3]

if you wanna game, for real, intel is THE choice.

if you're short on money, or don't game too heavy, AMD 3600+ ($105) or 3800+ ($115) is hard to ignore .... a complete build for $550

Ok.. Good point.. Games.. I dont do much of it.. What I do most of is Home Office, and tons of internet work, dvd/cd copying, basically, everything else.

So, I figure the price dif between a 3800+ dual core, and a core 2 duo E6300 is about 80 bucks give or take.. Is it worth it? If not, I dont supose theres any reason to get a Pentium D over a 3800+. So, are you saying, if its for games, get the core 2 duo; if not, get the 3800+ x2? Would the E6300 provide Any advantages for not gaming use over the 3800+?

Mainly for encoding and decoding (including zip and upzip, DVD-encoding).
If you only use office applications, you may just use Sempron / Celeron-D.

Do I detect a bit of game snobbery going on here? j/k... No semprons here, thank you... One of my criteria is that I use current technolgy, which is why Ive decided to not proceed with my Pentium D wishlist build. Clearly, Id be better off with a 3800+ or 4200+.. better performance and less money. Im not building it as a game pc, but I want a good machine nevertheless... Doesnt have to be the fastest game machine around, but its got to be current enough so as to get the most life and compatibilty out of it going forward that I can attain for a 'reasonable' pricepoint. Im thinking 3800+ might be the sweetspot for me.

 

[crackdlr]

actually i am saying two things

1)i like the x2 3600 over the 3800, because the 3600 (65nm version Brisbane) overclocks higher than it's sibling, 3800 (both the older 90nm version and the newer 65nm version) it also cost $105 so you can get the chip and a motherboard for the same price as a e6400

2)you will still see some added benefit from using a e6400 since it is a crazy fast chip - it'll still do video editing faster , but if your ripping movies, it's more dependent on the DVD drive, internet work, dependent on the connection, MS office is not too much of a resource hog...

the good thing about this price war between AMD and intel is they scaled the price of their chips in accordance with the chip's performance, so you need a fast chip - buy one, you wont get taken for a ride on the price you pay.

me, i play gpokr online, some counterstrike source games,(which runs fine on a 800 mhz chip) so spending 2000 on a build doesn't make sense for me - i rather use that money to pay off my car or something

as a side note you could also look at intel's new offering the e4300 (billed as a budget core2 chip - $187) it still overclocks crazy fast (3.1 - 3.3'ish ghz)

i think the main question actually comes down to future-proofing - in a year or two when you need another, faster, chip could you buy one and drop it in to your existing system, or will you need a new motherboard, ram, chip, and videocard (which pretty much makes it a whole new system build) on that front i think AMD might have a slight lead, but this IS speculation, $550 now maybe another 500 in a year or two sounds good to me vs. 1000 for the intel build, and maybe another 500 in a year or two - see my point...?

 

[WR]

Core 2 Duo definitely. The power consumption of the chips with typical motherboards at stock speed is as follows:

Pentium D > Athlon64x2 (89w) > Core 2 Duo > Athlon64x2 (35w)

I'm not clear where the 65w Athlon64s fit, but both the 65 and 35w versions carry a price premium, and the 3800+ mentioned is a basic 89w version.

The performance of the chips at stock speed is as follows:

Core 2 Duo > Athlon64x2 (any wattage) > Pentium D

The relative cost of motherboards may confuse one as to which platform holds best price/performance at purchase, but considering the power savings as part of TCO (cost of ownership) in a home office setup, that Athlon64 would cost more in the end than the referenced Core 2 Duo.

Additionally, the option remains to increase the performance of that Core 2 Duo by much more than the Athlon64 without incurring a performance-per-watt penalty. In other words, going with a mainstream motherboard and moderately priced performance RAM in both cases, you can still overclock the Core 2 Duo considerably more than the Athlon64 without deviating from stock voltage.

Roughly my observations:
Athlon64 x2 3800+ base clock 2.0GHz, overclock at stock 2.5-2.7GHz
Core 2 Duo E6300 (965 chipset) base clock 1.86GHz, overclock at stock 2.7-3.0GHz

 

[boostm3]

actually i am saying two things

1)i like the x2 3600 over the 3800, because the 3600 (65nm version Brisbane) overclocks higher than it's sibling, 3800 (both the older 90nm version and the newer 65nm version) it also cost $105 so you can get the chip and a motherboard for the same price as a e6400

2)you will still see some added benefit from using a e6400 since it is a crazy fast chip - it'll still do video editing faster , but if your ripping movies, it's more dependent on the DVD drive, internet work, dependent on the connection, MS office is not too much of a resource hog...

the good thing about this price war between AMD and intel is they scaled the price of their chips in accordance with the chip's performance, so you need a fast chip - buy one, you wont get taken for a ride on the price you pay.

me, i play gpokr online, some counterstrike source games,(which runs fine on a 800 mhz chip) so spending 2000 on a build doesn't make sense for me - i rather use that money to pay off my car or something

as a side note you could also look at intel's new offering the e4300 (billed as a budget core2 chip - $187) it still overclocks crazy fast (3.1 - 3.3'ish ghz)

i think the main question actually comes down to future-proofing - in a year or two when you need another, faster, chip could you buy one and drop it in to your existing system, or will you need a new motherboard, ram, chip, and videocard (which pretty much makes it a whole new system build) on that front i think AMD might have a slight lead, but this IS speculation, $550 now maybe another 500 in a year or two sounds good to me vs. 1000 for the intel build, and maybe another 500 in a year or two - see my point...?

Yes I do, and I thank you. I must confess, overclocking is new and somewhat intimidating to me. So IM trying to find benchmarks of the cpus at their recommended speed. Im not saying I wont try and overclock later on, but going in, I dont want that to be a determiner. To overclock right, I see theres alot of research and screenshots that have been posted that I need to scope out first.. But Id like to get my system ordered first. Thats the main reason Ive been leaning toward the 3800+.. faster native speed by a bit.. The 4200+ of course is faster still, but then its starting to come closer to the INtel prices, so I dont want to kill the price advantage of going with amd.. Frankly, Im a bit of an Intel snob myself, but at the $100 dual core price points of the amds, its hard to pass up.

 

[boostm3]

Well, I can see this is not going to be an easy decision! Lets take one thing at a time.. .Ive already got a couple of mobos picked out if I were to go with the E6300. But Im not as familiar with amd compatibiltiy issues. So, can someone point me in the direction of what chipset (like I selected a 965 chipset mobo for the E6300) I would need for the 3800+ mobo, and then, a couple of different mobos which would be well priced but solid to work with the 3800+?

 

[crackdlr]

ok so from reading all your posts and replies this is what you are looking for

INTEL choice - e4300 ($187 solid overclockability - if you so chose to take advantage of this feature down the road)

AMD - x2 3600+ ($105 - the reason i keep adding this option instead of the 3800+ ($115) follows:

3600 stock speed 1.9ghz
3800 stock speed 2.0 (100 mhz difference for $10 // price vs. performance it should only be $5 dollars higher)

if/when you decide to overclock the:
3600 will reach speeds of 2.7-2.8 2.75 overclock 3.1 overclock(doubtful to replicate - possible engineering sample) another 2.75ghz
3800 will reach speeds of 2.6-2.7 2.6 2.70 2.61 2.65

e4300 other hand is common knowledge it'll go 3.0 - 3.2ish ghz

 

[boostm3]

I just added the Tforce 550 to my wishlist that Im putting together for this amd build along with the 3800+ which ive selected with the (65w) option for cooler running. price was up 6 bucks to 115 for the 65w option, but I thought it might be good to have for cooler running for the price. Thats not to say that by the time I relegate the build to the shpg cart, I wont have converted to the 3600+, but thats later. Next I have to select some memory. Suggestions? BTW, is this 550 chipset as good as the sli or the 61xx for my purposes? price/performance, compatability, etc?

Ok. i just preselected this for my wishlist amd build... Is it ok, ie, is it fully compatible with my mobo and processor selections? Thats the amd x2 and the Biostar TForce 550?

CORSAIR XMS2 1GB (2 x 512MB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 675 (PC2 5400) Dual Channel Kit Desktop Memory

Ok.. Ive put this amd build to bed, ie, completed the wishlist for it.. Please view it at the newegg publich wishlists under Pauls amd wishlist..
then just go to newegg.com, and go to wishlists at , select Public Wishlists, and search under Title for: Pauls amd Wishlist.. Bless it or not, I value what you guys say, and the help youve given me so far..

 

[m25]

That's more or less right, more or less, because a X2 4400+ matches the E6300 and for the 6400 it takes a 5000+ maybe.
However, the bang/buck goes to the 3800+ because you can find it this dirt cheap:
http://www.ewiz.com/detail.php?name=A64-3800CU
and that is a lot less than an E6300 or even E4300; price/performance on the lower end dual cores is still AMDs domain with both the 3800+ and 3600+.

Right.. But the dual core it compares with in performance, was the Pent D, not the C2D units I was looking at... So, sure, for $105, the 3800+ is a no brainer if you were planning on going with a Pentium D... But there seems a wide performance gap as well as price gap when comparing those cpus with the E6300 C2D unit. If I want that class of performance, there doesnt seem to be any alternative but going with that unit.. in other words, I havent found an AMD cpu that performs as well, for significantly less money.
Well, even the 6300 is not much of a leap from the 3800+ if you don't OC it . On the other hand, Core2 is more efficient than K8, so don't expect to find a K8 perform better than a Core 2 CPU. Now AMD has only the advantage of the lower end, just like Intel had it with the PD 805; they offer CPUs with less performance for much less money.

 

[pmr]

of course you could aways get an e6400 and overclock that mofo to 3.5ghz and get in some crazy 1800 x 2400, 16x AA, 60 fps in oblivion outdoors

Please take your head off of your arse before posting!
I really mean it.

 

[1Tanker]

Another thing to add to the equation is that the AMD boards are generally cheaper.

Get the E4300... and DDR2-667 is more than enough. If he isn't going to overclock it, he could even use DDR2-533. The RAM savings will cover any "extra" that is incurred with C2D board. AM2 x2's really need DDR2-800 for optimal performance. Use anything slower and the perf. drops off making the E4300 that much more powerful. If he wants to overclock, DDR2-667 will still get him to 3GHz minimum(no AMD will touch that).

 

[corvetteguy]

K, i don't know why people are saying the x2 3800 is crap, and only good cuz its cheap. I have one. I bought it in October for $150 Canadian. Now i overclocked it to 2.7ghz and its crazy fast along with my other stuff. Now it isn't slow at 2ghz either, but i overclocked because i could. I also plan to buy an AM2+ processor later, so if i need to i can up performance eventually.

Seriously don't let people tell you it sucks, becuase it doesn't. Spending more money isn't a big requirment to get good performace because you won't really notice a few frames per second.

Also, to overclock an intel processor you need a good mobo, for AMD not so much. Take that inot condsideration, along with RAM, which goes in intel's favour.

 

[boostm3]

With AM2 you want to use ddr2 800 ram. Corsair is good ram and the 2x512 kit they have on newegg is a pretty good choice. http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16820145566
There is not much difference I do not believe performance wise across the different nforce 5xx chipsets. I think it is more of a feature set than anything. The 61xx series boards are micro atx and have onboard video. SLI is unnecessary unless you want to do some really high resolution gaming and even then sometimes a single card can be just as good. If you do go with the x2 3600+ combo make sure you get a good cooler. Newegg went stupid with their prices of the Arctic cooling 64 freezer pro and ewiz is out of them. I did find it though on another site for a good price. http://www.xpcgear.com/acfreezer64pro.html
For the price here is a cooler on newegg that is pretty good as well.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16835128009

Will Do.. I was going to get the same ram as you recommended but in the slower pc2 5400 675 speed, not having realized the mobo can handle the faster 800 speed of yours, so thats what Ill be adding to my config.. thanks.

 

[m25]

Yes, K8 still rocks, I'm proud of my 2.45G 4200+ too, but it will be quite hard to be proud of your K8, when K10 gets out; I just multiplied the 1.8GHz of their slowest chip with by the ~1.7 factor of advantage over K8, an there comes a relative 3.06GHz K8 😳
...2.5Gx1.7=4.25GHz K8 (this should roughly perform like a XE6800)... at least, that is what my calculator says (4.25x0.7=2.975GHz) :lol:

 

[boostm3]

if you wanna game, for real, intel is THE choice.

if you're short on money, or don't game too heavy, AMD 3600+ ($105) or 3800+ ($115) is hard to ignore .... a complete build for $550

plus you can overclock the 3600+ to around 2.7 - 2.9 ghz (maybe 3.0) which puts it around a stock e6400 so you could pull off some decent gaming

of course you could aways get an e6400 and overclock that mofo to 3.5ghz and get in some crazy 1800 x 2400, 16x AA, 60 fps in oblivion outdoors

just depends on what you do with it

Im getting closer to placing my newegg order. Based on yours and others' advice, Ive decided to base my system on newegg's promotion combining the Biostar 550 mob and the Amd Athlon X2 3600+. The combo price makes it hard to pass up.. But I do have one main question. All the RETAIL versions of the AMD X2 cpus contain a 'Heatsink and Fan'. But the newegg special Combo I mentioned features an OEM version of the 3600+ x2 cpu, meaning it OMITS any Heatsink and/or Fan.

Since overclocking will be something I am anxious to try down the road since this combo seems so good at it, should I purchase an aftermarket heatsink/fan combo? Even if I dont overclock, I would think that since all the boxed versions of X2 cpus come so equipped, I feel I should also have one for the 3600+ X2.

Can you guys advise me on this? Is the heatsink and fan that comes in the boxed retail version available as a separate purchase for me to buy for my 3600? Should I? How handicapped would it be without it?

 

[Threshold]

1) Get an aftermarket heatsink.
2) Last I checked, OEM processors didn't have a heatsink. (Just clarifying.)
Hence, 3) You ain't gonna boot that sucker. One of two things will happen without a heatsink: 1. You'll fry the damn thing. 2. It'll shut itself off in about ~0.2 seconds.
4) Stock HSF is decent, but not exactly worth buying, especially separately.
5) In accordance with 3), you'd be COMPLETELY handicapped without it.

 

[boostm3]

1) Get an aftermarket heatsink.
2) Last I checked, OEM processors didn't have a heatsink. (Just clarifying.)
Hence, 3) You ain't gonna boot that sucker. One of two things will happen without a heatsink: 1. You'll fry the damn thing. 2. It'll shut itself off in about ~0.2 seconds.
4) Stock HSF is decent, but not exactly worth buying, especially separately.
5) In accordance with 3), you'd be COMPLETELY handicapped without it.

Thanks Thresh.. Once I purchase the aftermarket cpu cooler, there goes the price advantage of the combo.. Its either:

3600+ x2 Amd cpu OEM using the 65nm tech and 65 watt power plus Biostar 550 mobo for combined price of $150 PLUS the price of aftermarket cpu cooler (the 3600+ x2 is NOT available from newegg as a retail version)

OR

3800+ x2 AMD retail cpu using 90 nm tech and 65 watt power plus Biostar 550 mobo for price of $188 but with cpu cooler included stock.

Im not a gamer, althoughn I like the idea of the most speed for the money.. STill, im thinking the second choice might be my best bet given the cpu cooler issue.

Please comment.. thanks.