CPU decision: e6600 vs e6700 vs q6600

[Lazarus7]

Hey all, well the cpu prices in Australia seem to have dropped dramatically in recent times. First let me give you a price rundown.

e6600 $315
e6700 $437
q6600 $727

Now originally I was going to go the 6600 at 3ghz with 667 ram but am now thinking perhaps the 6700 at the same fsb and get 3.33ghz for only ~$120 more?

Or then there is the lovely idea of going the quad core and run that at 3ghz.

In writing that I've pretty much convinced myself that I will at least go to the 6700, however I guess my dilemma now is will the quad core give me that much of a performance increase? Bear in mind that the pc will be used mainly for gaming, in particular RTS. So not a great deal of heavy duty multi tasking will be going on.

Thanks
Lazarus

 

[darious00777]

Check out the E6320 or E6420. Could be a better deal for you in the short turn. If you're planning on using the CPU for more then a year, go with the E6700.

The E6x20 will give you the same amount of cache, reducing that bottleneck, but the overclocked to 3 gigahertz will use up more electricity, making them cost a bit more the longer time goes on.

The quad core Q6600 might be overkill unless you multi-task heavily, work with video data, or run scientific software (Folding@Home, BOINC, etc.).

In summery: Stick with the E6700, especially if you want to keep your electric bill down.

 

[epsilon84]

Just stick with the E6600, at 3.33GHz the RAM will be running at 740MHz, which shouldn't be a problem for most DDR2-667 RAM.

 

[mrmez]

dood, ur options range SO much in price.
If all of them are affordable grab the Q fo sheezy.

Also... what u use ur pc for?

In games like Oblivion ive seen NO fps difference between...

-805D @ 3.8Ghz
-925D @ 3.5Ghz
-4300 @ 1.8Ghz
-4300 @ 3.1Ghz

So... if all i did was game, id be better off with a new gfx card, however i really do notice the extra cpu juice for photo/video editing.

 

[epsilon84]

Mez, I'd say you're probably GPU limited in Oblivion if you aren't seeing any differences in framerate.

Just out of curiosity, what kind of framerates are you getting?