Besides budgetary concerns, why would anyone consider any less than a 4MB Conroe?

[FelixDeCat]

I mean really. If youre gonna make it "worth your while", you might as make it "worth your while".

Sure the 2MB is competent, but go for the 4MB if you can afford it I say.

Am I wrong about this?

 

[IamDavid]

$$$

Going from X2 requires mb/ram/cpu.. not worth it. maybe a little down the road..

 

[Regs]

Because I think it has something to do about money and thoughts.

 

[broly8877]

~3.5% average difference at same frequency according to anand, 10% absolutetly best case scenario...

I'd rather spend the money saved on a better card/cooling/MB/etc.

 

[FelixDeCat]

Originally posted by: Regs
Because I think it has something to do about money and thoughts.

Thats probably true, but I say if youre really "thinking" about it, go for the gusto. Go four meg. In the long run youll be happier.

Of course money doesnt grow on trees. We all have to work for a living, so save up if you have to, IMO.

 

[FelixDeCat]

Originally posted by: broly8877
~3.5% average difference at same frequency according to anand, 10% absolutetly best case scenario...

I'd rather spend the money saved on a better card/cooling/MB/etc.

I dont know why but I remember the same thing being said about Hyperthreading. And HT paid off in spades for big encoders like me.

 

[Pabster]

I'd have to agree. Although the E6300 does offer an incredible P/P value.

 

[broly8877]

HT needed optimized apps. The advantage extra cache has now will be the same.

 

[Mucker]

It's more likely because overclockers like to spend as little as possible and push it as far as they can, the benefits being very good price/performance compared to their high end bretheren.

Take the 144 Opteron for example, a very low cost chip with some astounding OC's (in some instances 1200 to 1400 MHz OC :Q). It's all about bang for buck for alot of people, me included. If you are not buying cpu's to overclock them, you should probably get the best you can afford, but paying a premium is pretty silly when it comes to computer parts. The depreciation is much too severe.......

 

[networkman]

Law of diminishing returns. Many people think that if I have 2meg cache it's gonna be twice as good a 1meg cache; and so 4meg is gonna be 4 times better than 1. But as others have pointed out, unless you've got some really funky app that can take full advantage of the 4meg cache, you're not going to see returns anywhere near what one might expect.

Consider the performance gains one gets from having various levels of ram: the benefits are usually very pronounced in a WindowsXP system going from 256meg to 512meg. Going to 1Gig usually gets you a bit more performance gain but no where near what the jump from 256 to 512 was, even though it's the same doubling of exisiting ram.

 

[raincityboy]

They make Conroes with 2MB L2?
I thought that was Allendale.

 

[networkman]

Right or wrong, I'm getting my info from two links A) PC Mag - point#3 and B) Intel's processor number feature sheet

 

[aggressor]

I think the 2mb cache CPUs are overclocking better at the moment, at least when not FSB limited (ie e6400 vs e6600)

 

[shamans]

Originally posted by: FelixDeKat
I mean really. If youre gonna make it "worth your while", you might as make it "worth your while".

Sure the 2MB is competant, but go for the 4MB if you can afford it I say.

Am I wrong about this?

Maybe it isn't worth the while for most people. Why buy an expensive sports car to drive 20 minutes to work? Some people do, most people don't.

 

[DrMrLordX]

Originally posted by: FelixDeKat
I mean really. If youre gonna make it "worth your while", you might as make it "worth your while".

Sure the 2MB is competant, but go for the 4MB if you can afford it I say.

Am I wrong about this?

http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=2795&p=6

Check it, low multipliers mean higher potential FSB speed for additional performance. The ideal performance situation would be a 4 meg chip with a low multiplier, which you could achieve with the E6800. Of course, you also need a board capable of maxing out the chip without hitting an FSB wall . . . the E6300 might well require a 570 mhz FSB to hit its wall, and I don't think any board has yet reached that level. Maybe a modded DS3 could do it.

 

[FelixDeCat]

Originally posted by: DrMrLordX

Originally posted by: FelixDeKat
I mean really. If youre gonna make it "worth your while", you might as make it "worth your while".

Sure the 2MB is competant, but go for the 4MB if you can afford it I say.

Am I wrong about this?

http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=2795&p=6

Check it, low multipliers mean higher potential FSB speed for additional performance. The ideal performance situation would be a 4 meg chip with a low multiplier, which you could achieve with the E6800. Of course, you also need a board capable of maxing out the chip without hitting an FSB wall . . . the E6300 might well require a 570 mhz FSB to hit its wall, and I don't think any board has yet reached that level. Maybe a modded DS3 could do it.

DS3?

 

[bunnyfubbles]

The cache is ultimately negligable, not worth the price/performnace. This isn't like the P4 where it was crippled with anything less than 512KB of cache. The reason I'd pay the extra money for, say an E6600, would be for the higher multiplier which would be better for higher overclocking (as motherboards/chipsets tend to crap out before the E6300/6400 do) - the extra cache would only be a bonus.

Now if I could get an E4200 (with an 800MHz FSB), then it would be a different story, because it would be a cheap chip with a higher multiplier which should ultimately allow for higher overclocks. But who knows, by the time those chips are out we might have motherboards that don't hold back the 6300/6400...

 

[Zap]

Originally posted by: FelixDeKat
Of course money doesnt grow on trees. We all have to work for a living, so save up if you have to, IMO.

Sure. While you're at it, may as well save up for a BMW 7 series because anything less and you're selling yourself short. Oh yeah, and million dollar homes are all the rage right now. If you're only living in a $300,000 home, you may as well be on food stamps.

C'mon Felix, don't tell me you're selling yourself short by not getting the Core 2 Extreme? After all, the mere E6600 chips are soooo slow. I can't understand why anyone wouldn't want to drop $1000 (before vendor raping^H^H^H profit) on a CPU and $200 on a motherboard, and $350 on "good" RAM. While you're at it, $600 of pocket change will get a pair of Raptor 150 drives, and don't forget dual Radeon X1900 cards for... OMG if you have to ask the price you may as well stand in the unemployment line.

Don't get me wrong, I'm reasonably excited about the Core 2 Duo... the forthcoming E4300. Pair that with a budget board like that Biostar reviewed by AT... tasty! Plus, I can still have food on my plate for the rest of the month. The only thing I'm selling myself short on is my e-penis. Of course if it gets much farther beyond my knees I'm gonna have some difficulties sitting down while wearing pants...

 

[Howard]

The difference is slight; I would say negligible (of course you compare at the same clock speed).

 

[dexvx]

E6600, cheapest 4MB chip, is $350ish
E6300, cheapest 2MB chip for now, is $190ish.

$350 chips these days are mid-high end. I, myself, have never paid more than $150ish for a CPU.

 

[harpoon84]

Of course, like most things in life, it boils down to money. Overclockers are generally tightasses and we want to get the cheapest chip and overclock it to levels far above the flagship CPU.

E6300s with Gigabyte DS3 mobos are getting overclocks in the region of 3.3 - 3.5GHz, which is excellent value. Sure, it's only got 2MB L2, but that is largely offset by the faster FSB. Don't forget an E6300 @ 3.5GHz is running at a FSB of 500MHz, or 2GHz quad pumped. That's some serious bandwith there.

For comparison, an E6600 @ 3.6GHz 'only' runs at a 400MHz FSB/1.6GHz QP.

 

[rmed64]

The whole notion is to oc it and get best price performance for less than half the price of the "high end" chips

You can oc above the speeds of a 4MB cache conroe and achieve faster performance anyway

Its all about the Megahurtz!

 

[exp]

Originally posted by: aggressor
I think the 2mb cache CPUs are overclocking better at the moment, at least when not FSB limited (ie e6400 vs e6600)

That's my reason for preferring the E6400 ATM, even though I was originally planning on an E6600. If both chips could reach identical FSB's on air/water then I would get the E6600 for another 400Mhz plus the larger cache, but with Allendale doing >450FSB to Conroe's 400 that reduces the difference between them to *only* the extra 2MB cache. A 1-10% boost in performance (or even slightly less, given the FSB advantage for Allendale) is not worth spending 40% more on a processor in my book, especially when you consider the opportunity cost of what you could get by putting that $100 into another component/upgrade. JMO.

Hopefully there'll be some O/Cing experiences w/ oem E6600's from TD posted on AT, XS or other sites between now and August 7. If the situation changes unexpectedly (e.g. mobo bios update) and Conroe starts doing 450FSB as regularly as Allendale then I would change my mind about the E6600.

 

[Aluvus]

Besides budgetary concerns, why would anyone consider any less than a Core 2 Extreme?

 

[Zebo]

6400 is the sweet spot ...