help compare these cpus pls

[zigzag03]

i know i'm taking you down memory lane, but i'm looking to upgrade an older machine and looking for a opinion on the following:

currently its a quad core Q6600 (2.6/8M/1066) with 4 meg of ddr2 on a p5n32e sli mobo. I'm considering a dual core E8500 (3.16/6M/1333) and bumping the ram to 8. Obviously the replacement would have a faster clock and bus speed, and i wonder, in your opinions, does this outweigh the extra cores and the larger L2?

Gaming performance is always the goal, but i'm not playing anything heavy, mostly racing sims and wot these days. btw graphic are a pair of 8800GTS 320m xfx in sli.

all very dated i know, but still passable for what i play and do, just looking for a little extra.

thanks for looking, zz03

 

[tweakboy]

Drop a SSD on the rig and your system will be soo fast. It will bring some life to that old Q6. gl

 

[NTMBK]

The dual core would be a big step back. Modern games love more cores.

The Q6600 is a notoriously good overclocker. Buy a new heatsink (like a Coolermaster Hyper 212 Evo) and overclock that sucker. There are plenty of threads out there about overclocking the Q6600, if you want to look for advice.

 

[zigzag03]

my experience with this setup from day 1 has been that even the taking the simplest overclock offered in the bios (fully updated btw) renders this machine unbootable. it has a stock intel cooler but it can't be complaining about heat at bootup. i'll look and see what i can find in the forums about it as i've never really pursued the issue. or maybe a faster quad core of the same generation? thanks for the response.

 

[R0H1T]

my experience with this setup from day 1 has been that even the taking the simplest overclock offered in the bios (fully updated btw) renders this machine unbootable. it has a stock intel cooler but it can't be complaining about heat at bootup. i'll look and see what i can find in the forums about it as i've never really pursued the issue. or maybe a faster quad core of the same generation? thanks for the response.

The first thing you should do is get rid of the stock cooler, the values you've set in the BIOS may also need some tweak depending on what you're trying to do.

 

[aarontpx]

Those 8800gts in sli suck down a boatload of power, imo you should upgrade to a single gpu as well as pumping that Q6600 up to a respectable OC. I would not recommend upgrading to the E8400.

 

[AnonymouseUser]

What PSU? That may be the reason you can't overclock.

 

[aarontpx]

What PSU? That may be the reason you can't overclock.

Excellent point.

 

[zigzag03]

first of all, if this belongs somewhere else, someone say so, i'll start a diff thread. also, if you think i should just start searching, i'll do that too.
was just fooling around in bios, award, and aitweaker. it actually did allow the machine to boot, but here's what i don't get. its lists the cpu as q6600, 2.4ghz, then beneath that it says core speed 1.67ghz. is this some fraction of the mulitple cores, or is this thing throttled way back? realtemp shows it the same, running at 1.67g. i'm sure i'm missing something basic.
for the record, since installing 7 from xp, a long time ago, i hadnt tried any overclock. that may be why it went further this time. i asked for a 5% overclock, ran some prime95 for 10 mins, it stablized around 147F, and after i stopped the test and closed the programs, it did a reboot on its own. maybe thats what it was doing before, and my recollections are wrong.

power supply is a seasonic 600. the 2 gts pour heat out of the top case fan like crazy, realtemp says theyre around 157F. the case has its window to the right, ps on the bottom, vid carts at top under a fan. 3 others in the case, one on the cpu and a vent directly "above" it, if the case were laying window up. no hot air coming out of that, for what its worth.

i'm off to search and read, but glad and grateful for anyone's input. zz03

 

[Hubb1e]

All you have to do with the Q6600 is bump the FSB up to 1333 from 1066 and you've got an instant overclock to 3ghz. You may not even need to touch the voltage. 1333 is an officially supported bus speed so any boards should be able to handle that. Super easy, you should have done it 5 years ago.

 

[tweakboy]

5 year Q6600 user.

PLL setting in BIOS as high as it goes. Also take northbridge voltage all way up 1.800 it should be.......
RAM adjustment. You can OC to 3Ghz without touching voltage.

 

[aarontpx]

power supply is a seasonic 600.

Shouldn't be a power issue then.

 

[Yuriman]

All you have to do with the Q6600 is bump the FSB up to 1333 from 1066 and you've got an instant overclock to 3ghz. You may not even need to touch the voltage. 1333 is an officially supported bus speed so any boards should be able to handle that. Super easy, you should have done it 5 years ago.

It may also appear as "266" to "333". I have a Q6600 machine that's been running at 3ghz for years by simply changing the FSB.

 

[Schmide]

I think your memory settings while overclocking may be wrong and are holding you back.

In bios
FSB & Memory Config

Set

FSB - Memory Clock Mode [Linked]
FSB - Memory Ratio [1:1]
FSB - (QDR), MHz [1333]

This is a 3.0ghz 333mhz qdr 1333mhz bus with memory running at 667.

If you were setting it like so with ddr2 800 memory

FSB - Memory Clock Mode [Linked]
FSB - Memory Ratio [Auto] (Auto is most likely a 3:2 ratio for this CPU)
FSB - (QDR), MHz [1333]

This is a 3.0ghz 333mhz qdr 1333mhz bus with memory running at 1000. (you may boot but your memory can't support this rate. ddr800 can oc to about 900)

After you check the first settings you can probably run with

Setting it like so with ddr2 800 memory

FSB - Memory Clock Mode [Linked]
FSB - Memory Ratio [5:4]
FSB - (QDR), MHz [1333]

This is a 3.0ghz 333mhz qdr 1333mhz bus with memory running at 832.

 

[zigzag03]

ok thanks everyone. schmide i had read in some post here somewhere to unlink the memory clock and had done so. i havn't otherwise touched those settings and now i'll try your settings with it linked back up. also, i'm guessing speedstep should be disabled? and how about the mulitplier. stock appears to be 6, but with it pushed up to 8 and at full load i'm finally seeing 2666.7mhz on realtemp. thats the stock speed of the unit if im reading it right. i want to thank you all for your help i'm learning a lot.

 

[zigzag03]

to schmide and all responders thanks again, shmide i'm at your last memory timings comfortably and mulitplier to 9 (max), altho still not sure how that should effect things. anyway, the machine seems stable and reasaonably cool with the fans cranked up. now i'll try and get a better cooler and carry on. thanks again.

 

[Headfoot]

You're definitely going to want to get a new cooler. The stock cooler is not going to cut it. A CoolerMaster Hyper 212+ or EVO will be great and it only costs around $25-30. You'll almost certainly get 3.0 ghz, but you might be able to get to 3.2 or 3.4 if you've got a good chip. Second, those 8800 GTS 320s are going to be holding you back. I used to have that same set up, the low 320mb of RAM really holds you back even at only 1680x1050 resolution. If you sold them both on eBay for $40 each you could get almost enough for a Radeon HD 7770 which is going to be a lot faster than those in SLI

 

[Piroko]

You may want to think about replacing your 8800GTSs though. A single GTX660 draws about the same power as a single 8800GTS at load (much less in idle) and should be double the speed of your SLI setup in most games, even on your aging Q6600. That will help keep your system temperatures lower as well.

 

[arsta]

Depends on what it is you play, but most newer games work better with more cores, so 2-core would be a downgrade.

 

[zigzag03]

thanks to the latest responders. off to compusa, oh wait, tigerdirect, retail store to grab a real cooler, and will check those recommendations. that coolermaster has been mentioned in an earlier post. and yes i'm sure a video upgrade is in order. have always felt more comfortable in the nvidia world, but will study the 7770 before going forward.

thanks everyone.

 

[NTMBK]

You got it working stable at 3Ghz? Awesome! Glad we saved you the cost of an upgrade :thumbsup: