4300 vs 6600

[dogsx2]

Is virtualization and 2mb more of L2 worth the difference in price if both cpu's will run the same oc'ed MHz? We are now at close to 2x the money for a 6600 vs the 4300.

L2 does make a small difference in some apps but does virtualization make that much of difference?

[Reefa_Madness]

If you compare the 6320 at 1.86GHz (in lieu of the 6600) to the 4400 at 2.0GHz (in lieu of the 4300) in this comparison of cpus with approximately the same clock speed, you'll get a feel for what the differences really amount to. As it has been on many other occassions, to a certain extent it depends on what apps you run.

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/core2duo-e6420_5.html

This is a related article.

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/dualcore-roundup.html

Hope that helps.

[dogsx2]

I bit on the $200 6600 from Frys and it is a poor clocker, maybe the poorest of 2 6600, 4 4300 2 6400 and 1 6300. I encode a lot and surf web with the rig in a Microfly. I cannot tell that much difference. I am having a hard time justifying it and not just ebaying it.

[Reefa_Madness]

Funny that you should say that because I was going to add that the comparison was basesd on the assumption that you could get them to clock the same and I was going to add (and I still believe that it is true) that on average, I believe that your chances for a better clock would come from the E6600. Sorry to hear that yours bucks that notion.

The E4300 / E4400 and upcoming E4500 (11 x 200) are interesting chips and all in all, seem to me to be pretty good buys for day-to-day rigs. Overclocked, I believe that they are certainly going to stomp anything in its price range.

I see that you have 4 of the 4300s...how have they clocked for you and with what voltages?

[jws2346]

Is virtualization and 2mb more of L2 worth the difference in price if both cpu's will run the same oc'ed MHz? We are now at close to 2x the money for a 6600 vs the 4300.

L2 does make a small difference in some apps but does virtualization make that much of difference?

I wish I could answer that question for every operation people perform on their computers. I personally fold 24/7 and having the extra 2 MB's of cache is definitely worth it to me. I don't have a E4300 chip, but I have a E6400 (Allendale core, 2 MB's cache) and a E6420 (Conroe core, 4 MB's cache). I can definitely tell the difference in my times per minute (tpf) both in WinSMP and Linux SMP. (both OC'ed to a mild 2.8 GHz) So, to make a long story short, it is definitely worth it to me to have the extra L2 cache, it's very important to me because of the programs I run on my computer. Oh yeah, I have a E6600 (2x of them) and the E6420 is about 12 tpf and my E6600 (in all fairness it's OC'ed to 3.2 GHz) is about 10 tpf (I only have one E6600 ATM, I'm still waiting for UPS to feed their horses and deliver my 2nd one, maybe Wed, 04/27/07) :)

[stealthbomber]

For purely number crunching apps the extra cache certainly helps.

For pure gaming the difference is very small, scaling from 3GHz to 3.6GHz+ in even the most demanding games the difference is so small it's barely worth looking at, overclocking the graphics card made much more of a difference to the frame rates than simply higher CPU clocks, or the extra 2MB cache.

You should just get the cheapest C2D CPU out there and overclock it to 3GHz (easy even with stock cooling) for games, 4MB/8MB cache processors for pure number crunching. :D

[Blacklash]

I'd agree with Stealth here based on experience and after reading many reviews,

A C2D overclocked to 3.0-3.2GHz is ideal for a pure gaming rig all things considered. For example; an E6320 @ 3.0GHz with my 8800GTX turns in 12.2k in 3dmark06, with my E6600@ 3.7GHz that score only rises to 12.5K.

I'd suggest most gamers looking for value get a E4300 with a 965 mobo and do 3.0-3.2GHz. If you really want value grab a Brisbane 3600+ and OC it.

[elsupremo]

With a nice aircooler, you could be getting 3.5+ out of any of the higher end C2D, making a very nice setup indeed.

[hillwilla]

Any idea why FRY's has upped the price to $302.00 on the e6600?:eek:

http://shop4.outpost.com/product/4953791?site=sr:SEARCH:MAIN_RSLT_PG