CPU core question

[toreses]

I saw the Q6700 and Q9300
Q9300 ahas the faster speed but the price is about $260 lower.. I wonder if the kentsfield is better than Yorkfield??
the difference between I can saw from them is the L2 cache. Q6600 is 8M, Q9300 is 6M..
so, what makes the price different?

 

[aigomorla]

Originally posted by: toreses
I saw the Q6700 and Q9300
Q9300 ahas the faster speed but the price is about $260 lower.. I wonder if the kentsfield is better than Yorkfield??
the difference between I can saw from them is the L2 cache. Q6600 is 8M, Q9300 is 6M..
so, what makes the price different?

A good google would answer all your questions.


But rundown, the yorkfield is a die shrinkage of the kentsfield.

The Q6700 is the top of the line kents minus the QX series. The Q9300 is the bottom of the food chain.

As in terms of overclocking the Q6700 would eat the Q9300. But the Q9300 would draw less power due to the die shrinkage.

Are you an avid overclocker? if so the Q6700 would be a better solution. Otherwise the hardware requirements for a good overclock on the Q9300 would probably cost you more the a Q6700.


If these arent your only solutions, a Q9450 or X3350 is a better solution. However im still finding the Q6700 very hard to beat.

 

[Idontcare]

Read this xbotlabs article where they compare Q9300 to Q6600 and most, if not all, of your questions will be answered.

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articl...y/core2quad-q9300.html

 

[Ratman6161]

Originally posted by: Idontcare
Read this xbotlabs article where they compare Q9300 to Q6600 and most, if not all, of your questions will be answered.

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articl...y/core2quad-q9300.html

Another factor thats sort of implied in that article is that since you have to crank the bus speed up so high on the 9300, even at a 1:1 ration, DDR2 800 probably isnt going to work and you are going to have to buy more expensive RAM too.

 

[Pabster]

QX9650 is where it's at.

Yorkdale > Kentsfield, but with the current Kentsfield pricing, you can't beat it. They're terrific overclockers. Looking purely at stock speed, there's about an 8 to 10% performance delta between a Kentsfield 6600 and a Yorkdale 9300. Is it worth an extra $100? You decide.

 

[lopri]

I thought QX9770 just came out. Affordable, too..

 

[aigomorla]

Originally posted by: Pabster
QX9650 is where it's at.

AMEN to that.. Cou*4.4*gh :T

Priming tonight.

 

[TheJian]

Originally posted by: toreses
I saw the Q6700 and Q9300
Q9300 ahas the faster speed but the price is about $260 lower.. I wonder if the kentsfield is better than Yorkfield??
the difference between I can saw from them is the L2 cache. Q6600 is 8M, Q9300 is 6M..
so, what makes the price different?

If we're actually talking Q6700 ($370 cheapest I find) here, the comparable chip is the Q9450/x3350. It sells for less ($350) and has an 8x multiplier. Which even with crappy DDR2 800 memory should read 3.6ghz no problem (450fsb, 900mhz memory). Even my cheapo ADATA can hit 1000. Anand just hit 500fsb with a quad on Nvidia chipset board. One has to consider boards should get more optimized for quad and hit 500mhz regulary at some point as we all move toward quad. At that speed Q9450 hits 4ghz and uses far less watts at the wall.

We're not even counting the fact that this chip has SSE4.1 and is 31% faster in SSE2 (so says anand in a divx benchmark they ran). Adobe premeire just came out with SSE4 optimized code so other major apps shouldn't be too far behind. Since most people don't buy quads for gaming yet (not many games use it at all) the assumption is you want to do some sort of high end stuff.

After I consider the power bill for 3yrs on these two chips (around 70w higher with both @ 3.6 or so, see aforementioned Xbit article), higher $20 on Q6700, the heatsink it would take to cool the Q6700 @ say 3.6ghz (that ain't stock fan), and finally SSE4 I wouldn't want anything but the Q9450 in this case (vs. Q6700).

http://www.anandtech.com/cpuch...howdoc.aspx?i=3066&p=3
"Our G0 Q6600, surprisingly enough, couldn't really get much higher. While the same 3.33GHz overclock was possible at a lower voltage, our max was 3.51GHz (390 x 9.0) without resorting to improved cooling. Even at our max, the system wasn't always 100% stable, we suspect that our G0 chip would end up somewhere around 3.4GHz and fully stable in the long run."

Not stable at 3.51, suspected 3.4. Needs more cooling. 3.6ghz however is a cakewalk on Q9450 and it can do it on stock. Heck, for the $20 difference in chip cost you can throw on an Arctic Cooling Freezer Pro 7 ($22 ewiz). FSB might be a problem for Q9300/9450 (or multi depending on your view) but mhz is a problem for Q6600/6700 without good cooling.

Note: if the 9450's fan looks like my xeon 3110 fan you'll need the freezer pro anyway...LOL. This thing is puny.