E6750 or wait for E8400?

[imported_mystik]

Like the title says, would it be worth it to buy an E6750 now or wait a couple months for the E8400 to be released? I just purchased an eVGA 8800GT SSC (700 MHz) today, but my current system is a bit outdated for this.

AMD Athlon 64 3700+
2GB OCZ DDR 400 Platinum
eVGA 7800GTX 256MB
MSI K8N Neo4/SLI
OCZ-520ADJ - OCZ 520W PowerStream

As you can see my processor would probably be quite a big bottleneck for this card. I was going to get the 8800GT SSC from eVGA and wait until Jan '08 to upgrade my processor and possibly take advantage of the step up program from eVGA at that time. After some consideration though I've been thinking about canceling my 8800GT SSC order and just waiting for January to roll around so that I would still have 90 days from when I upgrade the rest of my system to take advantage of the step up program. Or should I just not worry about any of this and go ahead and purchase an E6750 & eVGA 680i LT SLI now and then upgrade to quad core in a year?

I mainly use this computer to play WoW, TF2, CS: Source at my monitor's native resolution of 1600x1200. My current system runs these games fine for the most part but I can't stand getting 15fps during a raid in WoW or slowdowns in CSS particularly in cs_militia. Plus I wouldn't mind being able to crank up my AA & image quality settings higher than they are now.

 

[tno]

I think that you could probably sell off most of your rig and adding that to the $300 you just spent on that 8800GT put together a pretty decent rig (keeping that 7800 of course) that will take you well into next year when you can get that same 8800GT for far less. Check out the FS forum, you can probably put together a quad core and a mobo for the price of the 8800GT alone. $50 more and you'll have the memory you need and off you go.

tno

 

[TC91]

i would wait since the e8400 is not too far off. your current system isnt too shabby either, i would wait. but if your current system cant get things done for you then u may have to jump the gun and get the e6750.

 

[myocardia]

Welcome to anandtech, mystik. Why aren't you overclocking that San Diego 3700? Most will do 2.7-2.8 Ghz fairly easily, even with a cheap AC Freezer 64 Pro. But yeah, with all of the newer games that utilize dual-cores, you'd be seriously cpu-bound, with an 8800GT.

 

[imported_mystik]

A quad core CPU seems like a bit much at the moment for what I'd use it for. Sure quad core might be a bit more "future proof" than a dual core processor but is it worth it when building a new gaming rig today or would it be better to get a faster clocked dual core? If I were to pick up a Core 2, whether it be a dual or a quad core would my current PSU be able to handle it? (+12V@33A) What if I were to add an 8800GT later on?

As for overclocking, I'm sure I could squeeze a bit more performance out of my current processor but is it really going to make much of a difference? I played around with this a bit when I first built my system and had no problem getting it up past 2.6GHz but didn't play around with it a whole lot. At the time I eventually just decided to run it at stock, of course I knew much less about overclocking back then and didn't want to take any unnecessary risks.

My system runs TF2 fine on high settings at 1600x1200 with 2xAA as well as any other games on the Source engine that I have played. I had no problem running the Crysis SP demo at 1280x1024 on medium settings. Probably the one thing that I dislike the most is dropping to between 12 and 15 fps on a 25-man raid encounter in World of Warcraft, I'm pretty sure this is CPU though because I'll have the same problem whether I'm using high or low settings.

 

[harpoon84]

Overclocking your current CPU to 2.6GHz+ will definitely help in WoW and CS:S, both of which are very CPU bound as you may already know.

That should be enough to tide you over until the E8400 is released.

 

[A554SS1N]

^ I'd wait for the E8400 too.

 

[Pain999]

You already have a motherboard and RAM designed for overclocking so you might as well use it! Just google overclocking that motherboard or just about any NForce4 motherboard and you should get a nice boost to limp along till something good comes out.

 

[Burpy]

I'm in a similar situation and was considering the E6750 for a new build. I didn't even know Intel was releasing new CPU's in January, so I guess I can wait a few more months.

My current setup.

AMD 3700+ s754
EPoX SLI PCI-e MB (one of the few s754 MB with PCI-e nf4)
7900GTX 512MB which I just Sold
2GB of RAM

I was considering selling the CPU, MB and RAM and upgrading. I may still go this route if my patience wears thin.

 

[hans007]

you couldj ust buy a $60 x2 4200 and overclock it for the time being. newegg i think still sells the 4200.

it woudl be the easy and lazy upgrade.

i'd wait for the e8400 honestly. the e8200 actually is the same speed as the e6750. then again the e6750 is what $185 now... i dont thiink its worth it what with $240 q6600 soometimes .

i think if you are getting an e6750 now, might as well wait for a deal and get a q6600 . and if you arent gonna wait, you probably could be ok with an x2 4200 939 or something like that from ewiz or newegg and just wait for the 45nm next year.

 

[nyker96]

yes I agree get the $60 x2 4200 OC it and that should hold you til next year Q1 when both AMD and Intel will intro their new stuff, more selection for you that way, and the benchmarks will show a better picture of what cpu is best for you.

 

[imported_mystik]

Thanks for the advice everyone, I've decided to hold off on buying the 8800GT and wait until early 2008 to upgrade my PC. I was able to overclock my 3700+ to 2.6GHz stable @ 1.5v. I was originally going for 2.7GHz but I had stability problems in Orthos without bumping the vCore up quite a bit.

http://valid.x86-secret.com/show_oc.php?id=264262

http://xs121.xs.to/xs121/07452/Orthos2-6.gif

 

[toadeater]

If you're going to upgrade in a year, get an e4400 (overclock it to 3.0GHz), not the e6750. You won't notice the difference in games, but you'll save ~$70.