E6850 or I7-860

[MStele]

I've been using a C2D E6850 with stock cooler running at stock 3 GHz for a while now. Recently, I have been eyeing a new i7 upgrade since I've read good things about performance, even considering their lower clock speeds. Overall I've been extremely happy with my E6850, but like many other power users, the desire to jump to the latest hardware often outweighs the actual need to do it.

I want to make some changes regardless. Assuming my motherboard is OC capable, would switching to a nice aftermarket fan/heatsink allow me to overclock the C2D to 3.2-3.4 with air cooling, or would i be better served to just buy the i7? Primarily I want to know what gains both directions would give me in gaming, and what my options are.

My video card is a Geforce 260 216 and I game at 1920X1200. For a case I use an Antec Three Hundred, so I think i'm good as far as air movement.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Drop in an E8500, and OC to 4+ Ghz. That should help your gaming.

I don't think that you would much notice the difference between 3.0 and 3.2Ghz.

 

[MStele]

Thank you for the suggestion. Spending almost $200 dollars on a chip virtually identical to my current one (except for the 45nm process) seems like a waste tho...but I do see it has great OC potential.

 

[RussianSensation]

In terms of most bank for your buck you could sell the E6850 ($80) and grab an E0 version of the Q9550 ($160 at Microcenter). Pick up an aftermarket cooler for $20-30 or if you intend to get into i7 category down the line, may want to invest into a universal cooler like a Noctua NH-U12P SE2. This processor should overclock to 3.8-4.0ghz assuming you have the P45 and not the P35 chipset (475 FSB x 8.5 multi). A good overclocking board will be a must for this. Then sell your GTX 260 and upgrade to 5850 for $299 when it launches Sept 22nd. I would not consider 'upgrading' to another dual core.

Your other alternative is of course to try to sell your CPU + Mobo + Ram and get something like Gigabyte P55-UD3R or Asus P7P55D ($140-$150) and 4GBs of DDR3 ram ($80) and aftermarket cooling. Games like Anno1404, GTA4, ArmA2 and Resident Evil 5 benefit significantly from quad cores. However, for all your other games, at 1920x1200, you will be GPU limited esp with 8AA. If you do any video encoding work, then the Core i7 is the way to go. Otherwise, the cheaper Q9550 E0 and keeping your DDR2 ram and mobo option may be all you need on the CPU end.

You can also try to hold out until Sandy Bridge Q1 2011 I believe.

I was contemplating the exact same options as you although I already had a 4890 and a Q6600 3.4ghz. I ended up selling the mobo + cpu + ram and some other old computer parts I wasn't using for $330 USD. This let me get a Core i7 860 and 4GBs of ram for 'free'. So my net upgrade cost was just the Gigabyte P55 board of $140. Not bad to play with new parts I guess.

Here are my preliminary benches, but on an MSI P55-CD53 board:

Resident Evil 5

Q6600 @ 3.4ghz + 4890 880/4000 factory clocks
1280x1024 4AA = 60.8
1680x1050 0AA = 57.8
1680x1050 4AA = 57.8
1920x1080 0AA = 54.6
1920x1080 4AA = 55.1

Core i7 860 stock w/Turbo enabled, DDR3 1066 CL7 timings + 4890 880/4000
1280x1024 4AA = 106.5 (+75%)
1680x1050 0AA = 97.2 (+68%)
1680x1050 4AA = 90.3 (+56%)
1920x1080 0AA = 88.8 (+63%)
1920x1080 4AA = 81.6 (+49%)

1920x1080 8AA = 77.3

WinRAR
Q6600 @ 3.4ghz = 1700-1900

i7 860 stock = 2850 with 1066 ram
i7 860 stock = 3200 with 1333 ram
i7 860 stock = 3500 with 1600 ram

 

[MStele]

Thank you Rus-Sen

I have a P35 (Asus P5K) chipset so overclocking is limited, as you stated. Naturally we all prefer the cheaper option, but since I'd need to replace motherboard and CPU to do heavy overclocking, it stands to reason to just get the i7-860,P55, 4GB ram since I can get them for < 500. Going from a 2 cores to 4 cores does seem appetizing because I do vid encoding and am a heavy FSX user, which I hear benefits from it. I guess I can just take my LGA-775 and use it as a file server...allbeit with some undervolt if I can manage it. Thanks for the help.

I did hear that some of the P55 boards are having memory problems due to buggy bios. Do you have any idea about what boards are recommended and which are to be avoided. I currently have my eyes on the Asrock P55 Pro Atx.

One last question : Do you think it is better to go with the P55 with on-die PCI-Ex or with the original i7 with triple-channel ram? Obviously P55 is newer, but does that make it better.

 

[RussianSensation]

If you want to have 'cheap' 12GBs of ram, then get the D0 920 stepping processor and a 6 DIMM X58 board. Those processors should also overclock to 4.0ghz. However, the X58 platform runs about 70-80W hotter. At stock speeds, the i7 860 will be faster as a result of the Turbo Mode. You also have the benefit of buying a socket 1366 cooler right now while 1156 coolers are not widely available/variety is limited.

Socket 1366 will also support 6 core Gulftown 32nm cpus but those will be Extreme editions priced at $1k+.

The choice of mobo depends on your budget and features. Do you want CF/SLI 8x/8x? Or are you going to run single graphics card? Do you need eSATA?

The Asrock board looks nice but it's $190 right? For that price you can get the EVGA SLI board, Asus p7p55D Evo or Gigabyte UD4P. MSI GD-65 looks decent too.

It seems some MSI and Gigabyte boards wont detect full 8GBs of ram when 4 Dimm slots are populated while some MSI boards have BSOD issues with memory (I had those with MSI P55 CD53).

MSI has 1 sec Overclocking with OC Genie.
EVGA has S775 cooler mounting holes for the CPU.
Gigabyte and Asus boards are usually always top quality.

Although, almost any board will max out the Core i7 860 at 200x21 multi.

Check out this review:
http://www.techreport.com/articles.x/17598

 

[MStele]

Well, the Asrock P55 board im looking at costs $114.99

http://www.newegg.com/Product/...x?Item=N82E16813157171

As far as GPUs go I only ever plan on running with a single card setup, so i'm not worried about running into any compatibility problems with crossfire/sli, nor do I need esata.

 

[nyker96]

MStele, if you want to spend more cash, I say go with i5-750//P55board//DDR3 combo then oc to about 3.6ghz+ will give you a really nice boost for gaming and just about anything you do. unless you want to setup for 6 or 8 cores then get i7. but if just doing a small upgrade in 775 get q9xxx, I almost try not to recommend people getting q9xxx for quads that $200 just not worth it with i5 on the table but if you must that would be an upgrade you will feel some difference.