Going from an old E4300 to a...

[AtaruMoroboshi18]

I've got a $140 to spend on a new CPU, my computer is an ASUS P5Q Pro running really nicely, with an MSI 260 GTX, 2x1GB G.Skill RAM, and the E4300 Core 2 Duo from a while ago. What would you guys recommend with $140 for upgrades? An E5200 and 2x2GB RAM? Any recommendations for a gamer's rig?

 

[VirtualLarry]

Go E8400, and OC to 4Ghz.

 

[theAnimal]

OC the E4300, upgrade to 4GB of RAM.

 

[AtaruMoroboshi18]

Originally posted by: theAnimal
OC the E4300, upgrade to 4GB of RAM.

I have and only ever got 2.7Ghz stable.

 

[Soulkeeper]

I own two e4300's both top out at about 3GHz, your luck seems to be slightly less. maybe try some more voltage ...
but in any case try to get a quad core (your board supports it), I think you'd be happy with nearly any quad going from that dual.
I have no idea what programs you run, or how much you plan on overclocking here, but this would be my preference.

edit: looks like newegg has a Q8200 2.33GHz 45nm for 165 free shipping

 

[AtaruMoroboshi18]

Originally posted by: Soulkeeper
I own two e4300's both top out at about 3GHz, your luck seems to be slightly less. maybe try some more voltage ...
but in any case try to get a quad core (your board supports it), I think you'd be happy with nearly any quad going from that dual.
I have no idea what programs you run, or how much you plan on overclocking here, but this would be my preference.

edit: looks like newegg has a Q8200 2.33GHz 45nm for 165 free shipping

How well will that Q8200 overclock? Also I play Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory, Bioshock, Assassin's Creed, Rogue-likes, Half Life 2, and Oblivion, big gamer!

 

[Soulkeeper]

Originally posted by: AtaruMoroboshi18

Originally posted by: Soulkeeper
I own two e4300's both top out at about 3GHz, your luck seems to be slightly less. maybe try some more voltage ...
but in any case try to get a quad core (your board supports it), I think you'd be happy with nearly any quad going from that dual.
I have no idea what programs you run, or how much you plan on overclocking here, but this would be my preference.

edit: looks like newegg has a Q8200 2.33GHz 45nm for 165 free shipping

How well will that Q8200 overclock? Also I play Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory, Bioshock, Assassin's Creed, Rogue-likes, Half Life 2, and Oblivion, big gamer!

I havn't seen anyone on these forums say they have one, but it is 45nm so 3GHz+ should be a given (likely no vcore increase needed)
you'd basically be testing the waters

there are over 140 reviews of it on newegg, you'll likely get an idea by reading some of those

edit: I just read some of the reviews people are getting various results ranging from 2.9Ghz to 3.96Ghz
many seem to be saying they are getting 3.1-3.2GHz without voltage increase, one guy says 3.5GHz but needed 1.5v (higher than i'd suggest)

these results sound reasonable to me, nothing is guaranteed nomatter which cpu model you get

 

[Soulkeeper]

e8400 dual core is likely favored if all you care about are those games (higher mult and a little more cache)

 

[Mundos]

e8400 is probably the best bet in that range...unless you consider what you're going to sell the e4300 for...that extra $50 puts you into quad town...i dont know how much of a benefit you're going to get from it...maybe you should invest your money enron stocks, let it grow and buy something better later. heh.

 

[Tempered81]

Originally posted by: VirtualLarry
Go E8400, and OC to 4Ghz.

+1 Biggest difference

 

[TidusZ]

2.7 on an e4300 is really low, you realize you can push the volts to 1.45-1.5 safely for years on that chip. Mine's been at 3.2 ~1.45v for close to two years. E8400 is a good upgrade, but 2gb ram is really holding you back.

 

[TurtleCrusher]

About the Q8200 overclocked, i obviously did it. I didn't need to up my voltage on either my ram or CPU. 3Ghz should be easy peasy on this chip for people who have knowledge on how to overclock. I got up to 3136mhz, but my bus speed was real close to 450FSB, so i decided to settle on 3ghz. Keep in mind at 3ghz its comparable to a Q6600 @ 3.2-3.3ghz, so its not like the performance isn't there.

It does run a bit hot at high bus speeds though.

 

[God Mode]

Q8200 isnt a good overclocking chip especially if your motherboard is lacking.

 

[TurtleCrusher]

Originally posted by: God Mode
Q8200 isnt a good overclocking chip especially if your motherboard is lacking.

Look around, many of the people who picked up on the $100 Q8200's have brought them to 3.4-3.7ghz STABLE. Unless you have a crappy asus/ecs G31 chipset, you can get 3ghz. And that 3ghz is what most people with the crowned overclocking Q6600 goes to.

Just because you look at the multiplier and go "waaaah 7x looks hard to OC" doesn't mean it is. Also you'll realize FSB has a much higher effect then pure clock speed in most applications.

 

[God Mode]

Originally posted by: Scholzpdx

Originally posted by: God Mode
Q8200 isnt a good overclocking chip especially if your motherboard is lacking.

Look around, many of the people who picked up on the $100 Q8200's have brought them to 3.4-3.7ghz STABLE. Unless you have a crappy asus/ecs G31 chipset, you can get 3ghz. And that 3ghz is what most people with the crowned overclocking Q6600 goes to.

Just because you look at the multiplier and go "waaaah 7x looks hard to OC" doesn't mean it is. Also you'll realize FSB has a much higher effect then pure clock speed in most applications.

Dont get all defensive. Where are all these people getting 3.4-3.7 stable? You realize 3.7 on a 7x multiplier is 527 fsb yes? Realistically, 3-3.2ghz seems to be the upper realistic limit on these chips. This is why I didnt buy the $99 microcenter deal and instead bought a superior Q6600 for $120 on craigslist.

Who said anything about the 'wahhhhh 7x multiplier?' Do you make silly statements to make your argument look valid? FSB is good but many people have problems with going over 400 on anything but highly rated motherboards with a good bios. To reach 3ghz on the Q8200, you need to be able to do 428 FSB.

What I said is truthful. You have a gigabyte P45 motherboard which fits in line with what I said.

Read some anantech posts and decide for yourself.

http://forums.anandtech.com/me...t_key=y&keyword1=q8200

http://forums.anandtech.com/me...t_key=y&keyword1=q8200

http://forums.anandtech.com/me...t_key=y&keyword1=q8200

http://forums.anandtech.com/me...t_key=y&keyword1=q8200

http://forums.anandtech.com/me...t_key=y&keyword1=q8200

 

[E4300]

Had three Q8200s (older stepping) and one E0-variety Q8200. The older Qs ran fine up to 3.3GHz on my IP35-E. Could go higher with Vcore, but VTT and NB voltages put the cap on this overclock. The other Q chip is prime stable up to 3.68GHz on a gigabyte board with only 1.28 load Vcore. A good chip can easily hit 520MHz FSB with a good board. We will see more 45nm quads selling for $100 or less. The duallies are already breaking $60 @ Fry's (combo sale). The cost of manufacturing a quad isn't 2x.

 

[TurtleCrusher]

I understand what you are saying, but i did pick up the budget P45 board, which often goes on sale for sub $75 and can be had for the same price as most budget mATX boards. And you said the Q8200 doesn't overclock well, which on paper can be attributed to its multiplier. I would consider the chip to be a good overclocker as it can be seen the standard 3ghz can be had with no voltage hikes. That's a huge win in my book.

The only thing that held back my OC was user error on my memory. The entire time i had my DDR2 voltage to 1.8V rather the default 2V.

 

[Denithor]

First off, the OP has an Asus P5Q Pro - that's a solid OC board. Not the absolute best (Gigabyte EP45-UD3P holds that crown) but certainly more than adequate for squeezing most of the performance out of a chip.

Secondly - FSB more important than raw clockspeed - do not know where in the world you got that impression but it's totally dead wrong. FSB typically accounts for <1% difference, even for quad-core chips where it has the most impact. Read a few reviews before posting comments like that.

Third, you're not going to see a huge difference going from an e4300 @ 2.7GHz to an e8400 @ 4GHz (which isn't guaranteed). I made a similar step - from e6400 @ 3GHz to e8400 @ 3.8GHz - and it felt exactly the same, in general duties and games. It does handle video processing faster but I don't do a lot of that so it was really kind of a letdown for me.

I'd suggest going to a quad (Q8200 or Q9400) instead if you really want to see a difference.

 

[happy medium]

Like others have said overclock your e4300 with some more voltage. I suggest you upgrade your 19 inch monitor (1440x900) and let the 260gtx stretch its legs a little.

 

[AtaruMoroboshi18]

Originally posted by: happy medium
Like others have said overclock your e4300 with some more voltage. I suggest you upgrade your 19 inch monitor (1440x900) and let the 260gtx stretch its legs a little.

I'm overclocking it right now, but for some reason it keeps throttling my CPU down from 9.0 to 6.0 and that's really aggrivating me...

 

[Gillbot]

Originally posted by: AtaruMoroboshi18

Originally posted by: happy medium
Like others have said overclock your e4300 with some more voltage. I suggest you upgrade your 19 inch monitor (1440x900) and let the 260gtx stretch its legs a little.

I'm overclocking it right now, but for some reason it keeps throttling my CPU down from 9.0 to 6.0 and that's really aggrivating me...

Read the stickies: http://forums.anandtech.com/me...=2164014&enterthread=y

 

[BolleY2K]

Yepp... My board has an FSB hole, which caused some problems at 2,5 GHz due to the 1066 FSB strap being pushed too far. I set FSB to 335 (1333 strap) and no problems anymore... I am running my E4300@3,1Ghz now for over 2 years rock solid - on a 650i SLI and stock voltages! Guess I got lucky with that little piece of silicon.

 

[TurtleCrusher]

Originally posted by: Denithor
Secondly - FSB more important than raw clockspeed - do not know where in the world you got that impression but it's totally dead wrong. FSB typically accounts for <1% difference, even for quad-core chips where it has the most impact. Read a few reviews before posting comments like that.

Dead wrong? Are you kidding me?

It is what separates the Q8200 and the Q6600 in terms of performance. Less than 1% difference? Ask yourself this, what is the ONLY thing that makes the Q8200 faster then the Q6600?

Clock speed? No.

Cache? No.

FSB? Obviously.

Other members on this forum we also quick to point this out. All around benchmarks show this. Here is a post from the NuclearMC CPU Benchmark thread.

Originally posted by: rogue1979
E6400@2816MHz - 8786
E6600@3300MHz - 10,345
E2180@3300MHz - 10,505
Brisbane 4000+ @2.65GHz 6850

Now check that out. An E2180 has the same clock speed, but only 1/4 of the cache. Going from 1MB to 4MB is a huge leap, and yet it hangs right in there.

Originally posted by: Idontcare

I ran a test, 200MHz FSB versus 400MHz FSB. This is with QX6700. Same 2.4GHz for both tests (12x200 versus 6x400):

2.4GHz (6x400 Mhz) = 12670

2.4GHz (12x200 MHz) = 11739

So that's an 8% increase in the Nuclearus score for a doubling (2x) of the FSB.

This also shows the performance increase of a raised FSB.

Yes, I read articles. I also find in much more meaningful to compare real life performance as well. Its one of the main reasons everyone was so excited over 45nm quads (and the lower power consumption).