Q9650 4Ghz or Keep Q6600 3.6

[Sem]

i currently have a Q6600 @ 3.6 Ghz and its great but i am thinking of getting a Q9650 and clocking it to 4Ghz

the thing is i want to do one last upgrade by the end of this week and then not have to worry about upgrading till the nehalem refresh is out which will probably be Q2 2010

so the question is will my Q6600 @ 3.6 last in a top spec gaming pc till then or am i better off with a Q9650 @ 4Ghz

i will still plan to do video card upgrades

money is not a issue and i can sell my q6600 for a good price to fund the Q9650
but i dont want to spend extra if it is not worth

i know alot of you will say i should just wait and get a nehalem but

1) its not available yet and i need it done by then end of this week
2) price gouging
3) would rather wait for a refresh as bugs would have been worked out and should perform a lot better etc

thanks..

 

[ghost recon88]

How much of a difference will you be paying once you sell the Q6600 and buy the Q9550? If its equal to or less then $50, I would say go for it. The Q6600 is still a very powerful chip man.

 

[Sem]

My Q6600 is a good chip has a vid of 1.237 and does 3.6 @ 1.4v i can sell it for around £100 ($157) and the Q9650 is £361 ($568) brand new
so its costing me £260 ($409)

 

[OCGuy]

I wouldn't. Well, I would, but I guess what i'm trying to say is that it isn't smart.

 

[aigomorla]

Originally posted by: TheWildOne

1) its not available yet and i need it done by then end of this week
2) price gouging
3) would rather wait for a refresh as bugs would have been worked out and should perform a lot better etc

thanks..

1. you should wait.
2. You still should wait.
3. Bugs? Which AMD fanboy did you talk to, sorry the bugs wont apply to most people so once again, No, you should wait.

You wont see JACK of a difference from your 3.6 to 4.0 unless your crunch / encode till no tomorrow.

So it makes no sense for you to goto TOCK this late in the game, when TICK is around the corner for a new gen platform.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Originally posted by: aigomorla
3. Bugs? Which AMD fanboy did you talk to, sorry the bugs wont apply to most people so once again, No, you should wait.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't your i7 mobo bugged, such that you could only run it at stock speeds?
I think it's pretty safe to say that there will be some bugs in the initial i7 platform. Whether or not they will be show-stoppers, I don't know.

 

[aigomorla]

Originally posted by: VirtualLarry

Originally posted by: aigomorla
3. Bugs? Which AMD fanboy did you talk to, sorry the bugs wont apply to most people so once again, No, you should wait.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but wasn't your i7 mobo bugged, such that you could only run it at stock speeds?
I think it's pretty safe to say that there will be some bugs in the initial i7 platform. Whether or not they will be show-stoppers, I don't know.

thats 1 out of 50+ samples they sent out.

LOL

you really wanna use me as a basis?

 

[Cheesetogo]

Well, you'll be able to get a 920 for less than what it will cost you to upgrade to a Q9650. I seriously doubt you would see any significant gains from just a 400 mhz increase.

 

[Sem]

well i still need a new mobo and ram so it will come out way more expensive

anyway ive decided to wait till summer 09 if my Q6600 is starting to show its age then i will probably get an i7
if its still going strong will probably hold on till the 32nm refresh

i need to stop being so compulsive with the constant pointless upgrades :roll:

i bet in a months time i get the urge upgrade again 😀

damn expensive hobby

 

[sgrinavi]

Do you need it? Then get it...

 

[brencat]

Originally posted by: TheWildOne
My Q6600 is a good chip has a vid of 1.237 and does 3.6 @ 1.4v i can sell it for around £100 ($157) and the Q9650 is £361 ($568) brand new
so its costing me £260 ($409)

For that price differential, it's not worth the switch. No way would I shell out $409 for that small of a performance increase.

You're one of the lucky 20% that has a 3.6ghz 24/7 capable Q6600 -- congrats.

 

[FiLeZz]

Originally posted by: TheWildOne
i currently have a Q6600 @ 3.6 Ghz and its great but i am thinking of getting a Q9650 and clocking it to 4Ghz

the thing is i want to do one last upgrade by the end of this week and then not have to worry about upgrading till the nehalem refresh is out which will probably be Q2 2010

so the question is will my Q6600 @ 3.6 last in a top spec gaming pc till then or am i better off with a Q9650 @ 4Ghz

i will still plan to do video card upgrades

money is not a issue and i can sell my q6600 for a good price to fund the Q9650
but i dont want to spend extra if it is not worth

i know alot of you will say i should just wait and get a nehalem but

1) its not available yet and i need it done by then end of this week
2) price gouging
3) would rather wait for a refresh as bugs would have been worked out and should perform a lot better etc

thanks..

I also had the q6600 Mine ran at 3.4ghz
I kept the q6600 for another rig and in my main PC I put the new q9650 in. It is running solid at 4.1ghz

It is for sure faster at video encoding , unrar, qpar, audio, and everything eles. I for sure can tell a huge differance.





I say Go for it... I am happy with my q9650

 

[jeffw2767602]

Not worth it unless you like giving your money away

 

[Drsignguy]

Originally posted by: brencat

Originally posted by: TheWildOne
My Q6600 is a good chip has a vid of 1.237 and does 3.6 @ 1.4v i can sell it for around £100 ($157) and the Q9650 is £361 ($568) brand new
so its costing me £260 ($409)

For that price differential, it's not worth the switch. No way would I shell out $409 for that small of a performance increase.

You're one of the lucky 20% that has a 3.6ghz 24/7 capable Q6600 -- congrats.

I must agree with this. Yes there is a performance difference between the 65nm and the 45nm but for the price of it all it isn't worth it. Especially compaired to your Q6600. And yes, you are one of the lucky 20% as brencat so eloquently put it.

 

[zsdersw]

I remember back in the day.. when I was young and stupid.. (now I'm a little older and less stupid) I switched out my Pentium 75 for a Pentium 133, on the misguided belief it would yield a noticeable difference in performance. It didn't. The lesson was learned. I don't recommend shelling out that kind of money for what you get. Put the money into something that's a better investment.

 

[Denithor]

Look at this from a purely financial standpoint.

Q9650 = $568

i7 920 = $284
X58 mobo = $300
4GB DDR3 = $130

So for approximately $150 more than the Q9650 you can get a full Nehalem setup that will match or beat a QX9770 in many applications.

You can then sell your current motherboard + RAM to offset that cost difference.

Live with the Q6600 for a couple of months until the prices shake out (and maybe the cost of x58 boards drops) and then pick up a bigger upgrade than a Q9650 can offer.

 

[ArchAngel777]

I don't think Nehalem or a Q9650 will be worth it unless you are doing tasks that make use of it. For most people, they can skip the TOCK and the TICK and maybe the next TOCK even, - if they have a high clocked Q6600.

Both of my Q6600's I owned, B3 and a G0 easily hit 3.6Ghz. I wouldn't say I am lucky, just that I was willing to get proper cooling and run higher voltage that most people would. My rig is still going strong, very strong while running at 1.48v (actual). I had it running at 3.93Ghz at 1.55v, but it was rather ridiculous to keep it there.

Keep in mind that clock for clock, sometimes the new Penryn is faster at all than Conroe. Best case scenario appears to be around 10%. So if we take the best case scenario, here is what we come up with.

3.6 Ghz ---> 4.0Ghz = 12%

4.0Ghz X 1.10 (10% increase clock for clock) = 10%

Best case scenario is that your upgrade will increase CPU performance right around 20%, and wost case scenario about 10%, assuming that you can even hit 4Ghz with a Q9650. Definately not worth it, but I have been tempted myself to do the same thing you proposed. But when you do the math, it just doesn't make sense.

As for Nehelem - at stock speeds the chip seems great. I am not sure how reliable or easy these will be to overclock. Only time will tell. Even so, we run into the same situation with this chip. In some tasks, it doesn't appear to be faster than Penryn at all. In others, it stomps it (encoding, CPU 3D Rendering, Servers, etc...) But if your main computer is surfing the web, ripping a few DVD's and playing games, it would be very, very hard to argue upgrading from a Q6600 @ 3.6Ghz to either a Penryn or a Nehalem.