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stay with Q6600 or upgrade to Q9550

J

jigalig

Junior Member
Stay with Q6600 or upgrade to Q9550 would like to make the most of my current hardware< I mostly game FPS and RPG and some video editing do not know if it will make much of a deference, I would like to squeeze as much power out of my hardware and would like to to upgrade my platform once the 28nm cpu s come out, thanks guys .

Q6600 OC 3.6
GA-EP45-ud3r MB
4 gig ddr2 800
vappor-x HD 4890
2 WD cav blue HDD 320 in raid 0
Dell UltraSharp U2410 1900x1200 24-inch Widescreen
 
i currently have a q6600 at 3.0.. worth it to upgrade to i7? or what should I wait for before upgrading?

/didn't mean to hijack
 
you are already running at 3.6GHz cept for more cache and lower power usage the Q9550 won't be much of an upgrade at all.
Now if you were only running at 3GHz or less the upgrade might be noticeable, but then you have to ask yourself if the prices are right. Last I checked the Q9550 was more expensive than a new motherboard and quad cpu from amd. (havn't looked at the i3/5/7 stuff)
 
It might not be what you want to hear, but there's nothing out that would be a cost effective upgrade to a Q6600@3Ghz+ unless you have a professional level task that keeps more than 4 threads saturated at all times.

Everything you could buy would be marginally faster at best for typical usage and you'd pay hundreds of dollars for it. I'd say that someone who bought a Q6600 that could overclock to 3Ghz+ when it first launched and kept it until now has probably seen the most bang for the buck/futureproof processor in a decade.
 
Thanks for the reply s, I have had it for about three years or so and its served me well I did a lot of research before I built this setup to future proof and last but some times newegg
gets the best of me.
 
i would get an SSD with the money instead and then wait for sandy bridge or bulldozer for your cpu upgrade
 
I moved from a QX6850 to my current CPU, and I noticed a very slight bump in gaming performance, but in applications that takes advantage of SSE4 like media encoding, the performance gain is higher than 100%. I also found lower power consumption, the system felt smoother overall, because when I was using the QX6850 running at 3.60GHz by 100%, my system felt slighly unresponsive, with the Q9650 at the same speed didn't. In overall, an average of 15% gain in performance will be noticeable, with a much higher boost in SSE4 optimized software.
 
It is nice to see the Q6600 getting some love after all this time, and I have been eyeballing
the SSD s for a while but the size needs to go up and the price needs to come down.
 
jigalig said:
It is nice to see the Q6600 getting some love after all this time, and I have been eyeballing
the SSD s for a while but the size needs to go up and the price needs to come down.
Click to expand...

Interesting that the Q6600 still pops up in new threads on this forum. For the person with the 3.6Ghz OC -- he MUST have the G0 stepping.

Mine is the old B3 stepping. In another recent thread, I raised the issues about hardware deterioration on a second system (Wolfdale) -- the B3 being the first where I noticed it. It had been -- at one time -- set to just below 3.3 and long ago I'd left it at 3.0. I had to bump up the VCORE to hold it there almost a year ago, but it was still within the spec range and stress tests a month ago shows it's "holding up."

Jigalig's choice about upgrading -- in this economy -- depends on "want" versus "need," what you use the current system for, and other factors. I've tightened my belt, so to speak, for OC'ing projects this last year -- until I can build up my savings account. More frequent builds are a hobby. Hobbies are on the back-burner for now . . . .

By the time I get around to it, those new chips in the making may have been released. Some of my colleagues here familiar with my posts may snicker that it's taking me this long to move up to I7, but that's OK.
 
It is the go stepping and I keep it at 3.6 about 90&#37; of the time, I may wait a little longer
that way I will just make a complete platform jump when the 28nm CPU comes out that way
I will appreciate the performance bump more and get as much out of it as I did with this system. thanks again everyone.
 
jigalig said:
It is the go stepping and I keep it at 3.6 about 90% of the time, I may wait a little longer
that way I will just make a complete platform jump when the 28nm CPU comes out that way
I will appreciate the performance bump more and get as much out of it as I did with this system. thanks again everyone.
Click to expand...

That, too, makes sense.

For me -- I like to make transitions as smooth as possible, so I wait for BIOS revisions to a motherboard. Thus -- still eyeing the x58 boards for the I7 cores. Then again, I need to check and see whether these existing boards will handle a next-gen processor if it's going to be socket-1366. I haven't even kept up on the progress with the 28nm cores, so I don't really know if Intel is coming up with yet a new socket beyond 1366 or 1156 . . .
 
Depends on cost, I'd say. Performance improvement may not be great but Q6600 @3.6 GHz is one hot chip. Q9550 runs much cooler. @3.4 GHz (8.5x400), Q9550 should match or beat Q6600 @3.6 GHz. (9x400) It may not be worth the full price but if you can sell your Q6600 and keep the cost under, say $50, then I'd do it. (How much is a Q9550, anyway?)
 
lopri said:
Depends on cost, I'd say. Performance improvement may not be great but Q6600 @3.6 GHz is one hot chip. Q9550 runs much cooler. @3.4 GHz (8.5x400), Q9550 should match or beat Q6600 @3.6 GHz. (9x400) It may not be worth the full price but if you can sell your Q6600 and keep the cost under, say $50, then I'd do it. (How much is a Q9550, anyway?)
Click to expand...

Q9550 cost as of June 21

Microcenter: $169.99
Newegg: $278.99
Tigerdirect $249.99(OEM only)


Personally unless the OP can get it at microcenter, I find it far from a worth while upgrade.
 
dbk said:
i currently have a q6600 at 3.0.. worth it to upgrade to i7? or what should I wait for before upgrading?

/didn't mean to hijack
Click to expand...

overclock to 400fsb... dont matter if its 3.2 or 3.6

Just get to 400fsb.. and come back and see if you need more Horse power.

jigalig said:
It is the go stepping and I keep it at 3.6 about 90&#37; of the time, I may wait a little longer
that way I will just make a complete platform jump when the 28nm CPU comes out that way
I will appreciate the performance bump more and get as much out of it as I did with this system. thanks again everyone.
Click to expand...

And what would you do that would require you to upgrade from a 65nm quad to a 45nm quad?

That transition gave us a 10-15% better scaling rate... which is still unoticiable, and also a slightly better overclocking experience.

But still overclocking is a YMMV, so you might not get that magic 4ghz which you see other Q9550's running at.

My rule of thumb has always been... never side grade... upgrade...
Q9550 is a diagonal side grade... not really worth it.

If your gonna upgrade go with an i7... you'll probably hold onto that machine for at least 3 yrs since its open GPU friendly... meaning u can throw in Xfire or SLI..
 
Last edited:
LoneNinja said:
Q9550 cost as of June 21

Microcenter: $169.99
Newegg: $278.99
Tigerdirect $249.99(OEM only)


Personally unless the OP can get it at microcenter, I find it far from a worth while upgrade.
Click to expand...

came in to say this.
if you have an MC and can resell the q6600, it's a no brainer.

i had a Q9550 and it did 3.4GHz all day undervolted.
i could probably take it close to 4GHz but i don't need that speed or want to stress the chip.
 
q6600 is still good... specially when you have the G0 stepping... you just have to overclock it a bit... rather than buying another quad core processor and having only a little bit of improvement...
 
my daughter's rig has a q6600 @3.6Ghz. i'm on it right now and it runs great! comparing it to my sig rig --- i recommend you save your $$$ for something else.
 
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