X2 5000 or E6600

[YankeesWin]

Before you crucify me for even asking and scream C2D at the top of your lungs, hear me out.

I already have an X2 3800 in my current setup, and found a decent deal on an x2 5000. Would it be worth "redoing" my setup so to speak by getting an e6600 + new mobo? Is there really THAT MUCH of a benefit to having a C2D setup, or should I just pop in the 5000, sell the 3800, and call it a night? I'm not a hardcore gamer, but I do play games on a regular basis, and I watch a lot of movies on my PC if that fits anywhere into the equation.

I know I could just OC the 3800, but I'd rather not.

 

[MichaelD]

If you already have the entire hardware platform, I'd say get the X2 5000. Much cheaper that way and performance will be good.

Does your existing AMD platform use DDR2 memory? PCI-E video card? All C2D boards are DDR2/PCI-E only (unless you want to use a PCI video card, that is).

OTOH, if you've got a few hundred burning a hole in the pocket, a shiny C2D setup is indeed the hot ticket these days.

 

[myocardia]

You do realize that the X2 5000's are Socket AM2, not Socket 939, right?

 

[tallman45]

The equivelant of a 939 x2 5000+ (which I do not think exists) is either an Opteron 185 or an FX-60

To answer your ??, it is a 60 second swap (at most) to drop in a very fast CPU, and be done vs a complete new install, new CPU, MB, Ram and Reinstall of windows

Either takes minimal effort to get to 2.8ghz, no risk of not getting a good chip

 

[YankeesWin]

my setup is socket AM2

 

[n7]

Sounds like the 5000+ isn't such a bad idea in your case, since you don't want to OC.

C2Ds aren't really such a hawt deal at stock speeds, since motherboards are pricey.

 

[MichaelD]

Originally posted by: n7
Sounds like the 5000+ isn't such a bad idea in your case, since you don't want to OC.

C2Ds aren't really such a hawt deal at stock speeds, since motherboards are pricey.

Good points, and you're definitely right on the motherboard prices. $250-$300 for a user-level board? :Q You've gotta be joking.

The $300 range is the domain of workstation and server boards. Dual socket, 8+ memory slots, onboard SCSI, PCI-X slots, SMB, etc.

IIRC, I paid $140 for my DS3 and that hurt to do.

 

[OcHungry]

These days the only people are screaming C2D are those Intel Fanboys who never owned an AMD system (s939 x2 to be more specific). Those who owned a decent AMD x2 system and changed over are gradually coming to terms w/ their mistakes (wasting so much $ for nothing that spectacular made to believe) and slowly but surely are making the confession. The C2D isn?t that great and has been problematic for them (they know what I am talking about but me rather not poke their wounds and refain myself not to point them out). Notice how these users are more indifferent toward C2D and what they recommend.
Be practical and let your good sense guide you toward your gut feeling. Get the 5000 and pad yourself in the back.

 

[n7]

Originally posted by: OcHungry
These days the only people are screaming C2D are those Intel Fanboys who never owned an AMD system (s939 x2 to be more specific). Those who owned a decent AMD x2 system and changed over are gradually coming to terms w/ their mistakes (wasting so much $ for nothing that spectacular made to believe) and slowly but surely are making the confession. The C2D isn?t that great and has been problematic for them (they know what I am talking about but me rather not poke their wounds and refain myself not to point them out). Notice how these users are more indifferent toward C2D and what they recommend.
Be practical and let your good sense guide you toward your gut feeling. Get the 5000 and pad yourself in the back.

Absolute BS.

Did you think because a few of us suggested the X2 to the OP you could suddenly get away with FUD?

Until my E6400 (& now E6300), i had run AMD my entire PC owning life.

However, there is no question that for a new builder the C2D platform is the way to go, unless said user is on an extremely tight budget & will not OC.

In this particular case, an AM2 CPU makes sense for the OP, but for the most part, C2D is indeed the best option.

 

[BoboKatt]

Ok here is my quick note... I originally had a really nice setup that was 939. X2-3800 with a nice DFI Lanparty mobo (PCIE video and DDR Ram). I had the same issue with either dropping it all and going C2D or looking for a top end 939 AMD. Well I was so undecided I just did both.

Anyhow I went from an x2-3800+ to an X2-4800+ (which now OC'es around 2900mhz stable). I love it... my C2D e6600 OC'ed to 3600MHz and YES it's faster overall but in everyday use I really don't notice it. It was more of a new toy to play with and to learn a whole different system. Since it seems everything will go this route I might as well have started sooner rather than later

That Intel system cost me a mint since, I had to get the fast DDR2 RAM (more than what I should have paid for it really) and the expensive mobo and the e6600 was not cheap (still isn?t) when I bought it.

Honestly though, there is NOTHING wrong with say an X2-5000 or good Operton if you are happy with your current other hardware. I loved my DFI 939 mobo... to this day I cannot find a better board that treats me so well as this and I know inside and out. If you love your current rig and are very familiar with it, stay with it.

Also my X2-4800 with my Big Typhoon well worked in runs SOOO cool that it?s sick. My system is almost silent (what I consider silent) and I have to admit that compared to my e6600, I had to go through more trouble to keep the noise down and to this day it still runs way hotter. Just something to consider it high(er) temps make you feel a little apprehensive.

 

[SparkyJJO]

If you already have an AM2 board, the RAM and all, I'd stick with it. To go intel you'd need not just the CPU but also a new board which has already been pointed out is expensive. The speed difference between the two wouldn't really be noticeable in normal usage so it would probably be a better idea to just save the extra couple hundred $$$.

 

[Roguestar]

Originally posted by: OcHungry
These days the only people are screaming C2D are those Intel Fanboys who never owned an AMD system (s939 x2 to be more specific). Those who owned a decent AMD x2 system and changed over are gradually coming to terms w/ their mistakes (wasting so much $ for nothing that spectacular made to believe) and slowly but surely are making the confession. The C2D isn?t that great and has been problematic for them (they know what I am talking about but me rather not poke their wounds and refain myself not to point them out). Notice how these users are more indifferent toward C2D and what they recommend.
Be practical and let your good sense guide you toward your gut feeling. Get the 5000 and pad yourself in the back.

Oh god you again. I thought you had died or fallen off the internet or gotten picked up by the logic police or something.

Please, please, please take your bias somewhere else. This forum is for those who can say "I've used both, I've owned both, I've done these tests and this one is better". There's no point in blatant brand loyalty when pitting both companies against each other and getting the cream of the competition is what the smart consumer does, not hold on to previous brands' acheivements or hope that they'll "take back the crown".

 

[GundamSonicZeroX]

The C2D will perform better but it's not really worth the cost/effort of rebuilding.

 

[Noubourne]

Originally posted by: GundamSonicZeroX
The C2D will perform better but it's not really worth the cost/effort of rebuilding.

Whether the cost is worth it depends largely on what you use it for. I do a lot of gaming and video encoding/editing, and I'll be moving to C2D (or Q2D) next year. I can use the power.

Not worth the effort? Building a computer takes about as much effort as legos.

 

[swtethan]

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.asp?Item=N82E16813138037



so this motherboard is expensive?

 

[Arkaign]

Unless you are huge into encoding, etc .. dropping in a new AM2 cpu makes a lot more sense than migrating to C2D.

New build = C2D FTW .. but upgrading a good existing setup is usually preferred, as in your case

 

[swtethan]

btw....
http://www.anandtech.com/mb/showdoc.aspx?i=2860&p=11





"We were easily able to reach a final setting of 7x500FSB resulting in a clock speed of 3500MHz. We know the board can do better but the BIOS is locked at a 500FSB maximum currently. "

 

[stevty2889]

Originally posted by: OcHungry
These days the only people are screaming C2D are those Intel Fanboys who never owned an AMD system (s939 x2 to be more specific). Those who owned a decent AMD x2 system and changed over are gradually coming to terms w/ their mistakes (wasting so much $ for nothing that spectacular made to believe) and slowly but surely are making the confession. The C2D isn?t that great and has been problematic for them (they know what I am talking about but me rather not poke their wounds and refain myself not to point them out). Notice how these users are more indifferent toward C2D and what they recommend.
Be practical and let your good sense guide you toward your gut feeling. Get the 5000 and pad yourself in the back.

Yeah I know, it's horrible that my E6600 that I paid less for than my 4200+ X2 is running at 3.2ghz vs. my X2 @2.6ghz, with the same load temps, I mean it's only way way faster and cost me less, what a horrible choice.

As for the OP, since you already have an AM2 motherboard, the 5000+ wouldn't be a bad upgrade.

 

[Markfw]

Originally posted by: OcHungry
These days the only people are screaming C2D are those Intel Fanboys who never owned an AMD system (s939 x2 to be more specific). Those who owned a decent AMD x2 system and changed over are gradually coming to terms w/ their mistakes (wasting so much $ for nothing that spectacular made to believe) and slowly but surely are making the confession. The C2D isn?t that great and has been problematic for them (they know what I am talking about but me rather not poke their wounds and refain myself not to point them out). Notice how these users are more indifferent toward C2D and what they recommend.
Be practical and let your good sense guide you toward your gut feeling. Get the 5000 and pad yourself in the back.

BS... Troll

I have 6 X2 systems and a dual Opteron board. While I am happy with them, my 2 C2D systems are quite a bit faster (OC'ed to 3.5) than my X2's in CPU intensive apps. The biggest reason ? My X2's can;t get past 2.5, and my C2D's do 3.5 with ease, and they are ~15-20% faster at the same speed too.

 

[CurseTheSky]

Originally posted by: OcHungry
These days the only people are screaming C2D are those Intel Fanboys who never owned an AMD system (s939 x2 to be more specific). Those who owned a decent AMD x2 system and changed over are gradually coming to terms w/ their mistakes (wasting so much $ for nothing that spectacular made to believe) and slowly but surely are making the confession. The C2D isn?t that great and has been problematic for them (they know what I am talking about but me rather not poke their wounds and refain myself not to point them out). Notice how these users are more indifferent toward C2D and what they recommend.
Be practical and let your good sense guide you toward your gut feeling. Get the 5000 and pad yourself in the back.

I was going to read through the entire thread, but I had to stop there.

My last system was an X2 4200+ socket 939, on an A8N-SLI Premium (one of the best at the time), a 6800GT PCI-E, and some other goodies. You can see my new system in my signature. While I do agree that the X2 5000+ is the best choice in this situation, the 400MHz MAX overclock on my X2 4200+ compared to the 1.0GHz (so far, not done yet) on my E6600 makes me wary of X2s.

Performance wise, "leaps and bounds" doesn't even begin to describe it...

 

[aka1nas]

Originally posted by: Noubourne

Originally posted by: GundamSonicZeroX
The C2D will perform better but it's not really worth the cost/effort of rebuilding.

Whether the cost is worth it depends largely on what you use it for. I do a lot of gaming and video encoding/editing, and I'll be moving to C2D (or Q2D) next year. I can use the power.

Not worth the effort? Building a computer takes about as much effort as legos.

With the exception of the encoding, there is little to no advantage to migrating from a 2.8Ghz K8 to a C2D. Your gaming won't be noticeably faster as your video card will bottleneck you long before the CPU becomes an issue. You would be far better off buying a better video card and more RAM than a CPU at that point.

Not to say that I won't consider a Penryn or K8L chip in 1.5 to 2 years or so, but it's naive to think that it's going to help your gaming right now. I think I will wait for 2GB DDR2 or DDR3 sticks to become somewhat reasonably affordable and do an Quad Core 8GB Dx10 64 bit monster.

 

[OcHungry]

Originally posted by: Markfw900

BS... Troll

I have 6 X2 systems and a dual Opteron board. While I am happy with them, my 2 C2D systems are quite a bit faster (OC'ed to 3.5) than my X2's in CPU intensive apps. The biggest reason ? My X2's can;t get past 2.5, and my C2D's do 3.5 with ease, and they are ~15-20% faster at the same speed too.

Big deal and a lie. You don?t run your C2D @ 3.5 24/7 or play games or do cpu intense app @ that speed. you did 3.5 as an experiment and suicide shot just as anyone w/ phase change can do w/ a good X2 stepping (even up to 4ghz). My 4400 x2 is stable @ 2.97 GHz and can run Cinebench @ 3.1 GHz all on air (shall I post screenshots?). But I don run my machine at that speed because I don?t think it's safe or practical. I really don?t feel much improvement or feel any different running anything over 2.7-2.8 GHz vs. 3.1 GHz. So please, I have heard those gross exaggerations and are getting old. It's time you come out and speak the truth. Do you really run your C2D @ the speed you claim (3.5 GHz) daily, and w/ what cooling system?

 

[Markfw]

Originally posted by: OcHungry

Originally posted by: Markfw900

BS... Troll

I have 6 X2 systems and a dual Opteron board. While I am happy with them, my 2 C2D systems are quite a bit faster (OC'ed to 3.5) than my X2's in CPU intensive apps. The biggest reason ? My X2's can;t get past 2.5, and my C2D's do 3.5 with ease, and they are ~15-20% faster at the same speed too.

Big deal and a lie. You don?t run your C2D @ 3.5 24/7 or play games or do cpu intense app @ that speed. you did 3.5 as an experiment and suicide shot just as anyone w/ phase change can do w/ a good X2 stepping (even up to 4ghz). My 4400 x2 is stable @ 2.97 GHz and can run Cinebench @ 3.1 GHz all on air (shall I post screenshots?). But I don run my machine at that speed because I don?t think it's safe or practical. I really don?t feel much improvement or feel any different running anything over 2.7-2.8 GHz vs. 3.1 GHz. So please, I have heard those gross exaggerations and are getting old. It's time you come out and speak the truth. Do you really run your C2D @ the speed you claim (3.5 GHz) daily, and w/ what cooling system?

Lie ?? You are crazy, I DO run it 100%load both cores 24/7 doing F@H, and so does Duvie. He has 3 !. Don't call me a liar, I will get you banned. And at that speed, they still run cooler than my X2's ! And not only that, I am only using air cooling...

You are the king of trolls....

 

[customcoms]

Originally posted by: CurseTheSky

Originally posted by: OcHungry
These days the only people are screaming C2D are those Intel Fanboys who never owned an AMD system (s939 x2 to be more specific). Those who owned a decent AMD x2 system and changed over are gradually coming to terms w/ their mistakes (wasting so much $ for nothing that spectacular made to believe) and slowly but surely are making the confession. The C2D isn?t that great and has been problematic for them (they know what I am talking about but me rather not poke their wounds and refain myself not to point them out). Notice how these users are more indifferent toward C2D and what they recommend.
Be practical and let your good sense guide you toward your gut feeling. Get the 5000 and pad yourself in the back.

I was going to read through the entire thread, but I had to stop there.

My last system was an X2 4200+ socket 939, on an A8N-SLI Premium (one of the best at the time), a 6800GT PCI-E, and some other goodies. You can see my new system in my signature. While I do agree that the X2 5000+ is the best choice in this situation, the 400MHz MAX overclock on my X2 4200+ compared to the 1.0GHz (so far, not done yet) on my E6600 makes me wary of X2s.

Performance wise, "leaps and bounds" doesn't even begin to describe it...

Many people (including myself) are very happy with the latest X2's and manly Opteron OC's. I am running a 900mhz overclock on my Opteron, with only 5 bios boots-as in this is without trying. Not to say that a this is typical-one of my winchester 3000+'s needed 1.63v to do 2.4ghz-obviously not safe on air for long periods of time, and I was only comfortable with pushing 2.2ghz at 1.5v; my other winchester would do 2.5ghz on the same voltage.

What I'm saying is 1ghz oc's with Opteron 165's+good ram+good/great board are VERY feasibly. The C2D's are getting similar overclocks, however, we are talking an average of 3.5 vs really more like 2.6. Thats still a 900mhz difference. C2D is faster, period.

However, as has been mentioned, you are GPU bound in current games. A fast X2/Dual Core Opty is still at least 6 months away from becoming a limiting factor in games. If you are doing heavy video encoding and ready to build a new pc, with some $$, get a C2D. Otherwise, go with a faster X2 for drop in replacement.

 

[tallman45]

Opty 185 with cheap value Ram is getting me 2.9ghz. I can only wonder what it could do with better ram, but definatley not investing in any more DDR