Another Upgrade...

[AciDeX]

Well, It's about that time of year again. My 4400+ Toledo is showing its age and DDR is way too expensive. Its time to swap motherboards and throw a new chip in. I've been eyeing that AM2 Black Edition deal that’s dirt-cheap right now ($72). But have been telling myself to go c2d for my next upgrade for a while. I'd like to stay under $400 bucks and $350 is allot easier on the wallet. Just about any way I price it at newegg with a AM2 or E7200 by the time I pick out the motherboard I want, and slap in 4gb(2x2gb) of DDR2 the difference in price is only $30-$60 bucks. I guess I already know the answer that I'm looking for, what’s going to be the big(ger) hitter performance wise?

I just built an E8400 system for my roommate with a Gigabyte P35 DSR4 Motherboard and I’m very impressed with the speed of the system. Granted he's not O/C'ing, I'm wondering if I'd be able to snag about the same performance with an E7200 O/C? I would have liked to stay with AMD since I could roll over my heatsink(Zalman CNPS9500 AM2) without any issues. I emailed Zalman earlier about the availability of a mounting bracket so I could use it on LGA775, and should hear back from them soon. I'd like to get an E8400 setup but to keep this upgrade around my $350 goal I'm not seeing it. As far as motherboard goes, since I built my buddy's new rig on the P35 I figured I'd stick with that and I really liked the setup on the Gigabyte board but cant bring myself to spend that much on a DS4 motherboard for myself. I Figure I can get away with a Open Box: GIGABYTE GA-EP35-DS3P since it has allot of the features I'm looking for and as long as it works and I get an I/O back plate I could care less that its *open box*. Also what are the requirements for throwing a Xeon(LGA775) chip in? Are they the same architecture like the 939 Opterons a few years ago? Any suggestions or things I'm not considering? Thanks in advance, I'll still probably change my mind 3-4 more times today as to what I should get! >.<

 

[Dangman]

The E7200 performs just a bit better than the X2 6000+ at stock speeds. However, once OC'd, the E7200 will beat the X2 6000+ without a doubt. If you OC a E7200 to around 3.2Ghz or so, it should match the performance of a non-OC'd E8400.

As for requirements for a Xeon LGA775 CPU, officially a server motherboard. Unofficially, just about any high-end or mid-range motherboard by a reputable and high-end company will support Xeon LGA 775 CPUs.

 

[AciDeX]

The E7200 performs just a bit better than the X2 6000+ at stock speeds. However, once OC'd, the E7200 will beat the X2 6000+ without a doubt. If you OC a E7200 to around 3.2Ghz or so, it should match the performance of a non-OC'd E8400.

As for requirements for a Xeon LGA775 CPU, officially a server motherboard. Unofficially, just about any high-end or mid-range motherboard by a reputable and high-end company will support Xeon LGA 775 CPUs.

Cool, I figured it would be about the same as a 6000+ at stock, I just saw that fry's has a Q9300 combo w/ a crappy ECS board for $259... Allmost cheap enough to use for a couple weeks till I can grab a P35 board. Quad core I think would be worth going over my intended price point. Only downside to that is re-installing Vista each time and having to call M$ to re-activate. Anyone know if you can swap motherboards in Vista without re-installing the whole O/S?

 

[atobe]

hey i went almost the same route as you... i got the q9300 deal at frys and then bought a p35-ds3l board. i'm very happy with it.

 

[AciDeX]

nice! What ram did ya go with? Its even more tempting now, I may wait till I can order a board too so I can avoid as much re-install headache as possible. >.<

 

[wadec22]

whoa. do a little poking around here. i haven't read anything from anyone that has had luck oc'ing the 7200. even the editors here at hardocp have posted on the forum that, there experiences have shown the 7200 to be a pain in the a$$. avoid that chip for now.

as for swapping mobos.... i recently swapped an ip35-e for my maximus in vist ultimate and DID NOT require a re-install or repair.

on the other hand, my buddy just went from old school s939 to abit ip35 and had to re-install completly.

 

[atobe]

i got the gskill ddr2 800hmz from newegg... and yeah reinstalling isn't that fun.. i did it twice in a week once for the ECS mobo and again a week later for the gigabyte mobo.. oh wells ... you should just wait then reinstall it's hard to get your desktop the way you like it again.

 

[AciDeX]

whoa. do a little poking around here. i haven't read anything from anyone that has had luck oc'ing the 7200. even the editors here at hardocp have posted on the forum that, there experiences have shown the 7200 to be a pain in the a$$. avoid that chip for now.

as for swapping mobos.... i recently swapped an ip35-e for my maximus in vist ultimate and DID NOT require a re-install or repair.

on the other hand, my buddy just went from old school s939 to abit ip35 and had to re-install completly.

I can deal with one re-install, I figured changing platforms completly would make Vista angry.

I did look around a bit and alot of the 45nm chips seem to o/c like crap, and often come with a premium price. The Q9300 combo is tempting however, in the midwest I dont get to see any deals like that locally. If I can find a descent deal on a Q6600 I'd be all over it.

 

[amenx]

whoa. do a little poking around here. i haven't read anything from anyone that has had luck oc'ing the 7200. even the editors here at hardocp have posted on the forum that, there experiences have shown the 7200 to be a pain in the a$$. avoid that chip for now.

It may be useful if you provide a link or two to back up your point. Unless hardocp do a review of the e7200 then you cant reach that sort of conclusion. I've seen a few e7200 owners in forums get pretty good results with their chips and thats backed up by reviews which are plentiful by now:

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/core2duo-e7200_10.html#sect0

http://www.legitreviews.com/article/690/12/

http://www.hothardware.com/Articles/Intel_Core_2_Duo_E7200/?page=3

 

[MaStaFLaSH]

e7200 is a great chip, can hit around 3.8 fairly easily or so I hear. Q6600 > Q9300, at best Q9300 will hit around 3.0-3.2, a G0 Q6600 will hit 3.2 with ease and it's not that hard to hit 3.6.

 

[Sojuuk]

whoa. do a little poking around here. i haven't read anything from anyone that has had luck oc'ing the 7200. even the editors here at hardocp have posted on the forum that, there experiences have shown the 7200 to be a pain in the a$$. avoid that chip for now.

as for swapping mobos.... i recently swapped an ip35-e for my maximus in vist ultimate and DID NOT require a re-install or repair.

on the other hand, my buddy just went from old school s939 to abit ip35 and had to re-install completly.

[H] is as far as I can tell only have trouble overclocking the e7200 on P45 motherboards. don't get one of those and you should do better

 

[silent-circuit]

Watch the FS/FT forums here and you can probably pick up a Q6600 for $160-190, depending, in the next few days if not immediately.

 

[AciDeX]

Watch the FS/FT forums here and you can probably pick up a Q6600 for $160-190, depending, in the next few days if not immediately.

Thats a pretty good idea, I havn't puchased anything from a forum member since my Athlon 1.4Ghz T-Bird about 6 years ago!

I'll keep my eye out, also looking for a an OEM Q6600 those seem to run about $180 or so, but I might as well spend the extra $15 or so to geta retail at that price.

 

[wadec22]

It may be useful if you provide a link or two to back up your point. Unless hardocp do a review of the e7200 then you cant reach that sort of conclusion.

well this took about a 20sec search to find:

I've since had similar problems with the E7200 on yet another board. You guys will be hearing about that soon but I'm not impressed with the E7200 so far. Its' always been problematic to overclock in my experience.

that's a snip from the [H]'s motherboard editor in the 750i FTW thread. based on that little comment i imagine we are about to see a poor review of the cpu or at least an article warning against pairing it with a number of chipsets. i didn't post a link, b/c i'm not looking to buy it. i have read similar results from three or four long time [H] members now. i apologize for not "backing up my point". i was just passing on what i have read. if you simply punch e7200 in the search, you will find all users results good or bad.

 

[AciDeX]

well this took about a 20sec search to find:


that's a snip from the [H]'s motherboard editor in the 750i FTW thread. based on that little comment i imagine we are about to see a poor review of the cpu or at least an article warning against pairing it with a number of chipsets. i didn't post a link, b/c i'm not looking to buy it. i have read similar results from three or four long time [H] members now. i apologize for not "backing up my point". i was just passing on what i have read. if you simply punch e7200 in the search, you will find all users results good or bad.

Yea the E7200 looks like a descent proc for the money. I got my sights set on a quad now. I think its the only way I'll see a huge improvement. Hell I bet my 4400+ Toledo can catch up to a E7200 when I have it clocked to 2.75Ghz!

 

[wadec22]

i think the q6600 is an excellent bang for your $ right now. you can almost guarantee 3.2ghz and many can do 3.4-3.6. yeah it lacks SSE4 and you don't get the same amount of cache as some of the newer 45nm, but most users will tell you it's not worth the additonal 100+ bucks for those features unless your have the $ and are looking for a reason to spend thm.

 

[Sojuuk]

Yea the E7200 looks like a descent proc for the money. I got my sights set on a quad now. I think its the only way I'll see a huge improvement. Hell I bet my 4400+ Toledo can catch up to a E7200 when I have it clocked to 2.75Ghz!

2.75? SLACKER!

 

[AciDeX]

i think the q6600 is an excellent bang for your $ right now. you can almost guarantee 3.2ghz and many can do 3.4-3.6. yeah it lacks SSE4 and you don't get the same amount of cache as some of the newer 45nm, but most users will tell you it's not worth the additonal 100+ bucks for those features unless your have the $ and are looking for a reason to spend thm.

I had noticed that instruction set was missing from them, any idea of what might take advantage of SSE4 in the near future? I'm pretty it wont be anything that I would need in the next year or two and by that time I could find a Q9300 or better at a lower price.

2.75? SLACKER!

lol! 2.75 seems to be all I can sqeeze out of her these days. Especially since my T-Force4 SLi doesn't seem to like it when I push past that... >.< I also threw in a couple Mushkin 512mb modules that don't play nice with my Patriot sticks, I think they're failing cause I cant get them to do CAS2 stable at all.