E6400/E6300 vs E6600

[jhego]

Im planning to move to C2D from Opteron and i've noticed that E6400/E6300 are now more popular comparing to the E6600 which i thought was popular a month ago. So does the L2 Cache 4MB vs 2MB still matter? Please explain why the E6300/E6400 is a better buy than E6600. I'm planning to overclock and will have 2GB of RAM.

 

[stain.]

they are cheaper, and can generally OC higher. they get more of an increase in speed than the c2d's with 4mb cache.

 

[menlatin]

they are cheaper, and can generally OC higher. they get more of an increase in speed than the c2d's with 4mb cache.

Only becuase they are rated lower. For the most part the 63,64,66's will clock to about the same max clock, give or take a 100mhz.

The problem with 64/63 is that you need a high clocking motherboard to get the really high overclock.P965 variants are doing this more often, but not all will.

The 6600 is obviously easier on the motherboard as far as fsb goes, so a x975 board could be used, which has been shown perform a little bit better at same clocks. It will also allow the use of cheaper ram, but then now adays, most ddr 667 will do 900mhz easily, giving you 3.6ghz with an e6400 and 3.15ghz with e6300, so ram is a bit less of a concern.

All the new cups should do about 3.2ghz on stock volts and cooling as well.

The 2mb vs 4mb, only makes a small difference when using it for real tasks. Super pi does not count as a real task, but there is about an 11% difference there.

I got the e6400 initially becuase of availability, but then got a another e6400, and another (which i paid $275 for) becuase of a known good week and code. I got me to 4ghz, and i'm happy with it.

I think most ppl are going 6300, 6400 because the performance difference is so little, and the cost is quite low. Both cpu's can be had for $200 or less. Combine that with a $100 S3, some $150 ram, and you can have a very solid 3.5ghz upgrade for $500 after cooling solution.

 

[reswob]

Hey thanks for the information. I was also wondering about this too. The only difference between the e63 and e64 is the clock speed right? I am wondering how the e63 and e64 are gonna be like on the asus striker.

 

[gepetto]

I would go with the E6300, its really all you need, and it overclocks the best out of all of those you mentioned. 3 ghz should be a piece of cake on air, stock voltage.

 

[bobbydole]

i'm looking at going for a core2 build in the next month or so. and I was asking myself this same question. any benchmarks on a e6300 vs e6600 running at the same clock speed?

 

[mzs_biteme]

i'm looking at going for a core2 build in the next month or so. and I was asking myself this same question. any benchmarks on a e6300 vs e6600 running at the same clock speed?

Anandtech did some testing to see what the difference was between 2 and 4MB cache (at the same CPU speed) and it came out to be like 10% at the most depending on the app.. Most Windows apps and games gain maybe 4~5% from the extra cache... Whoopdee dooo...

 

[JackAshley]

Yeah, 63/64 seems to be the way to go...but the extra cache will be useful in the future, we can hope

QUESTION! How high of a stable, safe overclock have people gotten on the stock cooler? running 2.6 right now, and kinda worried cause im on stock...

 

[Decibel]

Whether you should worry or not depends on what your load temps hit. As long as your temps aren't too high, go nuts.

 

[InorganicMatter]

Anandtech did some testing to see what the difference was between 2 and 4MB cache (at the same CPU speed) and it came out to be like 10% at the most depending on the app.. Most Windows apps and games gain maybe 4~5% from the extra cache... Whoopdee dooo...

10% was the max increase, 0.5% was the min. Average increase was even less: 3.5%.