GTX280 & potential CPU bottleneck

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rampantandroid

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Would a stock clocked Q6600 be a bottleneck on a GTX280? I was having perf issues in Crysis, and bumped my Q6600 up a meager 200 MHz to 2.6 GHz, and seems to find the perf increase in Warhead by 10 frames (or more! Using a timedemo on the avalance level, I went from avg framerate of 25-30 FPS to 45 or so. Was this just a fluke?) Now, when I get home tonight I'll do more testing, but in your opinion, will the Q6600 pose as a limit on what the GTX280 can do, and at what speed then would the CPU no longer be a bottleneck?

Thanks!
 
I wouldn't think that a Q6600 would have any trouble keeping up with a single GTX 280, though in SLI it would be a different story. Fortunately, with a good air cooler, you can get a lot more than 200mhz out of that processor.
 
Aidzero said:
I wouldn't think that a Q6600 would have any trouble keeping up with a single GTX 280, though in SLI it would be a different story. Fortunately, with a good air cooler, you can get a lot more than 200mhz out of that processor.
Click to expand...

Eh, the cores are loading at around 55-59C according to CoreTemp...I know I need a new cooler for it, my ThermalTake V1 is...lacking. I'm looking at a TRUE, but I won't buy anything until I know it will work with Nehalem as well, as I hope to grab a Nehalem CPU in a "short" while, and spending 80 USD on a new cooler just to throw it away in 6 months seems...wasteful?
 
rampantandroid said:
Eh, the cores are loading at around 55-59C according to CoreTemp...I know I need a new cooler for it, my ThermalTake V1 is...lacking. I'm looking at a TRUE, but I won't buy anything until I know it will work with Nehalem as well, as I hope to grab a Nehalem CPU in a "short" while, and spending 80 USD on a new cooler just to throw it away in 6 months seems...wasteful?
Click to expand...

Don't count on ANY HSFs currently out working with Nehalem, considering that it is much bigger than current gen processors (footprint wise).
 
Proteos said:
Don't count on ANY HSFs currently out working with Nehalem, considering that it is much bigger than current gen processors (footprint wise).
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Yeah, I know...and but I still cannot justify spending 80 USD on a new HSF just to toss it in a short while. :(
 
Yea, given that situation, it might be worth waiting it out. The LGA1333 series will be out soon enough, and you certainly wont have any CPU bottlenecks with one of those.
 
Take this for what it's worth:

I had a AMD X2 clocked at just over 3GHz and a 280GTX. I clocked the GTX up to 660 Core and saw no increase in the Crysis bench. I got my new E8400 and overclocked to 3.7GHz and now saw an increase of 3FPS average in Crysis bench with my overclocked GTX compared to stock GTX speeds.

Bottom line is that it's possible but I'm not sure how the extra cores and computing power of the Core2 over the X2 would factor in.
 
Proteos said:
So get a XIGMATEK HDT-S1283. It's a darn good HSF for the money.
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Yup. Brought my load temps for an AMD X2 6400+ (125W) down to around 50-51 under load from about 63-64C.

O.P., from everything I've read review-wise a GTX 280 or HD 4870 X2 is going to be bottlenecked to an extent by about anything save for an extremely powerful CPU. CPU power has not kept up with increasing GPU power.

My CPU is bottlenecking a GTX 260 (oc'd to 666 Mhz) and its about the equal of an E6750 in gaming. Basically, I'm done buying video cards until I do a massive rebuild with a much more powerful setup. Just wasting money otherwise.
 
Aidzero said:
Yea, given that situation, it might be worth waiting it out. The LGA1333 series will be out soon enough, and you certainly wont have any CPU bottlenecks with one of those.
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You misread me - I don't intend on getting a Nehalem anytime soon...maybe in 6 months...I was talking about heatsinks. I just dropped 400 USD on my GTX280, not interested in buying into a totally new platform with rev 1 mainboards & CPUs - I'd sooner wait. And buying a new mainboard, CPU and tri-channel DDR3 doesn't sound very cheap to me.


I'll rebench tonight on my CPU, going from 2.4 GHz (stock) to 2.6, then see about hitting 2.8 and see if I see any pattern...but in real world perf (towards the end of Call me Ishmael) I wasn't seeing anything special...I might back off the custom config file I am on, see how it is helping/hurting me as well.
 
I know I need a new cooler for it, my ThermalTake V1 is...lacking
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i dont think so, i think its your case, im using a v1 and its fan speed is set to medium, my q6600 is overclocked to 3ghz and my idle temps are 28/28/33/33 and under load (prime95) they go up to
51/51/56/56, im using an antec 900 case.....so probablly you just need better air flow
 
u guys think an E6400 @3.0 would bottleneck a GTX260? im thinking i might OC to 666 (FTW speeds)


BTW i got a Xigmatek HDT-S1283 GREAT cooler and cheap.
I put 2 Scythe 3000 ULTRA KAZE fans on it and no matter what my ambient temps are ( i live in the Caribbean so its normally between 26-30C) it never goes over 52.

I bought the fans as case fans but then i thought, hey what the hell and put them in a push-pull config :D
 
Is your Q6600 a G0? If so you can easily hit 3.6ghz on that V1 cooler. I had a setup like that a couple months back.
 
B3 Q6600....in a Antec 900....

airflow is not the problem, and I've reseated the heatsink as well. Which way do you have the V1 blowing air?
 
Which way do you have the V1 blowing air?
Click to expand...
its blowing to the fan on the top, (the big one) :)
if its a b3 then thats the problem b3 are way hotter than g0,
 
rampantandroid said:
Would a stock clocked Q6600 be a bottleneck on a GTX280? I was having perf issues in Crysis, and bumped my Q6600 up a meager 200 MHz to 2.6 GHz, and seems to find the perf increase in Warhead by 10 frames (or more! Using a timedemo on the avalance level, I went from avg framerate of 25-30 FPS to 45 or so. Was this just a fluke?) Now, when I get home tonight I'll do more testing, but in your opinion, will the Q6600 pose as a limit on what the GTX280 can do, and at what speed then would the CPU no longer be a bottleneck?

Thanks!
Click to expand...

It absolutely can be a bottleneck. I think what happens is that even though you have four cores, the game does not necessarily spread itself out over the cores like water fills an ice cube tray. The games themselves are divided into threads and processes and some threads might be totally satisfied with a 2.4 Ghz core while others, like physics or whatever, might really benefit from a 3.0GHz or even 3.4 GHz core. I don't fully understand how or why but I do know that even if you have four cores, you still need to be concerned with clock speed.

Intel understands this so well that they are designing chips that shut down unused cores to allow the cores in use to be overclocked further, on the fly.

Frankly, a 2.6GHz Q6600 is just not that fast. On a gaming system, with that chip and especially with that graphics card, you really want to be in the 3.2Ghz-3.4Ghz zone.
 
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