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Q6600 over E8400 for future-proofing?

Which CPU I should get

  • E8400

    Votes: 10 30.3%

  • Q6600

    Votes: 23 69.7%
  • Total voters
    33
J

J87X

Limp Gawd
Joined
Dec 7, 2006
Messages
270
Building new system, plan on overclocking. Debating on whether to get an E8400 or Q6600. I will be mostly gaming. I realize that the E8400 is better for games now, but I would like to make this rig last longer. So, would the Q6600 really offer more future proof or by the time games and applications come out that support quad will it bottleneck the rest of the system (mainly a new GPU)?
 
By the time it matters that much, it may very well be obsolete.
 
Games will only become more and more multithreaded as time goes on. I would definitely go with the quad in your situation, since there's really no disadvantage to it. Even if the E8400 ends up being overclocked slightly more than the quad could be, the increase in clock speed won't really affect anything since games are more bottlenecked by the GPU anyway.
 
I heard that the Q6600 already bottleneck the Radeon HD 4870 a bit, so in the next 2 years when new cards come out will it be even worth it to get a new card?

Or will it bottleneck less as things start using quad cores more?
 
By the time slower clocked quads start out performing faster dual cores in games, the q6600 will be obsolete. Get the 8400.
 
J87X said:
I heard that the Q6600 already bottleneck the Radeon HD 4870 a bit, so in the next 2 years when new cards come out will it be even worth it to get a new card?

Or will it bottleneck less as things start using quad cores more?
Click to expand...

It will not bottleneck a 4870 if you overclock it.
 
By the time quad cores matter in games, the I7 will be the CPU to get.
 
vsboxerboy said:
QFT - there is no such thing as future proofing
Click to expand...

Well by the time a couple of games come out that use quad like Alan Wake, do you think I'd be glad I got the quad so I can play it on higher settings? Or will the new video cards then be bottlenecked and it wouldn't matter if I had quad or dual anyway?
 
rflcptr said:
By the time it matters that much, it may very well be obsolete.
Click to expand...
Will it be more or less obsolete than a 4ghz clocked e4800? Can you really benefit that much from speeds higher than 3.4? Or should I go with the extra multitasking power?
 
My opinion is, given that both processors are parts of Intel's previous microarchitecture...future proofing needn't be your concern nearly as much as how much performance you can derive for games that exist now and in the near future. Since you already stated that gaming is your primary application, get the E8400 as it's less likely (given its already higher stock clock speed and generally higher overclocking headroom) that it will hamper the system in any meaningful way.
 
rflcptr said:
By the time it matters that much, it may very well be obsolete.
Click to expand...
This is about all you need to know.
By the time games fully utilize quad cores, you will have a i7 920/ect making this question obsolete, just like the hardware listed :(
 
If you don't plan to upgrade for years to come (2-3 years?), the best would be the q6600--the price difference is pretty negligible at ~$25.

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115017
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16819115037

The general direction games are heading is toward utilization of more than two cores. There's just so much more headroom for the quad to grow compared to the dual core at only ~$25 difference. Here's an article for you to read:
http://www.cpu3d.com/article/4210-3/dual-core-vs-quad-core-which-is-better/comparison-charts.html

Overclocking the quad should make it last for quite a while.
 
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