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Remaining Core 2 life?

V

Vicpop

n00b
Joined
Mar 27, 2009
Messages
18
I've been trying to help a friend of mine with getting a new computer; he's a gamer (mostly Source engine-based games, like Left 4 Dead or Half-Life 2), and he's been stuck with a five year-old eMachines system for... five years.

He's saving up for a new computer, although it's going to take him a while to save up for. My question is, should I be telling him to wait for Core i5? Currently I've got him a Core 2 Duo in his build, but I'm worried about the new socket 1156 sort of pushing him 'behind the pack' again. Those supposed leaked prices are pretty steep, and money is sort of a problem.

How much longer are the Core 2-based models going to be common for gaming/general usage? How long would you expect i5 to take to be adopted significantly?
 
Well, Core 2 is a dead end as far as future upgrades unfortunately.
 
ISince your user is primarily a gamer consider this:

Here is the thing, with Intel's Tic/Tock 2 year cycle of die shrink followed by new architecture and the fact that Intel is actually able to deliver, more or less. on that schedule it is impossible to keep up on a budget or have a system that is not outdated (note I did not use the word obsolete) in a year or two.

My point is that is it now almost impossible to "chase the hardware" with Intel CPU and motherboards unless you buy a new CPU/motherboard and maybe memory every 2 years or less. Anything with DDR2 will be a dead end shortly (well I guess it already is).

HOWEVER - the real question is, in x years will software (game) be out there that compels/requires the user to upgrade ? Current high performance systems (CPU/motherboard/memory) have a tremendous amount of power, Now that Microshaft has us by the short hairs with regards to DXxx graphics in the OS - upgrading the OS will likely have more impact for gamers than the CPU/motherboard. It has been shown with benchmarks around the net that in general the i7 is not a big win for gamers. The i5 is the desktop version and will have the typical advantages of a die shrink but no huge performance increase over the i7. And my real point is that a nice core 2 system, tuned properly can likely provide up to 5+ years of useful service as it has all the horsepower needed except in special circumstances. If it is critical/worth the money to the user to save 20% of the time to encode a video etc the i7/i5 would be worth it. But the i5 is unlikely to be a huge improvement over the i7 for games etc. It is probably more important to go with Vista 64bit for the DX10 and memory than it is for going with an i7/i5 over a C2.

This clarifies your decision:
money is sort of a problem.
Click to expand...

Based on the above I am telling my gaming customers that are on a tight budget to go with a Q6600 in either the Asus or Gigabyte $130ish board with 2 x 2GB (room to add another 4GB later) and then depending on monitor resolution go for the highest performance video the rest of the budget allows. (ATI 4890 1GB card my current recommendation for 1650x1200 22in monitors) It is my opinion for a gamer that with video card updates such a machine will serve for a long time. (This assumes an OC to 3.2+ and proper bios tuning ) . If they can squeeze in one of the 45nm quads - all good. Of course if money is not an issue --- weeeeeeee !!!

So yes the core 2 is at the end of the hardware upgrade road - right on time per Intel's schedule. But that does not mean the CPU is any less powerful and it is my opinion, with video card upgrades that it can serve very well for some time in the future. I play the uber pig of a resource hog Warhammer on my 2 1/2 year old sig system very well and with a video card refresh have no worries about playing anything that comes out in the next couple of years. And the "next couple of years" is important because we just had the i7 release and in two years "the next big thing" will come out of Intel.


So I think the Core 2 will be around for quite a while, but the i7 is nowhere near (just based on posts here) the "gotta have" upgrade the Core 2 was and I expect the i5 to even be less popular unless they do something serious to the chip to make it perform better in games. Another thing is that for businesses a core 2 system of any type is huge overkill for the typical office drone several of the small businesses I deal with are still running P4 systems just fine and the economy is not helping them push to upgrade. And when they do upgrade a modest core 2 duo obtained a "last years technology" prices will look very attractive. Hell they might even spring for win7 too. I digress.

The other thing is his buying time frame. i5's are an unknown ATM but are just an i7 derivative. It is a sure bet the needed DDR3 will be more expensive than the dirt cheap DDR2 available now, CPU cost likely about a wash, motherboard ???? , motherboard compared to C2 motherboard more expensive.

although it's going to take him a while to save up for.
Click to expand...

So we are all pissing into the wind. When he has the money, that is the time to access the situation and make a decision, not now. But since you asked, my cracked crystal ball continues to tell me, for a gamer, its all about the video card if the rest of the system is 1/2 way decent. Note also the above does not apply for high resolution all eye candy on gaming, there you must have all the horsepower you can get along with the best video card(s).

That said, if a 920 and $200 MB and 6GB ram + top end video card and good power supply could be crammed into the budget its all good. But buying a top of the line C2 system when the prices tank due to i7/i5 would serve a gamer on a tight budget well.

I am sure that there is one game out there that the developers are working hard to make a lier out of me. It would also help to research what is upcoming in games your friend might be interested in and what game engine and "bells and whistles" the game uses/requires. Several gaming software sites around that provide info on upcoming games.


Another thought, how much memory is your bud running ? If one GB just popping another dirt cheap memory stick in that e-machine would provide an almost unbeleivable performance increase and a 4770 video card would likely run circles around what he is currently using. So for like $150 it may be possible to vastly improve his existing system and give some breathing time to see the the i5 will really bring to the table in terms of price and performance.


Wow - this got out of hand. eh- my opinion are worth exaclty what you paid for them.
 
I dont think source is all that multi-threaded, as /|\ said, if you can spend $150 on 4GB of ram and a 4770, holding out till Jan for an i3 might not be a bad option. 4 threads, DDR3, definitely has potential for upgrades (GPU and CPU both). Of course, thatd require PCI-E and a semi-decent DDR2 mobo.

If its DDR1/AGP, well, just do a $400 e7400/4GB/4770 build. That'll last, just make sure the guy is putting $20 aside a month for a sandy build in 2012.
 
Vicpop said:
I've been trying to help a friend of mine with getting a new computer; he's a gamer (mostly Source engine-based games, like Left 4 Dead or Half-Life 2), and he's been stuck with a five year-old eMachines system for... five years.

He's saving up for a new computer, although it's going to take him a while to save up for. My question is, should I be telling him to wait for Core i5? Currently I've got him a Core 2 Duo in his build, but I'm worried about the new socket 1156 sort of pushing him 'behind the pack' again. Those supposed leaked prices are pretty steep, and money is sort of a problem.

How much longer are the Core 2-based models going to be common for gaming/general usage? How long would you expect i5 to take to be adopted significantly?
Click to expand...

Really, if that is all he is playing, he would be fine with an x2 AMD and a hundred dollar card...I think this is an overboard build unless he is going to play anything more demanding.
 
There have been times in the past where if you buy a processor at the right time, it can have considerably more longevity than it otherwise would.

For example, I got my Q6600 almost 2 years ago and it’s still going very strong.

Anyone who bought one of the first Core CPU’s, E6600 or w/e back in 2006 could easily still be using it today.

Anyone who bought a 3Ghz P4 when they became popular around 2002 or so could have stuck with it all the way until Core2 in 2006 unless they went with AMD during that time.

In 2000, a ~1Ghz Pentium3 was a very nice chip to have even after the first generation Pentium 4’s came out later that year since they weren’t really much if at all faster and rambus sucked.

A Pentium 2 450Mhz, released at the beginning of 1998, had very good longevity and performance wasn’t much worse compared to the Pentium3’s that came later.

A Pentium 200 or 233 with MMX in late 1996 or so was a very good chip even compared to the first generation of pentium2’s that came out and had a great deal of longevity.

My point is that if you buy at the right time, you might end up having a rig that is “cutting edge” for as long as 2 years, with probably another 2-4 years afterward where it is still quite capable. Buy at the wrong time and your rig will be eclipsed by technology likely within a year, and obsolete within perhaps 2-3.
 
Its still going pretty strong. It should last a couple of years. Not everyone's a hard core computer enthusiast.
 
Thanks a lot for the replies; the current specs for the build can be seen at http://www.joeweasel.com/comp2009. The plan with the Pentium Dual-core was to overclock it a good amount, at least to match a higher dual-core model, with it technically being a Core 2 Duo. (By the way, is the Zalman heatsink there... adequate?)

To elaborate a bit more, he'd upgraded his graphics to a Geforce 6200 a pretty long time ago (PCI) and added another gigabyte of DDR ram (2GB total), but those coupled with his Celeron are still definitely holding him back quite a lot.

An AMD solution sounds interesting to both of us but I'll need to look around a bit more there, and I'm starting to not think about i5 anymore.

Again, thanks.
 
The E5200 you have listed is a GREAT budget CPU. Overclocks to 3.0 super easily and it's PLENTY powerfuly enough for a moderate to higher end gaming rig.

Good choice IMO! :)
 
GLSauron said:
If its DDR1/AGP, well, just do a $400 e7400/4GB/4770 build. That'll last, just make sure the guy is putting $20 aside a month for a sandy build in 2012.
Click to expand...

or even E5200/4830.

GotNoRice said:
There have been times in the past where if you buy a processor at the right time, it can have considerably more longevity than it otherwise would.

For example, I got my Q6600 almost 2 years ago and it’s still going very strong.

Anyone who bought one of the first Core CPU’s, E6600 or w/e back in 2006 could easily still be using it today.

-snip, but they're all good examples aside from the people who bought P4's to get shafted by the pwnage brought by AMD.
Click to expand...

Vicpop said:
Thanks a lot for the replies; the current specs for the build can be seen at http://www.joeweasel.com/comp2009. The plan with the Pentium Dual-core was to overclock it a good amount, at least to match a higher dual-core model, with it technically being a Core 2 Duo. (By the way, is the Zalman heatsink there... adequate?)
Click to expand...
sounds good, but again you might want to look at the E5200 or even a Phenom II. Recently AMD has been pretty good about ensuring backwards compatabillity. Even the aged Phenom 1 launch chipset (AMD 770) is compatable with Deneb (Phenom II). Both the Wolfdale (C2 E5k and E7k) and Deneb (Phenom II) will overclock past 3.0Ghz and put some really nice numbers up.

Vicpop said:
To elaborate a bit more, he'd upgraded his graphics to a Geforce 6200 a pretty long time ago (PCI) and added another gigabyte of DDR ram (2GB total), but those coupled with his Celeron are still definitely holding him back quite a lot.
Click to expand...

Even a lowly geforce 6200 will saturate the bandwidth provided it by old PCI. The bottleneck you've got there is substantial.

Vicpop said:
An AMD solution sounds interesting to both of us but I'll need to look around a bit more there, and I'm starting to not think about i5 anymore.

Again, thanks.
Click to expand...

Havendale (the i5 chip) yields are low, and the performance advantage over core 2 was meager. In a bad economy intel decided to cut their losses and cannibalize their 45nm part and wait for the shrink (with its increased yields).
 
Vicpop said:
Thanks a lot for the replies; the current specs for the build can be seen at http://www.joeweasel.com/comp2009. The plan with the Pentium Dual-core was to overclock it a good amount, at least to match a higher dual-core model, with it technically being a Core 2 Duo. (By the way, is the Zalman heatsink there... adequate?)
Click to expand...

The Zalman HSF is not that good of a HSF for the money. There are better HSF out there for the money like this one:
$40 - Xigmatek Dark Knight-S1283V 120mm HSF

If your friend doesn't need a modular PSU, I recommend this equal quality PSU instead:
$80 - BFG Tech LS-550 550W PSU

I do not recommend that Asus mobo due to the piss-poor placement of the 24Pin connector. It impedes airflow and makes cable management a bitch. So I recommend this mobo instead:
$85 - Gigabyte GA-EP43-UD3L Intel P43 Motherboard

Now MrWizard6600 made a good point: Newegg has some awesome AMD Phenom II combos lately that outperforms the E5200. Some examples:
$159 - AMD Phenom II X3 710 CPU + ASUS M3A76-CM AMD 760G mATX Motherboard Combo

The X3 710 outperforms the E5200 at stock speeds and is only $10 more.
 
and he if want to get 8GB of DDR2, he should buy it soon. Prices are going up on them. There used to be $20 and less deals all the time (for 4GB). You have to wait a while to see them at those prices now. I saw Crucial get down to $10 after rebate.
 
IMO the Phenom X3 720 is a much better deal than the E5200 + Zalman cooler. It will OC higher on its stock cooler, and it has another core, AND has much more cache. Also, I see no reason to buy a $100+ 4770 when you can get a 4850 for $90!

Mobo and CPU:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ComboDealDetails.aspx?ItemList=Combo.190879

RAM:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820148262

Vid:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814121288
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127414
 
This thread has sort of traveled away from my original question; thanks to those who answered it, but the build I've got for him now is probably as good as it's going to get.

ordovician said:
IMO the Phenom X3 720 is a much better deal than the E5200 + Zalman cooler. It will OC higher on its stock cooler, and it has another core, AND has much more cache. Also, I see no reason to buy a $100+ 4770 when you can get a 4850 for $90!

Mobo and CPU:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ComboDealDetails.aspx?ItemList=Combo.190879

RAM:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820148262

Vid:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814121288
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16814127414
Click to expand...

Those Phenom X3's are moderately cheap, but what's costly are the motherboards, at least, apparently; for the E5200 and that Gigabyte board (which was suggested by someone here), it's a mere $150. That combo you have there is $250, already breaking his limit including shipping. He doesn't really need the DDR3, which is also a bit expensive, and I'm going to keep the 4770 there just because of the die shrink, and because MIR is something he's sort of wary about.
 
If you are planning on keeping it for much longer than a year, then go quad. Sure, I will get many replies saying quad is useless for gaming, but your CPU will not be obsolete for a while. Additionally, since video cards progress much faster than CPUs, just changing the graphics card every 2 or 3 years will keep you current for up to 4 to 5 years, depending on how CPU technology moves. Additionally, get 8GB ram for sure. DDR2 is almost free (despite a few recent price spikes) and for a long term PC, the more RAM the better. Do not make the mistake of buying dual now, as dual is approaching the EOL with almost all desktops moving to quads.

-darkmatter08
 
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