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davey73   12-28-2006 at 05:16:53 AM

I am trying to put together a new system I am curruntly running an AMD 64 3000 Socket 754 I am mostly into gaming and was wondering if I should get a AMD or an Intel. I am really not into overclocking just want a decent CPU to run with a 8800 GTS video card. I was looking at the Intel C2D conroe what is the difference between... 4Mb vs 2Mb L2 cash. Is it at all important for gaming, will I see a difference?

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CompuTronix   12-28-2006 at 06:06:16 AM
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Check out the following THG article:

http://www.tomshardware.com/2006/0 [...] ning_test/

The C2D E6600 at stock clock gives slightly better benchmarks than AMD's FX-62 flagship chip. Remember that you're buying a 9x multiplier at 2.4Ghz, in addition to the 4Mb Cache, which is important if you're absolutely firm about not overclocking, however, the C2D's overclock so well, that it's a shame not to crank it up. It's like driving a Corvette at 55mph...what a waste of raw CPU horsepower!!!

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evilr00t   12-28-2006 at 06:08:35 AM
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Quote :

I am trying to put together a new system I am curruntly running an AMD 64 3000 Socket 754 I am mostly into gaming and was wondering if I should get a AMD or an Intel. I am really not into overclocking just want a decent CPU to run with a 8800 GTS video card. I was looking at the Intel C2D conroe what is the difference between... 4Mb vs 2Mb L2 cash. Is it at all important for gaming, will I see a difference?



With a 8800 series video card, you'll want to have the fastest CPU you can get to power it, ie. a C2D. Tomshardware did an article on which processors to pair with an 8800GTS and 8800GTX:
http://www.tomshardware.com/2006/1 [...] stest_cpu/

You could get a E6400 and OC it to X6800 speeds easily, though, if you're not interested in overclocking, you could get an E6600, instead.

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cozwin   12-28-2006 at 06:11:08 AM
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yer also agree, with the 8800 i would recommend something like he E6600 as that would work well with it plus it is a really good cpu at stock but tbh core2duo s should be abused and overclocked its fun and gets you alot more bang for the buck as the saying goes

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PCAnalyst   12-28-2006 at 06:18:49 AM
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Quote :

I am trying to put together a new system I am curruntly running an AMD 64 3000 Socket 754 I am mostly into gaming and was wondering if I should get a AMD or an Intel. I am really not into overclocking just want a decent CPU to run with a 8800 GTS video card. I was looking at the Intel C2D conroe what is the difference between... 4Mb vs 2Mb L2 cash. Is it at all important for gaming, will I see a difference?



There is no hard and fast rule about cache size, but the general rule is the faster the CPU relative to system memory, the larger your L2 cache should be.

C2D's are fast... and depending on the CPU you choose you don't really need to worry about the cache size... with the conroes that is...

I think you should get the C2D with good memory - at least 2 gigs worth - if you plan to get the most out of your gaming system.

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johnbilicki   12-28-2006 at 06:38:41 AM
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Cache (not cash) makes a difference for certain types of CPU intensive tasks.

In example when compiling statistics for my website with a 100 megabyte access log (per month) on my previous socket 754 with 1MB cache and 2,000 MHz the CPU would be used for about 10-15 seconds. With my 3500 (with half the cache but an extra 200 MHz) it takes about 30-40 seconds.

I can't speak for audio or video. Cache has it's uses but even if you're gaming and doing a lot of things at the same time you're not going to notice any real benefit from that cache unless one of your cores is being maxed out (and again, the cache may not always help).

Some motherboard's allow you to disable the cache on the CPU. Go ahead and try it out and see how much slower (if at all) your computer seems. I've never done it and sure as heck don't have any plans to!

So bottom line: unless you are actively aware of CPU intensive tasks (100% usage on a core) that you'd like to reduce wait time on (for that core and assuming cache would help) then don't worry about extra cache.

Without being able to buy a 4800 with 1MB cache per core I purchased a 4400 (yeah, OEM, blah) but that's all I had a choice for on Newegg. I can overclock the CPU for another 200MHz to simulate a 4800's performance if I want to via the FSB if I really want to though.

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halbhh   12-28-2006 at 07:00:57 AM
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This all depends on your priorities. Like is it important to feel like you're doing what most other people are doing, or is it more important to be effective (great performance) on a low budget.

If it is great performance on a low budget, you can go Intel or AMD (AM2 motherboard) either one, and feel confident you'll be able to have a drop-in quad core upgrade some day to replace your dual core. That's nice.

Current game performance is far more affected by your graphics card than whether you have a high end or low end dual core. A expensive graphics/cheap cpu combo will greatly outperform an expensive cpu/cheap graphics combo in games now.

So spend more on the graphics card than the cpu. That's important to the budget conscious gamer.

Also, and less well known, if you really have overall system performance as a priority, consider spending about as much on your hard drive as your cpu! This is true for anyone who on a budget who wants to use their computer often and many hours a day and needs overall superior general performance.

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