E0 vs c1 stepping

[d-block]

I am planning on getting the xeon equivalent of the q9550. The only problem is that it has the c1 stepping. I have been searching, and have found no definitive information about one being better than the other. I have found several site where people say the E0 overclocks better, but have no proof of this. Does anybody know for sure one way or the other?

 

[saaiello]

The E0 will overclock better trust that.

 

[d-block]

The E0 will overclock better trust that.

how much better? and will the fact that it is a xeon offset the stepping factor?

 

[saaiello]

how much cant be certain there as like any cpu overclocking varies cpu to cpu you could see a couple hundred extra mhz and maybe you wont but will be easier to achieve the max overclock with the EO. Being a Xeon does not make any difference they do the same for the core line as they do for xeon.

 

[d-block]

how much cant be certain there as like any cpu overclocking varies cpu to cpu you could see a couple hundred extra mhz and maybe you wont but will be easier to achieve the max overclock with the EO. Being a Xeon does not make any difference they do the same for the core line as they do for xeon.

i mean since it is a xeon, should run colder right? isn't that all the stepping difference is, temp?

 

[jsc]

The E0 will overclock better trust that.

You cannot say that. You can say, however, "The E0 will generally overclock better."

An E0 chip with an unusually high VID probably will not OC as well as a C3 chip with an unusually low VID.

 

[d-block]

You cannot say that. You can say, however, "The E0 will generally overclock better."

An E0 chip with an unusually high VID probably will not OC as well as a C3 chip with an unusually low VID.

so how much of a difference is there between the two? it has been established that an E0 will more than likely overclock higher than C1. does anybody have any benches or first hand experience of the difference?

 

[d-block]

no one knows?

 

[jedimasterben]

Xeons are supposedly higher binned for lowered voltage and better at handling higher sustained temperatures. However, though it may be higher binned, my current Xeon X3220 didn't OC worth a damn, barely making it to 3.3GHz with 1.5v. EDIT: I'm currently on a 750i board, as well.

I can tell you right now, though, that if you currently have the Q6700 on a 750i board, it probably won't clock any better, and if it does, you may get it to 3.6, which is definitively not worth buying another chip. Save your money for an i7 or the Phenom II x6's when they come out in April if you're looking for a speed boost.

 

[d-block]

Xeons are supposedly higher binned for lowered voltage and better at handling higher sustained temperatures. However, though it may be higher binned, my current Xeon X3220 didn't OC worth a damn, barely making it to 3.3GHz with 1.5v. EDIT: I'm currently on a 750i board, as well.

I can tell you right now, though, that if you currently have the Q6700 on a 750i board, it probably won't clock any better, and if it does, you may get it to 3.6, which is definitively not worth buying another chip. Save your money for an i7 or the Phenom II x6's when they come out in April if you're looking for a speed boost.

The thing is that I can upgrade to either the q9550 or x3360 for around $50. I want to make the switch while I can still get a good amount out of my q6700. Do you think it would be better to go for the q9550 with E0 stepping, or the x3360 with C1? I don't plan on upgrading the main components of my system for a while, and want to upgrade what I can for cheap, instead of the $600 upgrade to i7. I still have yet to hear if the C1 stepping makes that big of a difference on this chip though.

 

[jedimasterben]

I'm just saying that you're not going to get any big speed boost, as it probably won't OC much above your Q6700 as it is. I wouldn't upgrade to something so marginally better than what you have.

Also, I just bought the CPU/RAM/Mobo in my sig, and it cost me around $400.

 

[d-block]

I'm just saying that you're not going to get any big speed boost, as it probably won't OC much above your Q6700 as it is. I wouldn't upgrade to something so marginally better than what you have.

Also, I just bought the CPU/RAM/Mobo in my sig, and it cost me around $400.

$400? For me to upgrade to the i7 1366 with 6gb tri, crossfirex evga board, it is about $700. I kinda want to avoid the 1156 socket. Either way, for $235 for a new x3360 I'm having trouble not getting it. I guess I could price out what I could get if I were to sell all my main parts and go from there.

If I'm lucky, I can get about $400 out of the cpu, board and memory. I'm not sure that getting the i7 920 is that big of an upgrade from the x3360. I am using this as a comparison.
http://www.anandtech.com/bench/default.aspx?p=50&p2=47&c=1

 

[jedimasterben]

That will get you the general idea of what to expect, but with real world applications, and adding overclocking into the mix, your milage will definitely vary.

Why do you want to avoid 1156? The only thing it doesn't have (that actually matters) is the number of PCI-e lanes (the Asrock board I bought has 3 auto-switching slots, either 16x0x4 or 8x8x4, either config not being a bottleneck to any cards available today [not even your 5870] or even in the near future).

 

[d-block]

the 1366 has triple channel memory, and is said to be more future proof. either way, neither one currently destroys 775 to the point that i should switch. my q6700 is the only part that i can still get a reasonable amount for, so to me it isn't worth changing ram and mb for that amount.

 

[jedimasterben]

Said to be. Unless you're planning on spending 1K+ on the 6-core i7s, it's not future proof for you. Also, triple channel memory does very little in terms of performance, hence why I went with 1156.

I agree with it not being worth the upgrade if you don't need it. I'm only upgrading because I am selling my current CPU/RAM/Mobo.

So you're going to sell just the CPU?

 

[d-block]

That's the plan. Mine doesn't overclock for ***. I have to put 1.5v to it to go much higher than what it is at now.

 

[d-block]

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