Intel E6850 vs a new good processor

That really sucks,i wonder what went wrong with it,well it is definetely better to upgrade at this point (what have you got to lose?),your options depend on what your motherboard can handle, luckily for you the asus commando was one of the best mobos at the time and thus is still capable of handling many core 2 duos even now,your two best options would be the E8400 (for that mobo and for the price i think it is the best option) or an E7 series chip (i would go with the 8400 since it supports virtualization which will be needed to run xp mode on windows 7), of course going with another E6850 isn't completely a bad idea but i think you will be satisfied with an E8400 until your next big upgrade