Phenom II X4 945 vs 965 w/ OCing

[senormoll]

Hey all,
My question is pretty straightforward: I'm doing a new AMD build and I'm having trouble settling on a processor. If I plan on overclocking anyway, is there really any difference between the 945 and the 965 besides clock speed?

Suppose I wanted to overclock to ~3.8ghz. The 965 should run cooler, because it shouldn't require as much of a voltage increase. But assuming the heat isn't a problem, the two processors should perform identically at equal clock speeds, right?

Since it's a gift and I'm on a xmas budget, the extra $30 I save could be spent on a better hdd, mb, or graphics card.

Thanks in advance for your answers

 

[ahthurungnone]

You will not be able to change the multiplier on the 945 which makes it more difficult to overclock. However, you could settle for the 955 Black Edition (a little less than the 965) and overclock it to 4.0-4.2 Ghz without even having to increase the voltage.

 

[jj463rd]

The only difference is that the 965 has an unlocked multiplier (Black Edition).
If you really want to save some money look at a AM2+ 3.0 Ghz Phenom II X4 940 BE OEM CPU (lacks a heat sink and fan too) over at newegg for around $96 and a AM2+ mobo (cheap) with some DDR2-1066 RAM.Of course it won't perform as well as the AM3 965 BE though but it will save you some money.

 

[senormoll]

Ok thanks for the answers. I did realize afterwards that I compared a BE with a non-BE, so the 945 would be tough to get to 3.8 without changing the multiplier [:bohleyk:7]

@jj463rd I'm not on that small of a budget lol but thanks

I guess the fair comparison would really be the 955 vs 965 vs 970, but the basic premise of my question was answered so thank you

 

[senormoll]

Best answer selected by senormoll.

 

[Mousemonkey]

This topic has been closed by Mousemonkey