SB Celeron G530 vs. C2D E6600

[XJLanzaro]

I am going to build my brother a rig mainly for Internet use, which one of these CPUs is faster? They are both 2.4 GHz dual cores, the G530 has the newer Sandy Bridge architecture but the E6600 has twice the cache, so I'm not exactly sure which one to go with in this case.

 

[Supernova1138]

If you're just web browsing, there won't be much difference between the two in real world terms. The G530 is a faster CPU because it has a much more efficient microarchitecture, so it gets more work done per clock cycle than the old Core 2 Duo. Even with the lower amount of cache, the G530 will still be faster.

The G530 will also be equipped with better integrated graphics than what is available on LGA775 motherboards, so the G530 system will do better in lighter video tasks like HD video playback or browser games.

Generally speaking, you are better off going with the newer stuff. Finding decent motherboards that will work with the older Core 2 Duo chips is getting difficult. Plus you will probably have to get DDR2 RAM for the Core 2 Duo, and DDR2 is more expensive than DDR3 while being slower and using more power.

 

[XJLanzaro]

Best answer selected by XJLanzaro.