How long do you intend to keep your Q6600 until??

[UseItNow]

What Quad? I've got a Socket A AthlonXP 2000+ that's still going strong after 7 years. Here's to at least another 7 years (touch wood)! I think I'll have to remove the heatsink and apply new paste as it's been untouched since purchase/install!

No upgrade for this machine, just a new build....eventually to Core i5!

[Biscuit]

I'll keep mine for 5+ years I reckon, at some point in a few years it'll just be downgraded to a build for my children

Used to be the way it was for me, gettin my dads casts off. Now he gets mine

[shadowmaster]

If someone bought a Q6600 and an 8800GTX in the middle 2007 with 4gb of RAM even until the end of this year it would be a decent setup for gaming. 30 months is an eternity when it comes to computers and these parts have done very well indeed with regards to their performance. The 8800GTX is the 9700pro of its generation.

I agree the 8800GTX has aged very well. Still even now its more then capable of running most games at mid/highish settings and resolution.

[Technogeek]

I'm happy with my Q6600, it does the job and overclocks well. I can not see that i will be updating for a few years yet. Hard drives will be the first to be upgraded.

[Jonessie]

I have a Q9650 and it intend to keep this until I decide to upgrade to the i7, at the moment I do not see any potential reason why I need to uodate to an i7, I always wait until the following year to update a processor when the prices fall.

[sammorris]

The Q9650 is a seriously powerful CPU even now, it's not worth upgrading until something beats i7 because outside an i7 950+, it isn't going to make much of a difference.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

TBH, with most single card setups a Q6600 at around 3ghz is still not going to be much of a bottleneck at 1680x1050 and 1920x1200 for the average user especially since most gamers probably still have dual cores too. If the Athlon II X3 and X4 and the dual core Core i3(with hyperthreading) are launched under £90 this may start to change though.

[UseItNow]

TBH, with most single card setups a Q6600 at around 3ghz is still not going to be much of a bottleneck at 1680x1050 and 1920x1200 for the average user especially since most gamers probably still have dual cores too. If the Athlon II X3 and X4 and the dual core Core i3(with hyperthreading) are launched under £90 this may start to change though.

Please clarify further, thanks.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Please clarify further, thanks.

The CPU becomes a bottleneck mostly with dual graphics card solutions and at higher resolutions and settings. Most gamers probably have a sub £100 graphics card so are not going to be running games at very high resolutions and settings and hence the GPU is going to the biggest limiting factor still. More and more games are starting to make use of quad cores but not the majority still. The Athlon II X4 and the dual core Core i3 which has hyperthreading will be launched in the sub £100 bracket and this will mean more and more gamers will have a quad core or a processor capable of running 4 threads in the next year. More and more games will take advantage of this as it makes sense if more and more of the installed user base have such processors. Hence,I see a Q6600 at 3ghz still being OK for the next year or so until quad cores and hyperthreaded dual cores become common.

[Biscuit]

... Core i3 which has hyperthreading

Has this been confirmed now, i thought this was unsure.

After reading through this thread i have to say im tempted to just buy a 750i or a P45 too keep me going as long as i can with my Q6600. It would be nice to upgrade and everything but it just seems so unnecessary the more and more i think about it. A decent motherboard update would probably be all i needed to keep me happy saving me a couple of hundred quid.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Has this been confirmed now, i thought this was unsure.

After reading through this thread i have to say im tempted to just buy a 750i or a P45 too keep me going as long as i can with my Q6600. It would be nice to upgrade and everything but it just seems so unnecessary the more and more i think about it. A decent motherboard update would probably be all i needed to keep me happy saving me a couple of hundred quid.

According to this article it does:

http://channel.hexus.net/content/item.php?item=19709

Also you can get an X48 based motherboard for around £86 delivered:

http://www.novatech.co.uk/novatech/s...html?DFI-DKX48

[Biscuit]

Are DFI boards still a bit picky with RAM/PSU?

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Are DFI boards still a bit picky with RAM/PSU?

Not sure to be honest!! There is this x48 based motherboard from Scan too for around £100:

http://www.scan.co.uk/Products/Gigab...-SATA-RAID-ATX

[rox0r]

I'll be sticking with my E6600 for a good while yet. Windows 7 runs perfectly well on it and unless the Shuttle packs up I have no need to bother upgrading. I don't play as many games as I used to and the 4850 in it handles most things out fine.

I've spent hilarious amounts of money over the years on 'upgrades' that I've had to convince myself were actually worth the hard earned money. My next upgrade will be a proper full replacement with at least 50% improvement in speed/power, more importantly it will be at such a time whereupon I deem it necessary. The only game on my radar at all to be honest is Diablo III and I don't invisige that being a machine-eater.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

I'll be sticking with my E6600 for a good while yet. Windows 7 runs perfectly well on it and unless the Shuttle packs up I have no need to bother upgrading. I don't play as many games as I used to and the 4850 in it handles most things out fine.

I've spent hilarious amounts of money over the years on 'upgrades' that I've had to convince myself were actually worth the hard earned money. My next upgrade will be a proper full replacement with at least 50% improvement in speed/power, more importantly it will be at such a time whereupon I deem it necessary. The only game on my radar at all to be honest is Diablo III and I don't invisige that being a machine-eater.

Hello,fellow Shuttle SD37P2 user!! I have a Q6600 and an HD4830 in mine and TBH it still does everything I need it to do too and I am looking at something like a 100% improvement(hopefully) over what I have now to upgrade. Cost is one reason why I am keeping my PC as long as possible as SFF computers(especially a Shuttle) are not that cheap to build.

[DataMatrix]

I have mine overclocked and it rarely reaches 50-60% usage (on all cores), even on games it only reaches 20-30%. I can get 8.56x encoding speed with ConvertXtoDVD so I'm happy all around.

I'll probably upgrade when I need it or have the money.