E6600 vs E6400

[alexpollard]

Is the extra cache on the 6600 worth the extra dough or should I just buy the 6400 and overclock the **** off it?

[BlindMelon7]

Neither... buy the 6300 and overclock the **** off it.

[dave87]

Or wait for the E6420 - same cache as a 6600, same default speed as a 6400 and from what I've seen, the same price as the 6300

Dave

[fishboy25uk]

6400 has better 'Bang for your buck' than the 6600 so either that or the new fangled one dave87 said.

[Leepox]

easy to overclock.. just change the heatsink... =/

[Kumagoro]

E6420 doesnt come out till Q2 according to another thread.
thats quite a wait. Im hoping the 4200 or 4300 or whatever
is going to clock well as it will be 800 MHz not 1066 MHz FSB

I love a good Ocing bargain I just hope a decent cheap Ocing
mobo comes out by then.

[idiotekniQues]

i thought about the same decision for a bit recently.

the $100 difference was significant to me as it freed up money to get other things that would make my system perform better.

right now the e6400 is probably the sweet spot in core2 cpus. the $100 difference to the 6600 gets you nowhere near the performance increase, plus the 6400's OC the best. ive seen more than one 6600 owner answer this same question and say the 6400 is a better deal right now.

if you can wait until Q2 then the prices drop and 6420 comes out, but that wont be till april or later.

i couldnt wait, e6400 on the way with some kickass cooling to oc it with.

[alexpollard]

Thanks for the info. It does seem like false ecomomy. With stock cooling you will probably be able to get a moderate overclock on a 6600 which should make it pretty quick. If you want the same performace from a 6300 or 6400 you would have to spend a fair bit of cash on some watercooling (which is my intention as my last watercooled case just gave up the ghost).

So, you pay more for the faster processor and less for the cooling or pay less for the processor and more for the cooling.... mmm, difficult.

How boring would it be to have air cooling though...

[shaithis]

You shouldn't need watercooling to reach the same speed with an E6300/E6400 that you would with an air-cooled E6600......but you'll probably need faster RAM....and at the moment that is a price-hike.

[alexpollard]

Too true! Looking at £260 for 2GB of XMS8500! Possibly the most expensive item on my shopping list (apart from the 8800 Have you seen the price of the 9136 modules! Insane. Not to mention the price of Vista. Take a look at the price difference of Vista on the US vs UK Amazon site! We pay £360 and they pay $370 for the retail version. Doesn't seem to add up.

[Dipar]

Neither... buy the 6300 and overclock the **** off it.

QFT!

Just overclock an 6300 to 6600 stock speeds and then you will have an 6600 for half the price .

[Ripper]

never had a 6400 but my 6600 is the best chip I have ever owned

[shaithis]

Just overclock an 6300 to 6600 stock speeds and then you will have an 6600 for half the price .

But 3 to 3.5GHz is a must

[alexpollard]

Could always buy an old Vapochill off ebay and superchill the sucker. 4Ghz here we come...

[acidrainy]

The 4meg of cache was the selling point, for the e6600, to me. Plus the fact that I have the chip at stock voltages running @ 3.2GHz (45degC load - stock cooling).

I am holding of going higher until my new PSU comes on Monday. The chip will soar higher though.

[kempez]

I got the e6600 cause it's easier to clock higher with non-uberuber high-end RAM

And yes "uberuber" is a new word