Originally posted by: Winterpool
I've been following this discussion, and perusing many of the online benchmarks, trying to decide the same question: Q6600 v E8400 (which could more generally be framed as present quadcore v near-future dualcore). As with many other contentious issues, even when we agree on the data we have (current benchmarks, cpu prices, energy costs, etc), we can't come to a definitive conclusion because of future variables, the data we don't have and can only guess.
For example, I don't think energy prices are going to come down any time soon, but how fast will they be increasing? The inflation figures released this past week were rather alarming... And do we even know what cpu prices will be? The original terms of this discussion assumed the Micro Centre sale prices ($190 E8400 v $200 Q6600), but the E8400s are essentiallly unavailable whilst the Q6600s seem to be plentiful. In the next couple of months, the E8400s (not to mention other Penryns) should become available in real volume, but the Q6600 could very well settle at a price higher than the current MC sale. I don't believe the leaked price schedules anymore: without real competition from Sunnyvale, Intel can take its time releasing new processors at lower prices. Look at the current transition to Penryn: where are the Wolfdales? When they're available, some retailers are charging $250+ for E8400s. It seems Intel is quite content to clear out Conroe inventories first.
I've been slowly accumulating the parts for a modern system, taking advantage of the post-Christmas sales and rebates (for example heavily discounted Antec NeoHE and P182). This week I was rushed into buying a video card (which I'd intended to be one of my final purchases) because of the limited availability of the first-run ASUS EN9600GTs (what can I say? I'm a sucker for a
pretty lady ). I also bought the Corsair TWIN2X2048-6400C4 as the rebate was about to expire. At this point I've only the motherboard and cpu left. A part of me wants to have done now, which means buying the $200 Q6600. I can wait, say, a month for sub-$200 E8400s to become available (I'm going to buy the Abit IP35-E before its Newegg rebate expires in mid-March). But what if Wolfdales remain rare and/or over $200 for the spring? Then I'll kick myself for not buying these MC Q6600s.
If I were
certain that affordable Wolfdales were imminent, then I'd wait for the E8400, maybe even the E8500. I'm wary of quadcore's greater power draw: at idle (which is realistically where my computer will be most of the time), it can be a 90 per cent difference. I'm not a gamer, and my only high-intensity tasks will be video encoding and some editing. More cores are better for media, but on the other hand the Q6600 won't support SSE4.
Of course given the facts above, I should probably just buy the $100 E4500 from Micro Centre. Does anyone know if
those are still available? By the way, I'm typing this on an Athlon XP system!
Edit: if Caminetto is correct, then my spare kit is going to be sitting round all spring waiting for Penryn. Someone please convince me otherwise...