Q9450 or Q6600?

[Bookcase14]

I'm trying to decide between getting a Q9450 Yorkfield or a Q6600 for my new build. Any suggestions/opinions would be nice. Please stray away from the "neither, go dual core." I've decided I want to go quad, now I just need to know which one, or even if there is another one better than both of these. Please educate me a bit if you can on which overclocks best/higher. Thanks for the help gents/gals.

 

[Tempered81]

i'd get the q6600 for the 9x multi, and cheaper price

 

[Drsignguy]

I've got both and they are great at everything you throw at them. As for price/performance, the Q6600 is still the better buy. I get a higher OC with the Q9450 and the performance is a bit better but if I had a budget and had a choice of 1, the Q6600 would be that choice.

 

[WaitingForNehalem]

Fry's a Q6600/mobo combo for $150 today. I'd would go with a 9450 since it has SSE4.1, 45nm, faster, more L2 cache, Virtualization Technology Support, and it's newer.

 

[n7]

I'd say this is a price & how-long-do-you-want-to-keep-this question.

Price/performance = easy win for the Q6600.

Pure performance (assuming OCing) + longterm use = Q9450, though it's a PITA to clock high if you don't have a good mobo.

 

[myocardia]

Originally posted by: WaitingForNehalem
Virtualization Technology Support

Umm, every Intel C2D/C2Q that's 6xx0 series has this feature.

 

[Griswold]

Originally posted by: WaitingForNehalem
Fry's a Q6600/mobo combo for $150 today. I'd would go with a 9450 since it has SSE4.1, 45nm, faster, more L2 cache, Virtualization Technology Support, and it's newer.

And what exactly does SSE 4.1 do for you? Dont say "video encoding", please. Only the (inefficient) divx6 codec will benefit from it due to lack of a clever ME algorithm (google it if you want to know more) - any sophisticated, on h.264 based, codec wont need SSE4.1 to gain any significant amount of speed. They'll do the same in software at the same or higher speed - brains over muscles.

So, what else is there you need this SSE extensions for?

And as far as VT goes, thats nothing other Core2 processors dont have.

 

[geoffry]

Originally posted by: Griswold

Originally posted by: WaitingForNehalem
Fry's a Q6600/mobo combo for $150 today. I'd would go with a 9450 since it has SSE4.1, 45nm, faster, more L2 cache, Virtualization Technology Support, and it's newer.

And what exactly does SSE 4.1 do for you? Dont say "video encoding", please. Only the (inefficient) divx6 codec will benefit from it due to lack of a clever ME algorithm (google it if you want to know more) - any sophisticated, on h.264 based, codec wont need SSE4.1 to gain any significant amount of speed. They'll do the same in software at the same or higher speed - brains over muscles.

So, what else is there you need this SSE extensions for?

And as far as VT goes, thats nothing other Core2 processors dont have.

As far as I know the SSE4.1 instructions only are useful in media encoding so things like games will never see a benefit.

I was debating Q6600 / Q9450 as well, I was leaning towards the Q9450 for the longest time but lately I've been telling myself to get the Q6600. My power supply can handle the extra juice and its quite a bit cheaper, and I don't ecode movies anymore.

And even if I did do some encoding, the Q6600 is no slouch.

However I wont be upgrading until my OCed C2D slows me down, which might not be until Nehalem is a good price given how seemingly slow software is taking use of 4 cores, so I might even skip Q6600/Q9450.

 

[chizow]

From what I'm hearing, the newer Q6600 G0s are poor overclockers, back to B3 days of 3-3.2GHz or so....

The Q9450 is a bit faster clock for clock but like the Q6600 and other Kentsfield quads, is harder to overclock than their dual core counterparts. Q9450 from what I've seen will overclock slightly higher than Q6600 if your board can handle the necessary FSB speeds and will also run cooler. I love my Q6600 but it does run very hot at the voltage needed to run stably at 3.6GHz.

If you have a board that can do 450MHz FSB I'd probably go with the Q9450 at this point, especially since it will give you a little bit more room to let Nehalem work out its problems. Or even let you wait it out until Westmere.

 

[error8]

Originally posted by: chizow
From what I'm hearing, the newer Q6600 G0s are poor overclockers, back to B3 days of 3-3.2GHz or so....

Yes, I keep seeing this rumor all over these forums, but I haven't really found someone who really had a bad Q6600 overclock. Everyone says these new G0s are crap today in overclocking, but no facts to sustain this.

Is this only a rumor or it's true?

 

[Gillbot]

My G0 would run at 3.4, not one tick higher. If you get a later batch Q6600 G0 expecting 3.6GHz or more, you may be disappointed.

 

[Idontcare]

Originally posted by: error8

Originally posted by: chizow
From what I'm hearing, the newer Q6600 G0s are poor overclockers, back to B3 days of 3-3.2GHz or so....

Yes, I keep seeing this rumor all over these forums, but I haven't really found someone who really had a bad Q6600 overclock. Everyone says these new G0s are crap today in overclocking, but no facts to sustain this.

Is this only a rumor or it's true?

Could be a simple case that the early reports of teh uber easy overclockings with G0's were a might bit over-representative of what the average experience/distribution was even back then.

In all events you are relying on reportings from folks who go to the trouble of reporting their results, and even further you are relying on them having known what they were doing when arriving at their conclusions (of either the >3.6GHz is teh eazy variety or the G0's are crap can't do >3.4Ghz evar variety).

Your mileage will vary from everyone elses, even if everyone had the exact same identical chip (because while all people are made equal it would appear some are more equal than others...)

 

[myocardia]

Originally posted by: Idontcare
Could be a simple case that the early reports of teh uber easy overclockings with G0's were a might bit over-representative of what the average experience/distribution was even back then.

In all events you are relying on reportings from folks who go to the trouble of reporting their results, and even further you are relying on them having known what they were doing when arriving at their conclusions (of either the >3.6GHz is teh eazy variety or the G0's are crap can't do >3.4Ghz evar variety).

Your mileage will vary from everyone elses, even if everyone had the exact same identical chip (because while all people are made equal it would appear some are more equal than others...)

Dude, you have the best posting style I've ever seen. Just call me your #1 fan. BTW, I couldn't agree more, with every word of it.

 

[Bookcase14]

Great responses guys. Thanks. In regards to overclocking the Q9450 (because I think I am leaning more towards this one), what is a good motherboard that could support such an endeavor?

 

[chizow]

Originally posted by: Idontcare

Originally posted by: error8

Originally posted by: chizow
From what I'm hearing, the newer Q6600 G0s are poor overclockers, back to B3 days of 3-3.2GHz or so....

Yes, I keep seeing this rumor all over these forums, but I haven't really found someone who really had a bad Q6600 overclock. Everyone says these new G0s are crap today in overclocking, but no facts to sustain this.

Is this only a rumor or it's true?

Could be a simple case that the early reports of teh uber easy overclockings with G0's were a might bit over-representative of what the average experience/distribution was even back then.

In all events you are relying on reportings from folks who go to the trouble of reporting their results, and even further you are relying on them having known what they were doing when arriving at their conclusions (of either the >3.6GHz is teh eazy variety or the G0's are crap can't do >3.4Ghz evar variety).

Your mileage will vary from everyone elses, even if everyone had the exact same identical chip (because while all people are made equal it would appear some are more equal than others...)

It could be, but I'm actually basing it on reported results along with VIDs when provided. From what I've seen recent batch G0s are showing VIDs of 1.28 and even 1.3+. Mine is 1.2375V purchased in Jan 08, which is around the time G0 hit their peak (based on XtremeSystem thread and the VID thread here). I think its pretty widely accepted lower VID/TDP chips will OC better, as shown multiple times over since C2's release.

 

[Drsignguy]

Originally posted by: myocardia

Originally posted by: Idontcare
Could be a simple case that the early reports of teh uber easy overclockings with G0's were a might bit over-representative of what the average experience/distribution was even back then.

In all events you are relying on reportings from folks who go to the trouble of reporting their results, and even further you are relying on them having known what they were doing when arriving at their conclusions (of either the >3.6GHz is teh eazy variety or the G0's are crap can't do >3.4Ghz evar variety).

Your mileage will vary from everyone elses, even if everyone had the exact same identical chip (because while all people are made equal it would appear some are more equal than others...)

Dude, you have the best posting style I've ever seen. Just call me your #1 fan. BTW, I couldn't agree more, with every word of it.

I have noticed the same thing. Makes you think about every word and put it all in perspective.


Btw, I have 2 Q6600's, 1 couldn't get past 3.0 ( high vid ) without heating the house due to voltages. The 2nd ( lower vid ) Oc's with ease to 3.2 and am testing to get 3.4 out of it...So, IDC is again, on the mark.......

 

[Drsignguy]

Originally posted by: Bookcase14
Great responses guys. Thanks. In regards to overclocking the Q9450 (because I think I am leaning more towards this one), what is a good motherboard that could support such an endeavor?

I am currently using the Gigabyte EP45-DS3R board and it seems better for stablility than my EP35C- DS3R is to OC for this chip ( Q9450 ). It does have a few more voltage settings in the bios to fine tune with. I like my EP35 but I am liking my EP45 much better. Asus, MSI are some good choices also.

 

[F1shF4t]

Originally posted by: chizow

Originally posted by: Idontcare

Originally posted by: error8

Originally posted by: chizow
From what I'm hearing, the newer Q6600 G0s are poor overclockers, back to B3 days of 3-3.2GHz or so....

Yes, I keep seeing this rumor all over these forums, but I haven't really found someone who really had a bad Q6600 overclock. Everyone says these new G0s are crap today in overclocking, but no facts to sustain this.

Is this only a rumor or it's true?

Could be a simple case that the early reports of teh uber easy overclockings with G0's were a might bit over-representative of what the average experience/distribution was even back then.

In all events you are relying on reportings from folks who go to the trouble of reporting their results, and even further you are relying on them having known what they were doing when arriving at their conclusions (of either the >3.6GHz is teh eazy variety or the G0's are crap can't do >3.4Ghz evar variety).

Your mileage will vary from everyone elses, even if everyone had the exact same identical chip (because while all people are made equal it would appear some are more equal than others...)

It could be, but I'm actually basing it on reported results along with VIDs when provided. From what I've seen recent batch G0s are showing VIDs of 1.28 and even 1.3+. Mine is 1.2375V purchased in Jan 08, which is around the time G0 hit their peak (based on XtremeSystem thread and the VID thread here). I think its pretty widely accepted lower VID/TDP chips will OC better, as shown multiple times over since C2's release.

A friend of mine got a G0 probably 4 month ago and it has a VID of 1.325. That thing was flat out reaching 3ghz. Actually my old B3 overclocks better (which is not saying much) and has a VID of 1.3125. The G0 I got late last year has a VID 1.2875, does 3.42 at 1.35 vcore.

 

[GundamF91]

Get yourself the Q9450, it's more overclockable than current batch of Q6600. I can easily hit 3.6Ghz, using 8x450. And can also get to 3.8Ghz, but the temp is pretty high. For a good board, use Asus P5Q Deluxe. Basically you want a strong board with stable vCore regulation, and also stable NB power.