waterprism
Expert Member
Would appreciate your thoughts, guys, because I'm getting information overload on this 
Which of the following processor/setups do you guys think is better? Both are in my price range and both happen to be in my exact PC of choice at two different retailers.
The one is an Intel Core 2 Duo E7600 at 3.06ghz and a 3mb cache with 2GB DDR2.
The other is an Intel Core 2 Quad Q8400 at 2.66ghz and a 4mb cache with 2GB DDR2.
The computer will mainly be used for typical day-to-day applications, watching online videos and the like, a bit of gaming, and then probably some video creation work.
I've looked at quite a few benchmarks and I'm left a bit confused. These benchmarks were pretty old but seemed to suggest (at the time) that the Core 2 Duo was performing better overall than the quads of the time, especially for day-to-day applications. Those benchmarks seemed to suggest that the Core 2 Duo did better at lots-of-programs-open-at-the-same-time kind of stuff and the quads did better at more labor-intensive kind of stuff. Since then, more recent benchmarks put the Core 2 Quad Q8400 way above the Duo obviously, but to me anyway, the more recent benchmarks focus more on the bruteforce type of stuff.
Since the computer will be used for a bit of both kinds of things - application intensive and labor intensive - I'm a bit info overloaded on this and would appreciate your thoughts. As I'm upgrading from a P3 that's dying at 599Mhz, I really want plain sailing from here on out and want to make an informed choice.
Which of the following processor/setups do you guys think is better? Both are in my price range and both happen to be in my exact PC of choice at two different retailers.
The one is an Intel Core 2 Duo E7600 at 3.06ghz and a 3mb cache with 2GB DDR2.
The other is an Intel Core 2 Quad Q8400 at 2.66ghz and a 4mb cache with 2GB DDR2.
The computer will mainly be used for typical day-to-day applications, watching online videos and the like, a bit of gaming, and then probably some video creation work.
I've looked at quite a few benchmarks and I'm left a bit confused. These benchmarks were pretty old but seemed to suggest (at the time) that the Core 2 Duo was performing better overall than the quads of the time, especially for day-to-day applications. Those benchmarks seemed to suggest that the Core 2 Duo did better at lots-of-programs-open-at-the-same-time kind of stuff and the quads did better at more labor-intensive kind of stuff. Since then, more recent benchmarks put the Core 2 Quad Q8400 way above the Duo obviously, but to me anyway, the more recent benchmarks focus more on the bruteforce type of stuff.
Since the computer will be used for a bit of both kinds of things - application intensive and labor intensive - I'm a bit info overloaded on this and would appreciate your thoughts. As I'm upgrading from a P3 that's dying at 599Mhz
, I really want plain sailing from here on out and want to make an informed choice.
