Daniel Iliev wrote:
I've decided to get an Intel based box, but I've not been following
closely the hardware development for more than 5 years. Another
trouble is that most of the people I can ask don't use Gentoo and they
miss the point of "much compiling". So, I need your help.
1) CPU:
model,CPU Freq,FSB Freq,cache,technology
E8400, 3.00GHz, 1333MHz, 6MB, 45nm
Q8200, 2.33GHz, 1333MHz, 4MB, 45nm
Q6600, 2.40GHz, 1066MHz, 8MB, 65nm
Which one? (please, consider overclocking).
I would get the E8400 because it overclocks good. Upping the FSB from
333 to 400 will give you 3.6GHz (the CPU has a multiplier of x9). That
means you can get DDR2 800MHz RAM and run it with an FSB:DRAM ratio of
1:1 (400 FSB = 800 DDR). 1:1 FSB:DRAM is the fastest configuration for
Intel systems. If you get DDR2 1066 RAM, then you can up the FSB even
more while retaining the 1:1 FSB:DRAM ratio.
The E8400 can go up to about 4.4GHz with a good aftermarket cooler.
Don't overclock it at all though with the stock cooler.
On the local market those are in the same price range and I'm going to
take Q6600 for the bigger cache (8MB). Is that the correct choice?
The Q6600 has *less* cache per core than the E8400. The E8400 has 3MB
per core while the Q6600 has 2MB per core. Yes, it's shared cache, but
for emerges all the core will be used.
The reason I recommend the dual core over the quad core is that
compiling isn't the primary use of a desktop PC. Application
performance is, that's why the higher speed per core of the E8400 is IMO
better.
2) Main board.
I was advised to get Asus P5K Premium (P35, ICH9) for Q6600. The thing
is there are models from the P5Q series (like P5Q3) which have a newer
chipset (P45, ICH10) but the same price. I can't understand why should
I choose the premium mobo even it's an older model. Please, advise.
I'd recommend the Asus P5E is you can find it. It's X38 based (slightly
more overclockable then P35 and P45, supports crossfire PCIe x16 while
P35 and P45 only have PCIe x8 in crossfire) with FSB1600 and its price
is very good (130€ here).
3) DDR2
600,800 or 1066? The thing confusing me is that the newer CPUs run at
1333MHz and the older (Q6600) at 1066. So, which DDR2?
It doesn't matter if the CPU is FSB1333 or FSB1066 because you can run
the RAM at whatever speed you want. But as I mentioned earlier, the
fastest FSB:DRAM configuration on Intel chips is 1:1, so to up the FSB
above 400 while retaining this 1:1 ratio, you'll need 1066 RAM. The
timings don't matter that much on Intel, so 5-5-5-15 RAM will perform
virtually just as well as 4-4-4-12 RAM.
4) Overclock
I intend to overclock the system but not extremely. I've been told
Q6600 would go up to 3GHz w/o any trouble. Is that true?
Depends on the CPU (not all Q6600 are equal) and motherboard. But in
general, 3GHz is easy to get with that CPU. Note: only with a good
aftermarket cooler! Don't try with the stock one.
How high
would the other two CPUs go w/o additional cooling and compromising
the stability?
You don't overclock with the stock cooler. Unless you consider an
overclock of, say, 200MHz as overclocking (the Q6600 for example can go
from 2.4GHz to 2.6GHz with the stock cooler). Higher than that may be
stable at the beginning, but the life of the CPU is greatly diminished.
It won't live for long if it runs at 70C while with a better cooler it
would run at 50C.
If you intend to only "overclock" that much, then there's no point in
going Intel at all. I'd recommend AMD in that case.
