Q9650 worth buying?

[Sir_Real]

Im wanting to upgrade both my gaming rigs there both running dual cores. I've already brought a q6600 second hand off ebay ( In post at moo ). Im not sure im going to see much gain over an e8200@3.9ghz tho. So instead of getting another q6600 or sticking with the E8200 i'm thinking Q9650, But there £250 !

Will i see much inprovement with a Q9650 over a Q6600 @ say 3.2 or an E8200 at around 3.9 ?

 

[Yukikaze]

Im wanting to upgrade both my gaming rigs there both running dual cores. I've already brought a q6600 second hand off ebay ( In post at moo ). Im not sure im going to see much gain over an e8200@3.9ghz tho. So instead of getting another q6600 or sticking with the E8200 i'm thinking Q9650, But there £250 !

Will i see much inprovement with a Q9650 over a Q6600 @ say 3.2 or an E8200 at around 3.9 ?

It does depend on the specific game, but in most cases the E8200 at 3.9Ghz is more than sufficient.

 

[(FIH) The Don]

get it used, they cost around 100£ used, maybe 120

 

[Bjorn_Of_Iceland]

Check for the vid. The lower the better. Those things go 4.1Ghz on 1.25 core volts.

 

[francis511]

Yeah the price/performance ratio for those chips is very low.

 

[Sir_Real]

The cheapest used one i've seen is £165. I might just use the q6600 in my main rig & use my e8200 in my second rig. Im not sure tho think i'll av to see how well this q6600 runs my HD4870x2 first.

Thing is i can get a q9650 from a local dealler ( so no postage cost to add ) & i'll prob get abit nocked off the listed price if i ask nicely They have done me qood deals in past.

 

[BarbaricSoul]

Is it worth it at this time, that's for you to decide. Will you see a improvement in overall performance? Hell yeah. I went from a e8400 ran at 3.8 to the xeon equivalent to the q6600 ran at 3.6 and my system actually slowed down. I then got a q9650, and OMG. The q9650 is so much faster than the q6600. I noticed the difference immediately, even with the 9650 at stock speeds.

 

[BarbaricSoul]

oh, BTW, all my crunching points are from my q9650

 

[Tatty_Two]

^^^ +1, the Q9650 is a fantastic chip, I had the worst Vid and managed 4.5gig on 1.425V and ran 24/7 at 4.2gig on 1.235V, the thing with them though is that you need the right motherboard, the P45 is particularily strong for the Yorkfields and Asus and Gigabyte boards are best..... I saw people here with Top end x48 boards that were struggling to get beyond 4gig.

Will you see a difference in performance, yes you will, even in games now the performance is apparent in many of the more recent (multithreadeddded) titles, especially as we move to DX11 titles where many of them demand almost a multi core platform, play BFBC2 with the same Graphics card on a dual core then a quadcore system and boy will you see some difference.

 

[Sir_Real]

Is it worth it at this time, that's for you to decide. Will you see a improvement in overall performance? Hell yeah. I went from a e8400 to the xeon equivalent to the q6600 and my system actually slowed down. I then got a q9650, and OMG. The q9650 is so much faster than the q6600. I noticed the difference immediately.

Startin to wish i'd not brought the second hand q6600 now you've sed that lol

I'm very temped to raid my bank account & get a new q9650 this afternoon.

Thanks for the comments I'm going to go think if i really wonna spend £250 today

 

[francis511]

Thought about a cheap i5 quad-core instead ?

 

[Fourstaff]

Thought about a cheap i5 quad-core instead ?

And then he will have to upgrade his mobo and ram too?

 

[Brilford Wimley]

The Q9550 has better price/performance ratio than a Q9650.

 

[scaminatrix]

Personally, I think it's too late in the game to be spending money on LGA775.
I would definately recommend i5 or i7 if you can afford it.

 

[Tatty_Two]

The Q9550 has better price/performance ratio than a Q9650.

Not so sure about that, I think you are right in relation to stock prices and speeds, although for someone who overclocks, apart from the odd amazing Q9550 I think you will find that many with an average motherboard are handcuffed by the 8x multi, I am yet to find a Q9650 that wont do above 4.3gig on a half decent P45 giga board, that simply cannot be said for most Q9550's.

Personally, I think it's too late in the game to be spending money on LGA775.
I would definately recommend i5 or i7 if you can afford it.

Good point that can't be faulted, however, to show you just how highly I think of the Q9650, I would gladly swap my system with someones P45/Q9650 system with a small cash adjustment, for those that predominantly game only, there is not a great benefit for going i7 just yet, and I have had my current rig for more than 18 months!

The best price I can find it for new is £240..................

http://www.crescentelectronics.co.uk/intel-core-2-quad-q9650-3-ghz-processor.html

IMO it is not worth paying that, the other factors mentioned by other people factor too strongly at that price point, if you can get one 2nd Hand for under £175 then maybe.

 

[francis511]

And then he will have to upgrade his mobo and ram too?

For £250 I would seriously consider it.

 

[NdMk2o1o]

Startin to wish i'd not brought the second hand q6600 now you've sed that lol

I'm very temped to raid my bank account & get a new q9650 this afternoon.

Thanks for the comments I'm going to go think if i really wonna spend £250 today

If you want to spend £250 get an i5 750 and a motherboard, do not pay that kind of money for a 775 chip you will have to get ram too, though selling your old components will net you some kickass ddr3.

 

[EastCoasthandle]

A Q9650 will show you some improvements over both Q6000 and e8200. But I do suggest you overclock it to at least 3.60GHz (which isn't hard to do...400 FSB, adjust Dram Frequency, CPU voltage, etc).

 

[Fourstaff]

For £250 I would seriously consider it.

I ran a google search and it displayed £150-170, so I might have missed it.

 

[trickson]

Yes I still run the Q9650 and it is hands down the best chip ever ! you will see a huge increase in performance .
As for going with i5 or i7 ( I heard this mentioned here ) I would like to point out you will have to get a NEW MB and New RAM as well . with that said if you are just looking for an upgrade then YEAH but I see no real point in getting an i7 or i5 as there is little difference in the feel of them and the feel of a Q9650 . In most cases you will just get a 10% - 15% performance increase vs the Q9650 . thing is I would just do the upgrade and then you are stet for the next big thing later on down the road .

 

[newtekie1]

If it wasn't for the simply amazing deals I got on my current primary Rig, I'd still be running my X3370(Rebadge Q9650). Pushing them to 3.6GHz+ is easy, especially on a decent P45 board, and they perform wonderfully. Before the X3370 I had an X3220(Q6600 Rebradged) and it clocked like ass(only managed 3.2GHz) and seems overall sluggish compared to the X3370.

 

[InnocentCriminal]

I have a Q9450 and a Q9550, I haven't tried the Q9450 as I've only recently received it and it's currently humming along at 3GHz in my GF's lil rig (ASUS P5KPL-AM) but my Q9550 won't go past 3.75GHz without some serious volts in either my ASUS P5E3 or my Foxconn BlackOps.

Honestly, I'd save the money you have unless the offer on the Q9650 is hard to pass up. I'll have a word with my GF but I'm willing to sell my Q9450 for £100 delivered.

 

[Easy Rhino]

i have a q9650 and it destroys the q6600 at any speed.

 

[Sir_Real]

Had a busy afternoon & never had a chance to go get this cpu. The shop shut early today & not open at weekends !

Anyway just read through all the post put here while i was out. Im going to have to leave taking the i7 root as i really carnt be doing with the hassle of stripping out the mobo & trying to find buyers for it plus the old ram & cpu. Then theres the cost of replacing them for an i7 rig. Bound to end up costing a packet. I carnt really aford it at moo.

As for buying a used q9650, Well the thought of buying a used £170 + cpu that says ( No returns ) Just totally puts me off. What if its DOA ? I doubt ebay or paypal would be much help.

Im not going to shop around UK websites as i said above i can pick one up local. Which i recken i will be doing on monday.

I'll have the q9650 in the rig with the P5Q-E & 2X hd4870 1gb.

& for my other rig with the P5Q-SE & HD4870x2 that can make do with the Q6600, or the E8200. I'll be doing alot of benchmark, gaming tests with them two cpu's to figure out which is the best for games.

 

[Ross211]

If you were given the choice between Q9550 and Q9650 at this point in time (This late behind their time), I would choose the Q9650. There are many times I wish I had the 9x multi like the Q9650 but the Q9550 is only 8.5x - I got my Q9550 E0 new from Micro Center for $180 tho :~P