I'm wondering how many of us here still use the Core 2 architecture, in their main rig. Not a second pc, guest pc, laptop, I mean the main machine still having a Core 2 CPU.
I had an i7 920 at one point, but I wound up with a Q6600 system. It doesn't seem that much different from the i7 machine, at least at the speed I run at. Certain specific things have suffered, but overall it's much the same.
i had a q6600 untill just recenty it had been with me from new. and it overclocked like a champ (probably why i had it for so long)
I couldnt really see how id be better off with a new cpu. but after changing from a 5770 to a 7850 i decided that it was time for a change.
il cut out the long stopry and skip to the part where i got my i5-2500k. at stock it was easily 50% faster than my q6600 at 3.7 in most tasks. and when it came to some games (thief especially) the improvment was rediculous.
The in game bench test in thief is Ludicrous its just a beast on the cpu. i mananed to get a avarage frame rate of 26fps with a lot of tweaking with my Q6600 (in actuall game low drops were down in the mid 40's and usually well above 70) but the i5-2500k managed avarage frames of 63Fps with the exact same settings in the bench test. (obviously thats not reall world expirience) but it does reflect the fact that after the change i no longer had frame drops.
all i ever wanted was to set it up and enable tripple buffer v synk, and not drop below 60fps and the I5 (at stock) + my oc'd 7850 let me do that.
The q6600 even overclocked to 3.7 just could not do it. (no matter what gfx settings i used and tweaked, id still get the drops in game) and that set up had the highest "verified" 3dmark score for similar systems in fire strike and cloud gate. so its not like it was miss configured.
the media pc that i use for the tv downstairs (its the only thing connected to the pc) is a core 2 duo with a hd 6xxx low profile gpu (i forget which). and my other downstairs pc is also a core 2 duo with a 7570 gpu. i use that for light gaming and generall internet stuff. it can play thief at lower settings so its still useable.