better cpu or vid card?

maroon · Post by **maroon** » Tue Dec 11, 2007 11:25 am

Pricing out my new system and had a question. Basically, here are the choices:

1. Intel C2D E6550 + GeForce 8600GTS

or

2. Intel C2D E4500 + ATI Radeon HD3850

I'm a light gamer, mostly MMORPGs, and I do like to do some mild overclocking. And as you can see from my sig, I expect a build to last me for a while. Anyway, wanted to know what you guys thought was best.

Shagster · Post by **Shagster** » Tue Dec 11, 2007 7:12 pm

I'd get the second one.

Sava700 · Post by **Sava700** » Tue Dec 11, 2007 8:00 pm

I'd pick the 1st one.. Nvidia has better support it seems than ATI... I do believe the 8600's OC pretty good too.

MetalHead324 · Post by **MetalHead324** » Tue Dec 11, 2007 9:01 pm

YARDofSTUF · Post by **YARDofSTUF** » Tue Dec 11, 2007 9:11 pm

The ATI 3850 easily beats out the the 8600GTS.

Sava700 · Post by **Sava700** » Tue Dec 11, 2007 9:35 pm

YARDofSTUF wrote:The ATI 3850 easily beats out the the 8600GTS.

yeah but the processor in the first one is faster and since he said this:

maroon wrote:
I'm a light gamer, mostly MMORPGs,

I'd go with #1 mostly since the card will play any of those pretty darn good mostly with great driver support and Nvidia is pumping them out like crazy. But he will also have good CPU power for other things. Not to mention he said he wanted to do some OCing and the 8600's OC really good.

YARDofSTUF · Post by **YARDofSTUF** » Tue Dec 11, 2007 9:57 pm

Sava700 wrote:I'd go with #1 mostly since the card will play any of those pretty darn good mostly with great driver support and Nvidia is pumping them out like crazy. But he will also have good CPU power for other things. Not to mention he said he wanted to do some OCing and the 8600's OC really good.

ATI drivers are much better than they use to, the only difference is really nvidia's higher frequency of release.

The 8600GTS can't handle recent games at decent settings higher than 1280x1024 resolution.

CPU difference isnt that bad IMO.

Shagster · Post by **Shagster** » Tue Dec 11, 2007 10:08 pm

Here is how I saw this...

4500 can hit 3.2Ghz stock
6550 can hit 3.5Ghz stock

Since he is only overclocking midly he'll end up with the same frequency no matter which cpu he picks. Leaving only the difference in cache size. 2mb on the allendale vs. 4mb on the conroe is a 6% avg performance difference.

Taking that in mind the 3850 is about a 66 to 100% performance increase. 8600gt won't see much more drivers performance tweaks. 3850 was a lot of beast that is waiting to be unlocked by drivers.

A_old · Post by **A_old** » Tue Dec 11, 2007 11:08 pm

loop2kil · Post by **loop2kil** » Wed Dec 12, 2007 2:59 am

most definitely #2 per what shagster said.

pcuse5 · Post by **pcuse5** » Wed Dec 12, 2007 5:28 am

I'd go with the first one.

maroon · Post by **maroon** » Wed Dec 12, 2007 2:58 pm

Thanks for helping me decide! Gonna go with door #2.