How would a Conroe Xeon perform for gaming?

Too mobo none of the SLI mobo overclock well, otherwise a E6300 overclocked to 2.8GHz or above will be faster than either one of the CPU you have in mind.

The cache doesn't not make that much of a difference according to some reviews. it's only about 8% if both CPU is at the same speed, in this case the E6600 will still be faster by a good margain.

Xeon's are server based proc's, has nothing to do with a work station, work stations are like what customer service, or 2d rendering type deal, Quadro is for workstations because it doesnt need the 3d preformence, they have 3d preformence, but it is far from needed

workstations are made to stay on forever and work forever, same with servers i supose, but IMO, server procs arent gonna be worth it in a desktop

4mb of cache sounds nice, but like another poster said, wont make a huge diffrence, just more snappy to load stuff

soulsaver

im just wondering why your friend is dead set on a xeon, yeah they are made for servers, yeah they will work fine in a desktop, but only because of 2mb l2 cahce? and you chances of overclocking may not be that great, i hear conroe isnt that great for overclocking unless you have some model of asus mobo

honestly, clock speed means nothing, amd has proven it long ago, so go with what you want, itll work fine, but the more you overclock the more months and years youre taking off its life


soulsaver

wait...let me get something straight..

If I get a 6400 and run it at 6600 speeds with same voltage am I relay reducing chip lifespan?

I mean...arent these chips made together and then labeled? so theoreticaly Im running it at its intended speed when "born"...

no you got it wrong

when you make a processer, you make a line for each model i dont know how the intels are now nor the amd's but ill use older gen for my example

amd athlon 64's single cores"

what they do is they bin them, whatever doesnt pass, gets downgrade

IE some 3700+ can actually be fx55's, and some fx57's can be fx55's

depends how they bin when they are made

same volt, doesnt matter, your pushing more power into the proc to get the clock speeds, default is default for a reason, not just to let you the end user say """ok this is the starting line of 2.103, lets see what the finishing line is"""

overclocking period takes away from lifespan, its known, it always has, and always will, given......proc's wont die for a long time, its the 1 thing that should live forever in a computer, but the odds of it dying greatly mulitply when you overclock, pin mod, volt mod, any mod

yes i overclocked my 2 amd rigs, and my very first comp, i didnt mind cause i actually could feel and see some preformene gains.....overclocking just to overclock is lame and retarded

200mhz wont give you sheet, 800mhz youd prolly gain 2-4% if that in proc preformence

soulsaver

tell him to get the xeon, run some benchies and compare them to on line site reviews, i say get it


soulsaver

dont buy the 7950x2 though, the 7900GTO is a much better value for the money

@ kevin - I would get the xeon since you are right about the 6600 not being worth the extra money in this case. The xeon is priced between the 6300 and 6400, yet it is superior to both of them because it does have the 4 mb cache. I don't see the logic behind people telling you not to get the processor since it is faster than the 6300 due to the cache, albeit not by much, but it also isn't priced much more. I would say this 3040 is the best bang for your buck out right now. Workstation chips also tend to have higher tolerances (voltages, heat, etc..) , since they are often going to be used in more hostile enviroments than a desktop chip. What this theoretically means is that the chips have the potential to overclock better. A good example would be the Opteron 165 frenzy going on before the Conroe was released.

I am sorry but almost of the things you have said so far are either completely wrong or are not completely true due to a lack of knowledge on your part. What you said about the quadro's not needing "3d" performance is wrong. some CAD applications, 3dsmax, maya, etc... render in 3d, and the higher the fillrate of the graphics card, the faster rendering can be finished.

About overclocking reducing the lifespan "no matter what," you are also wrong. It is heat that kills the processor, not clockspeed. What this means is that at stock voltage, if you can keep the temperatures the same while overclocked (easily done with better cooling solutions than the stock one provided), this means the lifespan of the chip would be the same. Based on your theory, the 6400 is just an overclocked 6300, and it's lifespan should be less, since you are "pushing more power into the 6400." Also, all chips made have some overhead, and are always rated a little bit lower than what it is capable of. It's common engineering practice. Basically overclocking can be bad if the user doesn't understand the basics of what it actually means and how it works, but a properly overclocked chip will last just as long as one at default speeds.

Where is everyone getting this 4 Mb L2 cached in the 3040?? The Intel page (here) says it has no L2 cache and 2 Mb's of L3 cache..
Maybe I'm reading it wrong though, I have been awake for along time today..

BTW, isn't the dual core Xeon the same as any other Conroe chip? I thought Xeon's were just the cream of the crop, because they needed to be as stable as possible since they tend to run in servers most of the time. and they also have a multitude of cache options, depending on how insane of a price the customer wants to pay.
Once again, I could be wrong, won't be the first or last time...

Anyway if you get 2 7900GTO's in SLI you'll get A LOT more power than a 7950x2 for the same price.

hmm thats weird, because newegg shows 4mb of L2 cache:

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16819117102

And yes, the Xeon seems to be the same as the "regular" Conroes... It looks like the Opteron vs Athlons again

Maybe the egg page has an error. I would think Intel would know their own CPU's..

and I did a on Intel Xeon 3040, but that didn't help much.. All the pages have different info on them, but the ones that list it as having 4 Mb's of L2 cache also link to the egg..