About to upgrade core components on PC

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Hi allSee my current system specs in my sig. On Thursday or Friday I will be picking up and installing some new components:Replace Q6600 with Q9550 (and probablyt overclock)Replace MSI 975X m/b with MSI X48C PlatinumReplace 4gb Corsair DDR2-800 RAM with 4gb DDR3-1333mhz RAMI have benchmarked FSX on my current system (as of today) using the FSX Benchmark flight, high config settings and FRAPS and will run another benchmark post-upgrade and chart and post the results when the rebuild is done.My time is limited but if anyone has anything in particular they want tested on a before/after basis, please let me know ASAP and I will see what I can do.Andrew

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Are you sure you want to do that? Any difference will relate 1:1 to the CPU's clock. Actually you are trading down in potential CPU performance. The 6600 has a 9X multi and the 9550 only has an 8.5X. That will limit any O/C. Ram speed and mobo version will make no difference. You're best bet is to spend $60 on a good CPU cooler and O/C that 6600 to 3.6Ghz. http://www.jab-tech.com/product.php?productid=3762(Then buy us all pizza with all the dough you saved.)

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LOL ... sadly I am on a Q6600 B3 stepping (as I bought from one of the first released batches) and they do not overclock well at all ... in fact the best I can get is an additional 300mhz (2.7ghz) with high-end air cooling and arctic silver, no matter what I do on the cooling and vcore front. I definitely got a pretty poor Q6600 which, unfortunately, can happen ...With a Q9550 I will be able to clock up much higher because of the headroom a slightly lower multiplier provides and the lower heat output from the 45nms fabrication - I have seen plenty of 9550s clocked to around 3.8ghz. In addition, the 12MB cache on the Q9550 is 50% larger than on my Q6600.However, we will see when I get the gear in the box and run the benchmark. Funnily enuff, when I went from a duo to a quad when they first came out everyone said not to - I would see a decrease in performance on FSX etc because of the lower core speeds - of course, that was not the case.Note that this is my work machine, too, as I work from home, and I need more grunt on the processing side given the volume of applications I use at any one time so that is a significant part of the motivation to upgrade.Thanks, though, for the input - it is always valuable to get people's comments here and I appreciate that you took time to respond and provide feedback. Hopefully the benchmarking will bear out some reasonable performance increase although, for me, I can run FSX (as I GA fly only) at pretty much 50fps - 60fps all the time so it is not as if I am 'need' of more power.Andrew

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Still consider, the 9550 goes to 3.8 for $500 and needs more expensive ram and a new mobo to get there . . . and the 6600 (slacr) goes to 3.6 for $180, reuses your plain-jane DDR2-800 and that 975 mobo (those 975s run at 400 no problem and ram speed is irrelevant). If its a decent cooler, the 6600 'thermals' are not a problem. If it's not, ya gotta get a decent CPU cooler anyway. The cache provides no performance advantage. They just had extra room on that 45nm die so marketing said "we can sell cache." That will keep you going til the Nehalem shows up. However on the other hand, that's ~ $1000+ in additional expense for 200Mhz of CPU clock . . . just the way Intel planned it. If it's just gotta be now, the 6600 gets 95% or the performance for ~ 10% of the price. If a builder's going to go the 'full-dollar distance,' it might as well be with Nehalem - in 2 more months - . The prices will be competitive with the current Qs and X mobos.And too, its not about ever increasing FRAPS FPS runs. It's about - smooth - frames at 30FPS. Anything above that does not matter for FS gameplay. Most certainly, an extra 200Mhz won't make or break it. 200Mhz is worth, Maybe, an extra 5% on the GA traffic slider. Maybe.

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Hrmm .. now you're making some valuable points. And I was all decided ;-) I'll talk to my wholesalers (this gear is paid for by my company so i don't have to outlay anything and we just depreciate it against our tax for three years so it is virtually free in the medium term). I have never been confident I would be able to get a G0 stepped core up to 3.6ghz but you seem awful confident so ... perhaps it is doable? My long-term experience with savage overclocking has been ordinary at best but maybe you're right ...Cheers for your input Sam ... I'll kep you posted.A :-)