Firs of all, hello.As per topic I'd like to upgrade my PC a bit and I'm on tight budget. As much as I'd like to get i7 it's out of question now. Right now I have core 2 duo E6750 running stable at 3.3GHz, 4GB Geil memory at 830MHz 4-4-4-12, Radeon 4850 512MB. All this on Win7 RC with FSX. I know this chip could go a little bit faster but the memory wouldn't (I tried). So the two options are: 1) get some better memory (like corsair dominator) and try to overclock the CPU more. But I don't think that would make much differenceor 2) change CPU for a quad core. But which one overclocks good? I can't afford q9550, so are q8400 or q9400 any good? How far can I push them?If they cannot be clocked will I get any performance gain at all? Currently I get 35FPS with simple aircraft (RealAir scout) on complex airports (Heathrow). Default Boeings run at 40-50 FPS but something more complex (like MD 11) gives me ~20FPS. I know FPS are not everything in FSX so will it help with microstuttering and blurries?To sum it up: will going from E6750 @3.3 to Q8400 or Q9400 make any difference?Thanks in advanceGreg

Microcenter was selling the Q9550 for $170 US recently, so you might check that out...it's a great deal that I took advantage of. This CPU overclocked to 3.4 easily, and I plan on pushing it a bit further. I've seen overclocks in excess of 4 GHz for it without water cooling.This Q9550 upgrade was from an E6600 (oc'd at 3.2) and has made a very significant difference in FSX in terms of smoothness and crisp scenery, even though FPS is still limited in urban areas and over detailed scenery addons.

You'll need to get a quad to the same speed as the dual core you're running now if you want the same FPS roughlyI quad would help with the microstutters some, but I'd rather have more 500MHz more clock that going quad core routeI'd look for a Q9550, heres one for 220 @ newegghttp://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx...N82E16819115041

I got in on the Q9550 at MicroCenter at the aforementioned $169 price and it's been well worth it. 4GHz was ridiculously easy to achieve. Details in sig.

I got in on the Q9550 at MicroCenter at the aforementioned $169 price and it's been well worth it. 4GHz was ridiculously easy to achieve. Details in sig.

Very true...I wanted to move to an i7 but just couldn't get the "loan" from the family "CFO"...but I've been very pleased with the boost in performance. Here's my specs:Asus P5QC MBQ9550 Core 2 CPU oc 3.4 GHz4 GB OCZ PC2 6400 DDR2 RAMBFG GeForce 275 GTX (stock speeds)Corsair 850HX PSU1 WD Raptor X 150 GB SATA HDD2 Seagate 320 GB SATA HDDs1 Seagate 1 TB HDDSoundBlaster X-Fi XtremeGamer Fatal1ty ProPioneer DVR-111D DVD-RW PATALite-On LH-20A1S DVD-RW SATANEC MultiSync 90GX 19" LCDWin Vista Home Premium (64 bit)Forceware 182.50 video driver

Thanks for suggestions.I forgot to mention that I'm in England. That means all the good deals on PC components you guys have in US are unavailable. Q9550 costs here 164 GBP which is roughly 262$ :( the Q9400 goes for about 30-40$ less and Q8400 another 30-40$ less. Newegg and MicroCenter don't do internation deliveries.

If you want more performance from your existing setup then you can raise your memory timings to 5-5-5-15 and try to o/c further. That should help your RAM stretch its legs.

Well I went and spent some money I didn't have and got myself Q9550. Not much gain in FPS but a lot smoother, crisper and consistent.I managed to overclock it to 3.6GHz and run prime95 for 8 hrs on blend and 8hrs of small FFT without problems at around 65C. But FSX crashes after few minutes. I guess the memory can't cope with 860MHz but it runs stable at 830MHz. Lowering timings doesn't help. I have 4x1 GB but I bought them separately and even that they're same brand and timings the voltage is different. So I think that's what causing troubles.FSX runs stable at 3.5GHz. Temps went down to about 55C and 60C when running prime. I don't think I can go any higher with my cooler (Zalman9700) and this memory. Overall I'm very happy with the results, although I'm broke :)