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    Processor cache size, P84/600 vs P9500

    Discussion in 'Hardware Components and Aftermarket Upgrades' started by PhoenixFlare500, Oct 7, 2008.

  1. PhoenixFlare500

    PhoenixFlare500 Notebook Geek

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    Hey guys, I'm trying to decide between these three processors:
    Intel® P8400 45nm "Montevina" Core™2 Duo 2.26GHz w/3MB L2 On-die cache - 1066MHz FSB 25 watt
    Intel® P8600 45nm "Montevina" Core™2 Duo 2.40GHz w/3MB L2 On-die cache - 1066MHz FSB 25 watt (+$55)
    Intel® P9500 45nm "Montevina" Core™2 Duo 2.53GHz w/6MB L2 On-die cache - 1066MHz FSB 25 watt (+$165)

    The total cost will be over $2000 so I'm wondering if $55 is really that big of a difference for the first two. As for the third one, I'd like to know what difference the cache size makes and whether it's worth another $110 dollars. What kind of tasks would benefit by a 6MB cache versus a 3MB one and by how much?

    Thanks for your help. :)
     
    PhoenixFlare500, Oct 7, 2008
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  2. Phil

    Phil Retired

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    Phil, Oct 7, 2008
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  3. Ethyriel

    Ethyriel Notebook Deity

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    Big caches won't benefit things like games all that much, it's too unpredictable to be cached effectively. Where it really helps is with large applications with lots of unrelated tasks, like big office apps and such.

    Seeing that you're running Linux, honestly, you probably won't notice unless you're experimenting with databases or compiling a lot of code. I think some media encoding might benefit substantially, as well, but don't quote me on that.
     
    Ethyriel, Oct 7, 2008
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  4. PhoenixFlare500

    PhoenixFlare500 Notebook Geek

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    Hehe Linux. If you thought I was using Linux because of my avatar, look at it again. Other than that I have no idea how you'd get that idea.

    About the whole gaming thing, keep in mind this computer will not be used only for games, I'll be doing lots of student-type stuff in here as well such as Microsoft Office, web, MSN, watching movies, listening to music, lots of different stuff. All at the same time (I realize that's more of a RAM issue). I'll probably wanna do a little bit of photoshop and stuff too if I get the chance.
     
    PhoenixFlare500, Oct 7, 2008
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  5. Ethyriel

    Ethyriel Notebook Deity

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    Ah, ok

    Well, why the hell aren't you using Linux? ;)

    I really don't think it's going to be worth the price. You won't notice a difference being dual core, especially if you have enough RAM. If you're really concerned about perceived performance, make sure you get a 7200 RPM drive, and 4GB on a 64bit OS.

    Read this and see if you think you'll need it, especially the locality parts
    http://arstechnica.com/articles/paedia/cpu/caching.ars
     
    Ethyriel, Oct 7, 2008
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  6. PhoenixFlare500

    PhoenixFlare500 Notebook Geek

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    Ugh, it's 3:00 in the morning where I live, my brain is definitely not functional right now. Thank you very much for the link though, I'll read this tomorrow and hopefully be able to understand this.

    As for Linux, I just never liked using it. We used it in computer science in high school for a bit and it wasn't really interesting. Then we had to use it in first year physics in university and that's when I really started to hate it.
     
    PhoenixFlare500, Oct 7, 2008
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