CPU upgrade from E6300 - more speed & less power consump

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Doors
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Joined: Sat Mar 17, 2007 3:06 am

CPU upgrade from E6300 - more speed & less power consump

Post by Doors » Wed Nov 04, 2009 3:16 am

Hi - any thoughts on what CPU (if any) would be more powerful but use less power than my current core2 6300 (1.86GHz)? It's on a 775 socket. I don't know much about CPU's but presume they have moved on uite a bit since I got this.

I will get a new motherboard if need be. I don't game, just use my PC for work, but want to remove my final fan in the case (on the Skythe Ninja heatsink) to get that silent PC. I've just upgraded to a SSD so no noice there either.

Thermaltkae Mozart Tx case (big, plenty of room)
CPU Core2 6300
Asrock mobo with Intel GMA950 built in graphics (o.k. not great, but works fine)
picoPSU with extrnal 120W brick
Scythe Ninja heatsink
Noctua NF-S12 fan
Kingston 64 Gig SSD


Cheers,
Doors.
Last edited by Doors on Wed Nov 04, 2009 6:44 am, edited 1 time in total.

b_rubenstein
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Post by b_rubenstein » Wed Nov 04, 2009 4:31 am

Your E6300 is based on the 65nm Conroe core and all the newer dual core CPUs (including the current E6300) are based on the 45nm Wolfdale core and are more efficient. Something like the E5300 would run faster and use less power than what you have now.

What you do have to do before buying a new CPU is to go to the Asrock web site, see what the current version of the BIOS is and check their compatible CPU list. Not all motherboards that worked with Conroe core chips are compatible with Wolfdale chips.

MikeC
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Post by MikeC » Wed Nov 04, 2009 8:16 am

Have you tried undervolting your CPU? If the board BIOS supports it, try going down from the default voltage by incremental steps -- say .05V or .1V -- till your system freezes or crashes, then go back up a step and see if the system is stable -- ie run some general benchmarking program or prime95 or whatever for a little while. Every 0.1V drop will reduce CPU power draw at load by >10% or more, depending on what the default voltage is.

Several SPCR articles on the topic:

CPU Undervolting & Underclocking: A Primer
[url=http://www.silentpcreview.com/article102-page1.html]Undervolting T'Bred-B CPUs with José Ã

alleycat
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Post by alleycat » Thu Nov 05, 2009 6:51 am

As Mr Rubenstein said, the modern E6300 is a faster version of the old one, running at 2.8GHz using 45nm technology. The new E6300 will run cooler and they're pretty cheap. You can easily run the Ninja without a fan on it, but I would definitely use a low speed rear fan to exhaust heat out of the case, like Mike suggested.

Doors
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Joined: Sat Mar 17, 2007 3:06 am

Post by Doors » Thu Nov 05, 2009 7:21 am

Thanks Mike and Alleycat,

Well, the idea of a pc with absolutely no moving parts might not be possible then - and I'll take your advice and keep the fan.

However, I never had any luck with the Zalman ZM-MFC2 fan controler or in using the high or low setting cables to set the speed manually - whatever I did it was still loud enough to hear. Maybe a simple manual fan controler would be better suited so I can set the speed more precisely. I'd prefer not to mess with the BIOS as a) I'm not expert enough and b) I don't think my cheap mobo allows you to change much.

My current temps using Speed Fan are:

System: 38
CPU: 35
AUX: 45
Core 0: 35
Core 1: 39

kater
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Post by kater » Thu Nov 05, 2009 7:46 am

Upgrading from the old E6300 to the new one will definitely give good results - more oomph, less power use, lower temps.

The only real performance gain you will have here will come from higher clock, as both chips have the same amount of cache - much needed for gaming. If you don't play games, and your rig says you don't, this would be a good step (to get PDC E6300).

To make things a wee cheaper you can get sth. like E5300 - practically the same as E6300. E5300 doesn't have virtualization, the rest is the same. Yeah, def clock is different but since both CPUs overclock like mad I doubt this makes any difference. Just make sure your mobo can take new 45nm CPUs.

As said before, a fanless Ninja will work well with both of these. My E6300, even OCed, runs v cool and draws v little power.

MikeC
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Post by MikeC » Thu Nov 05, 2009 7:46 am

You might also consider a new fan -- there are probably quieter ones around.

alleycat
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Post by alleycat » Thu Nov 05, 2009 7:50 am

Those temps are great. I'm more of a "set and forget" guy, and tend to hardwire my fans at 5V, which will be fine for the scenario I mentioned above. The only fan controllers I've ever used are one I built myself, or the Zalman Fanmate (set to minimum) which is really cheap.

Doors
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Post by Doors » Fri Nov 06, 2009 2:33 am

Hi,

I looked up the new E6300 and compared it to my E6300 on the Intel website - and they both have the same 65W consumption?

http://ark.intel.com/ProductCollection. ... lyID=41877 & http://ark.intel.com/ProductCollection. ... lyID=26547

The later (Pentium 45nm) E6300 also has a higher TCase temperature - whatever that means?

I've emailed AsRock about the motherboard as I can't tell from this link if it can take the new 45mm processors: http://www.asrock.com/mb/overview.asp?M ... OE945G-DVI

Final thoughts - is it worth waiting for 'the next thing' in processors? I mean, is there anything new coming out shortly that would be worth waiting for instead. These I5 and I7's seem very expensive and the Atoms still aren't powerful enough. Somthing inbetween would be good - but i guess that's what the E6300 is?

p.s. the fan and PSU and heatsink I choose were from the reviews on this website by Mike Chin, though 2-3 years ago now.

kater
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Post by kater » Fri Nov 06, 2009 2:56 am

Some time ago, when I still had my previous E6750 (same core as yours, only 4MB cache) and the then brand new PDC E6300 I compared them in terms of power, temps and performance. When both worked at 3200 MHz (def V) they drew 120W and 106W in idle, at wall, respectively. When loaded with Orthos they drew 179W and 148W. Also, the E6300 worked at 50 C then and the E6750 had 57 C. Same setup, of course. I also included E8200 in this comparison and its numbers are almost identical to PDC E6300. Intel's data should be, IMO, treated more like a "range". Anyway, a 45nm CPU will always be cooler and less power hungry than a 65nm CPU.

Mobo - well, the website only lists Conroes, Conroe-L, and older (irrelevant here) CPUs so a 45nm CPU might be a no-no. To boot, no mention of Q6600 is there, so another indication the chipset has serious limitations. The 945G chipset is oldish and not hi-endish, the chances of a 45nm CPU working there are slim. But... a quick brows thru some forums shows there is hope - had not time to research it but guys are talking of new bioses making it possible to run 45nm CPUs on this chipset with GB boards. Might be that Asrock will also work.

Waiting for sth in between? Don't think so. The lineup is already saturated with all kinds of CPUs, both in 65nm and 45nm flavors.

Doors
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Post by Doors » Fri Nov 06, 2009 3:10 am

Thanks - I think it might be time then to get a new mobo as well. I can always use the old one with the old cpu in my soon to be built home server with my old Seasonic S-430, so nothing will go to waste.

As for a new board, I'll take a look at the reviews on Silent PC Review. I don't need anything special - built in wifi and bluetooth would be great, so I don't have to clutter up the back with dongles etc. Built in graphics would also be good as I don't game and don't want the extra power consumption of a graphics card as I'm using the pico PSU.

E6300 it is then - at least it's half the price it was when I bought the very first E6300 when these core duos had just come out.

b_rubenstein
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Post by b_rubenstein » Fri Nov 06, 2009 4:01 am

If you don't have a pressing need to upgrade now, it might be worth it to wait for next year. Intel will be bringing out an i3 dual core processor with 32nm features, and the i5 & i7 will also be moved to 32nm process.

The Max power dissipation is related more to the physical CPU package. As the CPU's go through die shrinks the Vcc drops so the actual power drops. The current 45nm dual core CPUs only consume 6w at idle. The 32s should be better.

Trav1s
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Post by Trav1s » Fri Nov 06, 2009 6:48 am

kater wrote:Upgrading from the old E6300 to the new one will definitely give good results - more oomph, less power use, lower temps.

The only real performance gain you will have here will come from higher clock, as both chips have the same amount of cache - much needed for gaming. If you don't play games, and your rig says you don't, this would be a good step (to get PDC E6300).

To make things a wee cheaper you can get sth. like E5300 - practically the same as E6300. E5300 doesn't have virtualization, the rest is the same. Yeah, def clock is different but since both CPUs overclock like mad I doubt this makes any difference. Just make sure your mobo can take new 45nm CPUs.

As said before, a fanless Ninja will work well with both of these. My E6300, even OCed, runs v cool and draws v little power.
I second the e5200/e5300. I have one of each and they are quite impressive processors. The definitely are cool and quiet and have more than enough power for everyday tasks like word processing, listening to music and surfing teh web.
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6819116074

I am eyeing the e3200 for a file server... it's a 45nm processor that is OC happy and is $52 w/free shipping
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.a ... 6819116265

ilovejedd
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Post by ilovejedd » Fri Nov 06, 2009 7:06 am

There's also the E3200/E3300 which shouldn't be that far off from the E5200. From reviews, it consumes even less power and it even has VT to boot.

As an upgrade, though, the Pentium E6300 is nicer since it's got the same cache and FSB as the older Core 2 Duo E6300 and is 1GHz faster.

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