Vostro CPU upgrade advice ...

What is better for performance, not concerned with price at this time:

a 2.5 Ghz w/ 6 MB L2 cache on a 45nm chip (Edit T9300)or
a 2.8 Ghz w/ 4 MB L2 cache on a 65nm chip (edit X7900) ?

I am replacing a 1.4 w/ 2 Mb on a 65nm chip.

I am looking for quicker boot, app start ups, and some gaming.


Please reply with advice.

 

Get a T8100 and a good SSD instead. Otherwise, the T9500 is probably a tiny bit faster than the [X7900?], but they should pretty similar performance wise.

 

I mean if pricing doesn't matter go with an X9000... 2.8 GHz dual core...you might be able to mod the cooling system to handle it. The Vostro 1500 has a dedicated heatpipe for the CPU.

 

I was only considering pricing on the 2 choices I asked about, The X 9000 is another 100.00.

 

I have the Seagate momentious (sp) 500 gig coming and wanted a CPU upgrade to complement it.

 

Oh okay you were referring to the 2.

45nm will offer you lower temperatures but the Vostro 1500 isn't prone to overheating unlike it's HP counterparts so I would go for the 2.8 GHz chip.

While you are there I would clean out all the heatsinks/heatfins/fans and repaste the CPU.

 

I have Arctic silver 3 from a leftover project ... Is this still a good paste to use on an upgrade?