iMac processor upgrade from E8335

I'm looking at the possibility of upgrading my iMac (Early 2008)'s processor from an E8335. I'm not that knowledgable about processors (though I do feel competent enough with the guts of the iMac to affect the upgrade), so I thought I'd ask some questions before diving in.

The most important question, of course, is which one? Looking around, it seems that the E8335 and the T9900 are the best options, with the T9900 coming out on top, but I could very easily be missing something.

Does anyone know if the T9900 will even work as a replacement for the E8335? I can't see any reason why not, but then as I said, I don't know tons about processor replacement, except how to physically do it. It does seem that any Socket P processor with a TDP less than the original's ( 35? 44?) ought to work.

Is this even worth bothering with? Is the potential speed boost worth the cost and effort?

 

Not worth the cost or effort... at all. Not even sure the iMac would recognize the new CPU.

The iMac probably only supports CPU's that were offered as shipping options.

 

Any Penryn processor should work in there. The iMac will most likely not recognize the processor's name, but that doesn't matter. The iMac specific and normal Penryn processors share the same microcode, so the iMac will definitely know what to do with it.

Whether it is worth it or not depends on the cost and trouble you want to go through to replace the processor. I've read that some of the earlier iMacs of that style could be taken apart without too much effort, but then others require a whole lot of shenanigans to break them down. Depending on your comfort level with hardware, it may or may not be worth it to you.

 

I'm not worried about the effort to physically replace the processor; I'm fairly confident I can figure it out, and it will be interesting to do. My question is twofold: 1) What's the best processor to use? How do I figure that out? and 2) How much of a speed boost, roughly speaking, should I expect?

 

Thanks for the response. I'm not too worried about the difficulty of doing the replacement; I'm pretty sure I can do it, and it will be an interesting project. My question is twofold: 1) What's the best processor to use? and 2) How much benefit, roughly speaking, should I expect to see?

Thanks again!