e6300, 3.7GHz for $300

[Celegorm]

why dont you want the 680i? i have it and i've oc'ed my E6600 to 2.95. I have gotten up to 3.3 stable, but i didn't want my voltages that high, so i lowered it.

 

[ownage]

680i = hot chipset and the motheboard manufacturers give you a whole bunch of crappy heatpipes.

 

[alvino]

680i = The Suck. Like Ownage said, it runs hot and results in motherboard manufacturers using heatpipes to clutter the motherboard. Some of the best chipsets for the Core 2 Duo are from Intel themselves.

 

[hascet]

ya i've got a P965 mobo(asus p5b deluxe) and some crucial ddr2 1000, i just oc'ed my e6600 to 3.8Ghz stable so i'de say that that combo is pretty solid

 

[alvino]

Yeah, the P965 chipset is pretty good. I'm thinking about using it when I upgrade to Core 2 Duo.

 

[Celegorm]

i wouldn't say the 680 chipset is hot, unless 31 is hot. The asus boards i've seen with it did a bad job with the clutter yes, but they way it was done on my board, it doesn't interfere with anything.

 

[alvino]

Personally, theres only three chipsets I would use for the Core 2 Duo.

ATI RD600, Intel 975X & Intel P965. Those are nice chipsets with great overclocking performance.

I can't wait to see the DFI Infinity P965 board. From what I've heard, it's quite a beast at overclocking for a good price.

 

[lhuser]

I heard that some VIA chipsets can run it and the 945 series is where C2D starts.

 

[ownage]

but you see, those are not worth getting with the performance to price ratio. RD600 is good, but the clock to clock performance is not up to par with the other chipsets. 680i is very cluttered and runs hot, i would say hottest out of all the chipsets when running high vMCH, but when the subtimings are tightened, you can get roughly the same performance as 975x. P965 is really awesome, high FSB and DRAM clocks while running very cool. And the best in Super Pi 32M

 

[Celegorm]

what do you consider hot?