Server Processor Vs. Desktop Processor

[Trace]

I want to build a new system, and I was wondering just what the differences between a sever processor and a desktop processor are.

Would I see gaming performance decrease by using a Quad Server Core or a Quad Desktop Core?

I wanted to build a dual socket server core and have 8 physical cores.

Thoughts?

[slaveofconvention]

Very few games take advantage of more than one or two cores, those few that do are set up for 4 cores max - I wouldn't imagine 8 cores would make a big difference, other than to your bank balance after the build.

[Trace]

So stay with my Q6600 for a while longer?

[slaveofconvention]

I'm running a Q6700 and have no plans to upgrade for quite some time lol

I think the only upgrade it'll get will be to the former top-of-the range 775 CPU just before they discontinue them, and before they get rare and stupidly priced :p

[x88x]

The difference between s775 Xeons and C2Qs are pretty much nill in terms of actual use. The only difference is that the Xeons will often have more thermal headroom.

As for having dual quads, slave's right; you won't really see any improvement in gaming performance, but if you're gonna be doing other stuff, you might.

One other thing to think about if you want to do a dual socket board, is that most dual-775 boards require FBDIMMs, which are more expensive and slower, because they do so much error checking.

[Technochicken]

The main difference between s771(servers) and 775(desktops) is that 771 cpu's have 2 front side buses, so they can communicate with each other as well as the other components.

[Trace]

I was going to go AMD opteron's with DDR2 (I think)
But I wanted to be able to multi multi task
and Im pretty sure I've killed this Q6600 with Electrical Degradation.

[x88x]

With Opterons, make sure that if the MBB requires it, that you're using registered/ECC RAM. It's also more expensive than normal RAM (again with error checking/etc), but most multi-socket MBBs won't work without it.

[Trace]

Alright, thanks for the input guys!

[knowledgegranted]

I think there is something missing here; Server processors are also meant to be a lot more stable than the generic desktop processor. They are *sometimes* under volted and under clocked.