E2180 vs E6550

[Pain53]

What are the main differences between the two? Pros? Cons?

Which do you guys think is better?

The E6550 is probably better stock.. but what about overclocked?

The E2180 is also cheaper and can overclock like crazy...

Anybody have some input?

 

[b1gapl]

The upside with the E6550, is the amount of L2 cache. It's 4MB vs. the E2180's 1MB. But I don't think it's much of a difference, unless you're using programs that are more dependent on cache.

I'd go with the E2180, because it's cheap, has a higher multiplier (so it's easier to overclock), and gives you the option of having to save more, for a better processor in the future. If you get the E2180 to around the 3.4-3.6GHz range, I think it will be equivalent to an E6550 at 3.2GHz, and the cache won't matter much at that point.

If you do want a little more cache than the E2180, and even a higher multiplier, check out the E4600 and E4700. They have 12x and 13x multipliers respectively, and both have 2MB of L2 cache.