3700+ SD vs 3800+ Venice?

[digerati]

Price difference aside, which processor is "better"?

An Athlon64 3700+ San Diego with it's 1mb of L2 or a 3800+ Venice with only half the L2 but 0.2 more ghz (2.2 vs 2.4ghz)?

The system it would be going into would be a gaming rig with a 7900gt vidcard and 2x1gb of Corsair XMS pc3200.

Head to head at stock, which would be better in realworld use, the extra L2 or the extra ghz?

How about when overclocking comes in to play?

Thanks!

 

[Petros]

I have a 3700+ SD you speak of. Unfortunately, I don't have much to compare it to. I did, however, find a review for you to read!

 

[the.quixotic]

I have heard from a few places that, in gaming specifically, sometimes too much cache can actually hinder performance. However, 1mb is definately not too much, but i suspect for gaming the extra 200mhz will do a lot more than the extra 512K cache.

 

[Steevo]

The 3700+ is almost as overclockable as the 4000+.


I can reach 2.9Ghz and be rock solid with a Freezer 64 Pro. 3.0 Won't let me fold though, and 3.1 is flakey.

 

[lancer]

The 3700 SD is a better CPU, go to toms hardware, and look at the CPU charts the 3700 usually scores above the 3800 venice, i also specifically looked at both CPUS for myself and came to this conclusion.