Intel Pentium E6300 - Pentium Wolfdale Dual-Core 2.8 GHz LGA 775 65W Processor - BX80571E6300

Pros: This is for the non-enthusiast browsing Newegg.

As most on Newegg know, the E6300 is a Core 2 Duo Wolfdale CPU similar to the E8000 series. As a matter of fact, every CPU Intel currently manufactures are Core 2's, even the "Celeron" processors are really lower clocked Centrino procs used in laptops. This means that you can achieve beyond E8600 specs very easily with this $91 CPU!

It has a high multiplier at 10.5 that has shown speeds past 4GHZ on air. To get E8600 stock speed of 3.33GHZ stable like I have for my mothers computer, all you need to do is have a motherboard that you can change the front side bus speed (that is set to a default of 266) and change it to 317 x 10.5 to equal 3.33GHZ!

I put together a second build for myself and have it at 3.6GHZ stable w/ a 10.5 multiplier x 343 front side bus. I am very impressed with this low price Core 2 Duo!

You can go much higher of course but you would need to know a little more about overclocking from other reviews.

Cons: The 2MB L2 cache is a con albeit a very minor one. You lose a tiny bit of overclocking potential seen in the E7000 series w/ a 3MB L2 cache.

Overall Review: Also has Virtualization Tech which is required to run XP mode in Windows 7. By this alone, it is better than the E7000 series to me.

Dont be fooled by the names "Celeron" or "Pentium" anymore, they are ALL Core 2 Duos that perform quite well, have high overclocking potential, and are power efficient.

Pros: Smooth, crisp running processor

Cons: It's time Intel is held accountable for those garbage fans/heatsinks supplied with their processors. I'd rather spend the extra $10 and get something that will mount securely.

Overall Review: Why would Intel supply such a poor quality accessory with such great processors? It almost makes me want to go back to AMD. Spend the 10 bucks and get the MASSCOOL 8WT15-38, a very nice fan/heatsink for the money. Intel, please listen to your customers.