Intel Pentium E2180 - Pentium Allendale Dual-Core 2.0 GHz LGA 775 65W Processor - BX80557E2180

Pros: It over-clocks at stock voltage to 3.0 Ghz, runs cool as a cucumber, and (virtually-speaking) can leap tall buildings with a single bound.

Cons: I can't call them "cons." I bought an E2140 for another member of the fam-dam-ily. The L2 cache is only 1MB -- same as an old Prescott. You get the bandwidth you're willing to pay for, and I wouldn't complain about the price on these. These E21x0 CPUs are priced less than $20 apart. At forums we speculated about Intel's binning process, quality control and retail specification process. Remember -- Intel is a dominant firm. My over-clocking exercises indicate to me that these E21x0 processors are one and the same. They lock the multipliers at the factory to "product-differentiate." If you get the E2160 or E2140, you can still squeeze the speed out of 'em, but you'll need to twist up the FSB and VCORE.

Overall Review: These things seem to configure under "motherboard" settings (for my mobo, anyway) to 0.003V below the retail-box maximum voltage or 1.35V. With FSB = 800 Mhz stock, they OC well beyond 1,066 (266 host-frequency) to about 1,200+ FSB/300-host-freq without anything more than fixing the VCORE at the 1.3500V value.

Pros: On a Biostar TForce TP35D2-A7, I have this baby at 8 * 430 = 3440Mhz with 1.38volts Memory is Ballistix PC2 8000. Everest reads 9330, write 3260. SuperPI 1M calculation in 17 seconds.

Cons: Has 1MB of L2, but when overclocked it doesn't effect it. Don't know about gaming but encoding is fine for me.

Overall Review: This is the perfect Budget Overclocker until Quad prices drops or Intel 45nm Penryn is released. Smart Choice... Newegg rocks... Great prices and Excellent customer service.

Pros: Fast at 2.0 Ghz - If that isn't enough speed for you it is easy to overclock for faster speeds

Cons: Some may see the 1 MB cache as a drawback but for Internet, ripping and Burning and an assortment of other routine tasks - nothing has stopped this processor

Overall Review: I have never overclocked any computer but I decided to give it a try based on other reviews. I am running it at 2.4 Ghz without any effort by a simple adjustment in the bios and it is completely stable with maybe one degree rise in temperature. This is with stock fan and heatsink on an Asrock 4CoreDual-Sata2 motherboard.

Pros: Surprisingly Fast at the stock speed. This chip replaced a Pentium 4 (Cedermill) 3.0Ghz and annihilates it in every benchmark and game. UT3 ran choppy on the P4, COD4 and Crysis needed to run at lower settings. 3DMark06 maxed out at 5000 marks before, and all thats with a 9600GSO SuperClock. With this lil cheap wanna-be Core2 Duo performance skyrocketed! UT3 now runs smooth as silk, COD4 and Crysis run at much higher settings and smoother, now I'm getting 7500 Marks in 3DMark06. Amazing little processor.

Cons: 1 MB of Cache and 800 Mhz Front Side Bus. But you get what you pay for. The Heatsink is a little wimpy, but enough for this processor. Worst con is the fact that most ignorant people don't know that this is really a Core2 Duo, with a bit less cache. Had some big doofus at work confuse this wonderful chip with the craptactular Pentium-D. ARGH!!!!

Overall Review: Good Processor, and very cheap. If you already have an old 945 motherboard that's compatible this is a great upgrade. Also, some of the Cheaper Athlon X2's are very comparable performance wise, and much cheaper. But this Pentium Dual Core OC's like mad, expect 3.2 Ghz, if your willing to get a good aftermarket HSF.

Pros: This works very fast for the price, and worked very well with the asus mother board I chose ASUS P5N-EM HDMI LGA 775 NVIDIA GeForce 7100/nForce 630i HDMI Micro ATX Intel Motherboard

Cons: If you are looking to build a high powered gaming computer this is not the chip for you.

Overall Review: I would highly recommend this chip.

Pros: Cool, fast, great!

Cons: None.

Overall Review: Was a great upgrade over my previous CPU, a P4 Prescott 3.0 GHz. I was expecting only an improvement for multi-tasking, but even single applications are improved noticeably without any overclocking.

Pros: This is the second one I've used to upgrade a system. If your building on a budget you can't go wrong. My son is a gamer and he is doing just fine with his. COD 4 is about the newest game he plays and the slow down is from the graphics card not the processor. Cheap price for a lot more power than the P4's I used to use, Not a power hog either.

Cons: None

Pros: For it's capabilities - the price is spectacular. You get what you pay for from Intel right now with it's sub-$200 processor's.

Cons: Small cache. Somewhat sluggish multi-threaded capabilities - but this a dual-core mind you.

Overall Review: Overall value is spectacular. Whether looking at an overclocking piece or as an everyday unit with good multitasking right out of the box - go with this processor.