Intel Core i5-3210M vs Intel Core 2 Quad Q6600

Core i5-3210M vs Core 2 Quad Q6600 comparison

Our benchmark analysis concludes that the Core i5-3210M performs better than the Core 2 Quad Q6600. Furthermore, our gaming benchmark shows that it also outperforms the Core 2 Quad Q6600 in all gaming tests too.

When comparing core counts for these CPUs, we notice that the Core 2 Quad Q6600 has significantly more cores with 4 cores compared to the Core i5-3210M that has 2 cores. But they both have the same number of threads. These CPUs have different clock speeds. Indeed, the Core i5-3210M has a slightly higher clock speed compared to the Core 2 Quad Q6600. A Core i5-3210M CPU outputs less heat than a Core 2 Quad Q6600 CPU because of its significantly lower TDP. This measures the amount of heat they output and can be used to estimate power consumption.

Modern CPUs generally have more logical cores than physical cores, this means that each core is split into multiple virtual cores, improving efficiency for parallel workloads. Indeed, the Core i5-3210M has more threads than cores. Each physical core is split into multiple threads.