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From: Ivan Voras <ivoras@freebsd.org>
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In-Reply-To: <C7C53AE3.2441C%jon.otterholm@ide.resurscentrum.se>
Subject: Re: Choosing CPU for router
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On 03/16/10 13:40, Jon Otterholm wrote:
> Hi.
>
> In the process to build a new router and want to choose the best possible
> CPU for the job.
>
> Narrowed it down to the following:
>
> Intel Q9650 3,0Ghz
> Intel i7-965/975 3,2Ghz/3,33Ghz

Both are overkill, but in general here you should go for clock speed 
instead of multicore abilities. If you can get it, you will be better 
off with a 3.5 GHz dual-core CPU (like Xeon 52xx) than a 3 GHz quad-core 
CPU. Additional cores will not be used by network processing in your case.

Better invest the money in a good network card.

> What would be the benefit from a Xeon?

Stability, but that also comes from using better motherboards, ECC 
memory, etc, not only from the CPU.