xguntherc

Hmm.. As to above as Dzom said.. yes and no..

Overclocking your GPU will most likely lower the life span.. but only a little bit.. if it's a small overclock you should be ok.. Also there is no such thing as a 8600 GTX.. could you find out what cards you actually have?? I'm guessin 8600 GTS.. or 8800 GTX.. let me kno.

and as for the Q6600.. the Quad cores run great, nothing slows them down, or nothing slows mine down.. and they are beasts. But Overclocking is fun, you get good results, and it's interesting to learn how it all works and effects everything.. I have the Q6700 and it's OC'd to 3.33GHz I had it stable at 3.5GHz no problem but like John said above, makes more heat and 3.5 was a little more heat than I wanted.. so back down to 3.33GHz I went.

Will OC'n ruin your CPU.. yes and no, depends on how you do it.. First off, What motherboard do you have, as that will help us in deciding how easy an OC would be. Also Overclocking CAN lower the CPU's lifespan, but generally they are built to last longer than YOU are.. so if your careful, you'll be fine. the only thing that will kill your CPU is heat.. if you have sufficient cooling, you can OC that thing to 3.8GHz.. but thats a slow and dangerous thing to get done.

The general rule in OC'n is keep the temps low and you'll be ok. Also if you mess with the Voltage and crank up the volts for an OC, thats when you ruin your CPU. but Small to no Voltage change and a small increase is completely safe.. like mine, I'm at 3.9 with only a .50 voltage increase... and thats safe..

So it's completely up to you.. First off what Mobo do you have, and what graphics card do you really have..???