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geekhack Community => Other Geeky Stuff => Topic started by: Phaedrus2129 on Fri, 23 July 2010, 19:18:23

Title: Intel Flips Bird to Enthusiasts
Post by: Phaedrus2129 on Fri, 23 July 2010, 19:18:23: Quote
A video leaked to HKEPC and posted on YouTube (see from 2mins onwards) confirms the fact that only a 2-3 per cent OC via Base Clock adjustments will be possible. This is because Intel has tied the speed of every bus (USB, SATA, PCI, PCI-E, CPU cores, Uncore, memory etc) to a single internal clock generator issuing the basic 100MHz Base Clock.

...

Intel still plans to sell K-series CPUs which come with an unlocked CPU multiplier - and with this move, the K-series CPUs start to make a lot more sense, as they will be the only Intel CPUs capable of overclocking. Is this move a slap in the face for enthusiasts that will send them towards an AMD Fusion platform or are CPUs just getting fast enough that overclocking really doesn't matter that much to you any more?
Source (http://www.bit-tech.net/news/hardware/2010/07/22/intel-to-limit-sandy-bridge-overclocking/1)

I don't care if it's necessary or not, if I want to overclock my CPU to 6GHz under liquid nitrogen cooling, I want to overclock my ****ing CPU.

This is both good news and bad news for AMD. On the plus side, this will drive nearly all enthusiasts to use AMD CPUs. I mean, imagine taking a $50 2.2GHz dual core and unlocking/overclocking it into a 4GHz quad core, and compare that to spending $250 for a special "K" edition processor which basically just gives you a guaranteed 10% overclock, no more no less. I know that I'm waiting for AMD's Bulldozer.

On the other hand, with cheaper motherboard costs Intel will be able to drop its platform prices for mainstream units down closer to AMD, which will give them a larger market share in the mainstream/budget markets. That could seriously impact AMD's bottom line, in a very bad way, as lower costs is one of the big drums AMD beats to convince people to come to them from Intel.

No matter what comes of this, it's going to seriously change the CPU market.
Title: Intel Flips Bird to Enthusiasts
Post by: microsoft windows on Fri, 23 July 2010, 19:21:47: Pentium III's are great for overclocking.
Title: Intel Flips Bird to Enthusiasts
Post by: ch_123 on Fri, 23 July 2010, 19:22:18: How much money will Intel really save on this?
Title: Intel Flips Bird to Enthusiasts
Post by: microsoft windows on Fri, 23 July 2010, 19:25:46: It won't make much of a difference. Consider the total amount of processors bought from Intel. Then think about the amount bought by overclockers. Maybe 0.1% at the most?
Title: Intel Flips Bird to Enthusiasts
Post by: gr1m on Fri, 23 July 2010, 19:26:23: And they have 3 new sockets planned (after 1366 and 1156). Why do Intel customers take this ****?
Title: Intel Flips Bird to Enthusiasts
Post by: Phaedrus2129 on Fri, 23 July 2010, 19:26:33: Quote from: microsoft windows;205792
Pentium III's are great for overclocking.

Athlon XP is better. Barton ftw! ;)

Quote from: ch_123;205793
How much money will Intel really save on this?

Probably like 10%, not an insignificant amount.
Title: Intel Flips Bird to Enthusiasts
Post by: Phaedrus2129 on Fri, 23 July 2010, 19:27:37: Quote from: microsoft windows;205796
It won't make much of a difference. Consider the total amount of processors bought from Intel. Then think about the amount bought by overclockers. Maybe 0.1% at the most?

I'm thinking more in the way it will affect AMD. Enthusiasts will be screwed by Intel no matter what they do, there's no doubt on that. I'm looking at AMD and their market share and role, and at the enthusiast market and how it will react.
Title: Intel Flips Bird to Enthusiasts
Post by: D-EJ915 on Fri, 23 July 2010, 19:32:27: Quote from: microsoft windows;205792
Pentium III's are great for overclocking.

no they're really not

Isn't AMD releasing a CPU with built-in GPU?
Title: Intel Flips Bird to Enthusiasts
Post by: instantkamera on Fri, 23 July 2010, 19:36:52: Quote from: gr1m;205798
And they have 3 new sockets planned (after 1366 and 1156). Why do Intel customers take this ****?

truth.
Title: Intel Flips Bird to Enthusiasts
Post by: Phaedrus2129 on Fri, 23 July 2010, 19:38:34: Quote from: D-EJ915;205803
no they're really not

Isn't AMD releasing a CPU with built-in GPU?

Intel is, it's the Sandy Bridge chip mentioned in the article. I don't know about AMD.
Title: Intel Flips Bird to Enthusiasts
Post by: gr1m on Fri, 23 July 2010, 19:40:10: AMD probably will jump on the CPUGPU boat (inevitably I'd say) but until then, their current chipsets take care of IGPs very well. The advantage to owning ATI I guess. Intel should integrate Larrabee into Sandy Bridge CPUs; oh shi-.
Title: Intel Flips Bird to Enthusiasts
Post by: kriminal on Fri, 23 July 2010, 19:45:36: didnt intel tank the on-die gpu thing? well atleast for now?
and yeah dunno about AMD\ATI creating on-die gpu's
Title: Intel Flips Bird to Enthusiasts
Post by: instantkamera on Fri, 23 July 2010, 19:47:00: Quote from: Phaedrus2129;205805
Intel is, it's the Sandy Bridge chip mentioned in the article. I don't know about AMD.

Quote from: gr1m;205807
AMD probably will jump on the CPUGPU boat (inevitably I'd say) but until then, their current chipsets take care of IGPs very well. The advantage to owning ATI I guess. Intel should integrate Larrabee into Sandy Bridge CPUs; oh shi-.

Quote from: kriminal;205811
didnt intel tank the on-die gpu thing? well atleast for now?
and yeah dunno about AMD\ATI creating on-die gpu's

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/AMD_Fusion
Title: Intel Flips Bird to Enthusiasts
Post by: Phaedrus2129 on Fri, 23 July 2010, 20:14:17: (http://www.deviantart.com/download/172476281/Sandy_Bridge_and_Bulldozer_by_Phaedrus2401.jpg)
Title: Intel Flips Bird to Enthusiasts
Post by: instantkamera on Fri, 23 July 2010, 20:22:53: Quote from: Phaedrus2129;205821
Show Image
(http://www.deviantart.com/download/172476281/Sandy_Bridge_and_Bulldozer_by_Phaedrus2401.jpg)

genius.
Title: Intel Flips Bird to Enthusiasts
Post by: instantkamera on Fri, 23 July 2010, 20:24:36: and seriously, I cant wait around for Bulldozer, I gotta build. But I DO hope that thing puts the fear a' god into Intel and their fanboys. If only for the sake of strong competition.
Title: Intel Flips Bird to Enthusiasts
Post by: gr1m on Fri, 23 July 2010, 22:22:54: I don't know if I should wait for Bulldozer or the 4-core Thubans. I heard the 960T was not going to be released retail, and since it's already been delayed, I might as well go all out and get a Bulldozer when it comes out. My motherboard, thank AMD, can fit it.
Title: Intel Flips Bird to Enthusiasts
Post by: EverythingIBM on Sat, 24 July 2010, 00:49:24: Quote from: Phaedrus2129;205789
Source (http://www.bit-tech.net/news/hardware/2010/07/22/intel-to-limit-sandy-bridge-overclocking/1)

I don't care if it's necessary or not, if I want to overclock my CPU to 6GHz under liquid nitrogen cooling, I want to overclock my ****ing CPU.

This is both good news and bad news for AMD. On the plus side, this will drive nearly all enthusiasts to use AMD CPUs. I mean, imagine taking a $50 2.2GHz dual core and unlocking/overclocking it into a 4GHz quad core, and compare that to spending $250 for a special "K" edition processor which basically just gives you a guaranteed 10% overclock, no more no less. I know that I'm waiting for AMD's Bulldozer.

On the other hand, with cheaper motherboard costs Intel will be able to drop its platform prices for mainstream units down closer to AMD, which will give them a larger market share in the mainstream/budget markets. That could seriously impact AMD's bottom line, in a very bad way, as lower costs is one of the big drums AMD beats to convince people to come to them from Intel.

No matter what comes of this, it's going to seriously change the CPU market.

This also proposes that AMD may follow Intel in suit to ALSO drop their prices.
If you think about it, it's kind of like how everything is outsourced to china (one manufacturer drops prices by producing it in china, so everyone does that). If Intel decides to disable overclocking features also reducing costs, then AMD will have no choice but to follow and reduce costs to compete with Intel.

So, it's not anything good.

I also don't really think merging the CPU & GPU together is a great idea... then you'd have to change them both if you only wanted to change one, rather than being able to choose over either or. Doubt that will catch on. I certainly never enjoyed the integrated "intel graphics" garbage.
Title: Intel Flips Bird to Enthusiasts
Post by: NamelessPFG on Sat, 24 July 2010, 02:47:40: I was thinking about holding out for Haswell or Rockwell before retiring my Kentsfield Q6600, but if this is true, that probably isn't going to happen since I wouldn't see Intel reversing their decision here.

Unless AMD follows suit as well, in which case I'm pretty screwed either way.

(Then again, I doubt I'll have any new games to justify getting anything faster, given the way the industry is heading and how all of my games with lower-than-ideal framerates are GPU-bottlenecked or just poorly optimized.)
Title: Intel Flips Bird to Enthusiasts
Post by: Findecanor on Sat, 24 July 2010, 03:07:38: Big effing deal if you can't overclock your CPU. Get a CPU that runs fast enough from the beginning!
Title: Intel Flips Bird to Enthusiasts
Post by: gr1m on Sat, 24 July 2010, 03:10:40: Quote from: Findecanor;205878
Big effing deal if you can't overclock your CPU. Get a CPU that runs fast enough from the beginning!

No factory CPU is as fast as the overclocked ones these days. They don't sell 4.2GHz i7s or anything.
Title: Intel Flips Bird to Enthusiasts
Post by: hyperlinked on Sat, 24 July 2010, 03:22:56: Quote from: gr1m;205879
No factory CPU is as fast as the overclocked ones these days. They don't sell 4.2GHz i7s or anything.

So allow me to sound like a n00b for a sec here... What's the reason why? Is it a safety issue so that they give the chip a ridiculous safety buffer so that there's zero chance of it giving them a bad name by melting down?
Title: Intel Flips Bird to Enthusiasts
Post by: gr1m on Sat, 24 July 2010, 03:28:11: It's more like the conditions required to support an overclocked CPU can't be taken for granted. For 4.2GHz on an i7, on the typical chips (there are golden ones made of good silicon and those get sold as the $1000 chips), you'll need good cooling (either a $90 D14 or $100+ custom water cooling) and a fairly decent motherboard as well to supply clean, stable power to the CPU for it to be able to run at 4.2GHz. Not to mention airflow across the motherboard to cool the power delivery components, a good power supply, etc.

When Intel makes these CPUs, they have to account for the people that are going to put them in $80 motherboards, or for OEMs who are going to put them in $20 motherboards (99.9% of their market in fact), and also for their own included stock coolers.

Still, it's not impossible if they use the very best chips to get a lot more out of it than a normal CPU. For example, the AMD Phenom II X4 965 runs at 3.4GHz and it meets the factory specifications for heat and voltage. That's pretty much as high as a lot of people overclock their CPUs. So you can also overclock a Phenom II X4 945 to 3.4GHz but you'll need the good cooling and motherboard to support it, whereas a 965 can do it wherever.
Title: Intel Flips Bird to Enthusiasts
Post by: ch_123 on Sat, 24 July 2010, 06:21:00: Quote from: hyperlinked;205884
So allow me to sound like a n00b for a sec here... What's the reason why? Is it a safety issue so that they give the chip a ridiculous safety buffer so that there's zero chance of it giving them a bad name by melting down?

Like everything else in life, there's a huge safety margin applied on these things. When you bear in mind that I know people who have a 2.4GHZ Q6600 running at near 4GHz 24/7 without issues, obviously someone is doing something wrong, and it's not the overclockers.

Quote
Big effing deal if you can't overclock your CPU. Get a CPU that runs fast enough from the beginning!

And spend 5-6x times the price for something that generally only runs 50% quicker? I don't overclock myself because certain other higher priorities with my machine rule it out, but it's stupid to try and claim that it's not a good idea.

Also, I read elsewhere that this is only being done on the lower end socket.
Title: Intel Flips Bird to Enthusiasts
Post by: microsoft windows on Sat, 24 July 2010, 07:24:08: Overclocking, in general, isn't a good idea unless the person really knows what they're doing.
Title: Intel Flips Bird to Enthusiasts
Post by: audioave10 on Sat, 24 July 2010, 09:55:02: With all the info out there now, and the durability of current chips, overclocking is easier than ever. My CPU's are always well OC'ed and run for years that way. A good case and cooling (and a little knowledge) is all that's needed.
My Phenom II 945 (95 watt) is indeed OC'ed to 3.4 since I've had it. My Intel E8500 has run at 3.8 for 2 years now perfectly. Bang for Buck.
Title: Intel Flips Bird to Enthusiasts
Post by: Phaedrus2129 on Sat, 24 July 2010, 10:05:58: It's very easy to overclock these days, unless you go crazy with voltages it's very hard to damage something. Though I'm sure every overclocker has at least one part, from the first time they pushed something too far and fried it, hiding in their closet or workshop someplace. But my first OC, an E2200 2.2GHz OC to 3.15GHz, went swimmingly with only minimal help.
Title: Intel Flips Bird to Enthusiasts
Post by: gr1m on Sat, 24 July 2010, 12:59:38: Quote from: microsoft windows;205911
Overclocking, in general, isn't a good idea unless the person really knows what they're doing.

It used to be like that but ever since C2D overclocking became a second market and no longer some shady hardware modification method. If you didn't have the word "Overclock" in your motherboard's product description as a manufacturer these days, you wouldn't get it sold. Overclocking before (when the term was actually coined) was very different from it is today. I'm not some hardware genius, I bought this stuff because the motherboard and CPU advertised that they could be overclocked, and it was pathetically easy.
Title: Intel Flips Bird to Enthusiasts
Post by: NamelessPFG on Sat, 24 July 2010, 14:50:35: Overclocking has been easy for a bit over a decade, if you had a motherboard with BIOS-level overclocking options and a CPU with good overclocking headroom. Mendocino Celerons, anyone?

Of course, it was much more hardcore in the past, when you had to solder in a different clock crystal and hope that your CPU doesn't fry itself within seconds of powering the whole thing on, but that's more around the 1980s/early 1990s era of computing.