Hardware Intel Sandy Bridge Review

does P67 boards have graphics IO? i was under the impression that it doesn't, making the graphics parts inside the CPU completely worthless.

loving its power consumption though, that's a real step forward.

 

Yep, it says in the review that you need an H67 board to make use of the graphics side of the chip.

 

Very nice. If my Q6600 fails it looks like there might be a worthy/affordable replacement now!

 

is it just the asus board where the titan fenrir isn't compatible on sandybridge ?

after recently buying one of them it would be a shame to waste !

 

When will you be reviewing p67 motherboards to go with the cpus?

 

In theory the 'S' parts are supposedly chosen chips which take a lower performance hit at a lower TDP compared to their big brothers. Though tbh that all sounds like marketing crap intended to push overpriced CPU's.

Since you plan a micro-ITX I am guessing this will be an HTPC. In that case why not just go for for the i3 2100. Should easily have enough performance at stock for anything you can throw at an HTCP unless you have a truly amazing home cinema setup.

 

wow!

very impressed - but I cant see a massive reason to upgrade my i5 750 at the present time - what's on the horizon?

 

but review also said P67 is needed for overclocking. so we have to choose between overclocking or have backup onboard graphics?

 

For me, it looks like a no-buy. The performance is awesome, but...
First there is the fact, that i already own i5 750 with a rather expensive P55 board (EVGA P55), so it would be a relatively big loss of money to sell this board and CPU as used. Then, if you think about it - the differences in games are small for the resolution i use (1920x1200), and for the desktop, i don't really need a better CPU. Few archive operations every day, compiling Java apps, and that's pretty much the most CPU intensive operations. So why bother upgrading ?

For a new computer it is of course a no-brainer, there is no point getting S1156 at all. But as a upgrade from S1156, S1155 is not really worth it, at least in my case.

 

That's probably the issue for a huge amount of people and will probably only get worse in future for your average Joe computer user.

I upgraded from a E5400 to a i3 530 10 ish month ago but had absolutely zero need too and in honestly it made absolutely no difference to the feel of the PC. Each new processor just takes more and more people and makes them realise that what they already have is just fine.

 

Please bear in mind, that these were the low-mid range review sample chips from pre-November.

We will not see the true high-end i7 replacement chips until Q3/Q4 2011, expect the huge performance jump then.

 

I agree with Zinfandel.

I feel if you have to do benchmarks and analyse every operation, and cant just turn the new pc on and instantly notice that its faster and snappier etc, then it seems just a case of mobo manufacturers and cpu manufacturers just trying to squeeze something out of a stagnant market at the moment.

Now personally i usually go thurther than the average joe, but am feeling more and more like Joe everyday.

I really cant justify more money on minimal improvment.

Obviously if your going from real bottom end to new tek, then its different, but i think most people on here have an adequate pc anyway.

So until something fun/usefull and worth my money comes along, (then i will be happy to spend out.)

So will be sticking with my current setup for some time yet.

 

To be frank its yesterday's enthusiast performance but made available to the average user.

kind of kills the x58 board 'investment' dead. at least with a 1156 you saved some change for the next iteration.

when do we get some new - genuinely high end - chips?

 

And that's going to be the issue more and more. It's been a long time since CPUs were the limiting factor for the average user and even most power users. With the move towards GPGPU for really high end stuff, the advantages of higher and higher capability processors is going to be one of diminishing returns.

I hate to say it boys and girls (if any), but with ARM, Atom, and C7s able to do the things that 90% of people need them to do, the market for uber powerful CPUs is going to become pretty questionable.

 

+1 My thoughts exactly.

I've been browsing the web for the new boards and unnofficial benchmarks for the last few days, and I could easily get a new board and a chip as they become more available here. Truth is however, I'm not even beginning to push my current rig. tbh I've been steadily downclocking my cpu from 4Ghz as I mostly browse the interwebs nowadays ;-)

So I think I'll be sitting this one out, and wait for the socket 2011. Allthough, it'll be interesting to see whether the i7-875K's price will drop now that the new socket is out. I just might grab one.

 

is there much of a boost from a 750 @4k to a i7-875?

 

Well, they do offer better performance for the price for sure. If I had a Core2Duo rig right now then I'd deffinately consider upgrading to SB. But to any i5 750/60 and especially an i7 920-950 owner these chips do not offer enough performance to justify an upgrade. Also there is the problem of how much CPU power do people need. I noticed a difference in performance levels when I changed my rig, but it was from a Core2Duo E6300 running at stock with 2GB RAM, an 4670 under win XP with a 19" 1440x900 monitor to a i7 920 @4Ghz with 6GB RAM, a 4890, an SSD and a 32" 1080p TV. If I were to go from my current CPU+mobo (or even an i5 760 with a P55 mobo) to a i5 2500K I doubt, I would actually notice a difference in performance when using my rig. So, summing up IMHO it looks like a great CPU for the price, for people upgrading from older systems or just in need of a completely new rig, but there seems to be not enough reason for most bit-tech users to upgrade. A lot of us already have the i5's and i7's. Though if I were to do the upgrade from my old E6300 today and had a 1k£ budget for the rig then I'd deffinately buy the 2500K.

PS one more added benefit is the lower amount of RAM, again vast majority of applications don't really see a boost above 4GB so over-all system cost should be lower without much of a performance hit.

Looks like the new base for a lean gaming rig will be an i5 2500K, a P67 mobo, a 570/580 and 4GB of RAM. I'd say the lower number of PCI lanes will never be a problem when you use a single high performance card.

Same here. After running a 4Ghz OC, I clocked my CPU back to stock since I noticed I had almost no need for the extra performance (and power draw). TBH after realising that I almost started regretting that I didn't get a 750 or a 530 instead. Though I guess this rig should last me the next 4-5 years except for the GPU upgrades.

 

Any ideas on UK pricing?

I'm so glad I bought my X58 setup when it came out, nothing really has touched it in the last 2 years performance wise - and even this new architecture isn't a huge improvement.

I am concerned about the complete lack of overclocking on the budget chips though - you can bet there will be a premium for an unlocked multiplier!

 

yay nice to see some reviews out!

I've been saving for a whole new rig so can't wait for these to be released.

 

Price premium would have been the smallest worry since so far there are no plans of releasing K series CPU's on the low end at all.