View Full Version : Sandy Bridge review thread.
http://techreport.com/articles.x/20188
http://www.anandtech.com/show/4083/the-sandy-bridge-review-intel-core-i5-2600k-i5-2500k-and-core-i3-2100-tested
http://hothardware.com/Reviews/Intel-Core-i72600K-and-i52500K-Processors-Debut/
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/sandy-bridge-core-i7-2600k-core-i5-2500k,2833.html
http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/cpus/2011/01/03/intel-sandy-bridge-review/1
http://www.guru3d.com/article/core-i5-2500k-and-core-i7-2600k-review/
http://www.legitreviews.com/article/1501/1/
http://www.neoseeker.com/Articles/Hardware/Reviews/Intel_i7_2600K_i5_2500K/
http://www.overclock3d.net/reviews/cpu_mainboard/i7_2600k_i5_2500k_2300_1155_sandy_bridge_review/1
http://www.overclockers.com/intel-i7-2600k-sandy-bridge-review
http://www.pcper.com/article.php?aid=1057
http://www.pcpro.co.uk/reviews/processors/363982/intel-sandy-bridge
http://www.techspot.com/review/353-intel-sandy-bridge-corei5-2500k-corei7-2600k/
http://www.techreaction.net/2011/01
http://www.tweaktown.com/reviews/3754/intel_core_i7_2600k_and_core_i5_2500k_sandy_bridge _cpus/index.html
http://www.lostcircuits.com/mambo//index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=98&Itemid=1
http://www.computerbase.de/artikel/prozessoren/2011/test-intel-sandy-bridge/
ShaidarHaran
03-Jan-2011, 12:16
Guess these are all the "early looks" going to "preferred sites". Too bad no one had the time to do a decent review with some meaningful gaming benches, nor took a serious look at overclocking, or Folding.
kinda funny that the first two arrive at opposite conclusions ("FASTEST evah!" vs. "Doesn't move absolute performance ahead")
Guess I'll wait on a more thorough review with same-clock benches between i7 and SB...oh and Bulldozer too.
Updated with several more reviews. These are stolen from tech report's own SB reviews thread. >_>
Shame one cannot use the new transcoder without having a display connected to SB's GPU. Is CUDA encoding really as bad as Anand shows? Ugh.
SNB is impressive by its own merits, but I'll stick with my trusty i7-920 @ 4GHz for at least another year. AVX is the only lucrative point I see in the new architecture, and I hope AMD will strike hard with Bulldozer sometime this year so I can snatch a cheap 6-core Gulftown, for a decent mid-term upgrade. :p
I'm thinking of sticking with my 3 yr old Q6600 @ 3.2 GHz and 2 yr old PIIX4 940 for another year. SB is super fast in some apps but I just don't need the speed. I'm not even sure I would notice the extra speed unless I turned into a video encoding shop or render farm. :D
SB is sure to make an awesome notebook CPU with its evolved Turbo stuff.
codedivine
03-Jan-2011, 20:11
Does any review compare performance with turbo on and turbo off? And does any review report clock-per-clock performance with CPUs set to same frequency? That will make for interesting reading.
pjbliverpool
03-Jan-2011, 21:22
I'm still using an E6600! Its actually fine for most games with the exception of GTA4: LCS which is borderline unplayable despite me having a 4890.
Every other game I've tried works perfectly but I have a feeling one or two might be a bit smoother with a faster CPU. When I can afford it I see me shelling out for an i7-2600 although depending on how cheap I'm feeling I might opt for the i5-2500 instead. Its not like I'll really notice a difference in games.
I'm running an overclocked Q9550 on my main rig and one of those low power Athlon 64 x2 5050e on my server. To be honest I was planning a SB build on the main rig for March, but I might wait to see what AMD shows up with now. Headless Quick Sync on an overclockable chipset would have sold me but that's not in the cards apparently.
Does any review compare performance with turbo on and turbo off? And does any review report clock-per-clock performance with CPUs set to same frequency? That will make for interesting reading.
Check here! (http://www.computerbase.de/artikel/prozessoren/2011/test-intel-sandy-bridge/)
codedivine
03-Jan-2011, 22:55
Check here! (http://www.computerbase.de/artikel/prozessoren/2011/test-intel-sandy-bridge/)
Thats exactly what I was looking for! Thanks!
edit: That is an excellent review overall! The author should be commended!
DarthShader
03-Jan-2011, 23:40
It's also the first review to even mention OpenCL 1.0 compatibility of the IGP. I almost started to think it's not present at all...
Silent_Buddha
04-Jan-2011, 03:51
I might get SB just for the increased power savings. That'll allow me to retire my power hungry dual opteron server. Now I just have to decide if I should use SB for my main rig and migrate my Lynnfield system down to take over for the Opterons, or directly replace the opterons with a lower power SB. :p
Oh wait. SB MBs are going to be UEFI instead of BIOS allowing for easier use of HDD's greater than 2 TB in size.
Hmmm, OK, I may have to try to budget an upgrade to both my main rig and server/HTPC. :D Maybe I'll hold off on the server/HTPC for a bit to see what Bulldozer brings in that area.
And SB GPU slightly faster than I expected. I was thinking it would be slower than 5450 in all cases, but it's actually faster in roughly half the games I've seen it tested on. And as expected doesn't come anywhere close to a 5570. Argh, still no proper support for 23.976 fps playback. Looks like 5450 remains my only choice for HTPC work then.
Regards,
SB
At least Kyle did clock-for-clock benchmarks. Thanks Kyle!
pjbliverpool
04-Jan-2011, 14:10
Thats exactly what I was looking for! Thanks!
edit: That is an excellent review overall! The author should be commended!
Agreed, I took more from that than the 2other reviews I've read even though I don't read German!
SB definately seems to be the way to go for me. I wonder if a 2600 will be fast enough to keep up with whatever CPU's the next gen consoles use. I'd hate to have to upgrade again in another year or so just to play console ports.
joker454
05-Jan-2011, 04:44
Is CUDA encoding really as bad as Anand shows? Ugh.
I think most Cuda encoders are still fairly primitive. I do extensive video editing for my new business, and I notice that during an avc encode with Vegas Pro 10 my gpu load only goes to 9% so it's barely making use of the gpu. I do know that my gpu can decode far more than my i7-920 can because my i7 chokes when trying to play back just two simultaneous avchd streams, while Premiere Pro CS5 with Cuda support can play back 7+ streams easily with it's much better Cuda gpu decoding assist. In other words, Cuda decoding is almost an order of magnitude faster than my i7, whereas Cuda encoding is a mere 10% or so faster than my i7, which to me implies that Cuda encoders just need more work.
Either way, the i7-2600k looks like an amazing deal for the price. It's definitely time to upgrade my aging q6600 which is holding back my gaming framerates.
I wonder if a 2600 will be fast enough to keep up with whatever CPU's the next gen consoles use. I'd hate to have to upgrade again in another year or so just to play console ports.
Wouldn't worry about it, no one has next gen console dev kits yet, so the next gen consoles are minimum two+ years away.
aaronspink
05-Jan-2011, 06:53
I think most Cuda encoders are still fairly primitive. I do extensive video editing for my new business, and I notice that during an avc encode with Vegas Pro 10 my gpu load only goes to 9% so it's barely making use of the gpu. I do know that my gpu can decode far more than my i7-920 can because my i7 chokes when trying to play back just two simultaneous avchd streams, while Premiere Pro CS5 with Cuda support can play back 7+ streams easily with it's much better Cuda gpu decoding assist. In other words, Cuda decoding is almost an order of magnitude faster than my i7, whereas Cuda encoding is a mere 10% or so faster than my i7, which to me implies that Cuda encoders just need more work.
Or, large portions of the AVC flow don't map well to CUDA.
from what i can tell sb is about 25% faster per clock than the core2 quads
and as clock speed doesnt seem to be going up it doesnt seem like a great upgrade
Clock speeds are up a bit. Seems most 2600k units are hitting 4.4 GHz OCs on air. Not huge, but significant. Still, not significant enough to stop me from waiting to see what Bulldozer has to offer.
thats o/c'd speed though
ps: may be of interest to anyone considering sb
http://www.pcper.com/comments.php?nid=9572
thats o/c'd speed though
ps: may be of interest to anyone considering sb
http://www.pcper.com/comments.php?nid=9572
If that things works without hiccups then SB will likely get my $. It's the lack of headless GPU for Quick Sync that kills SB for me right now. That's the one area where it's performance improvements are huge.
dizietsma
06-Jan-2011, 00:19
It's a bit like Nvidia did with their latest gpu's, stuck the performance up and reduced power. The difference is Intel didn't need to do it and nvidia did.
At this rate Intels next tick will blow AMD out of the weeds if they can deliver on the smaller node.
At this rate Intels next tick will blow AMD out of the weeds if they can deliver on the smaller node.
I hope not. Without competition things would stagnate and prices would rise quite a bit. Intel needs AMD nipping at their heels (or vice versa) just as NV needs it too. The fanbois on either side are simply nuts for rooting for one to bury the other. This isn't sports for pitty sake.
It's a bit like Nvidia did with their latest gpu's, stuck the performance up and reduced power. The difference is Intel didn't need to do it and nvidia did.
At this rate Intels next tick will blow AMD out of the weeds if they can deliver on the smaller node.
The competitive field IMO, is different than few years ago when the primary competitor to Intel was AMD. If Intel slacks now, there's lot more that can nip at its heels than it used to.
BTW anyone see in the datasheet that the new GMA HD core supports DX11 CS function?
The Intel HD Graphics controller features the following:
• 3D Features
⎯ DirectX10.1* and OpenGL* 3.0 compliant
⎯ DirectX11* CS4.0 only compliant
⎯ Shader Model 4.0
DarthShader
06-Jan-2011, 09:23
If that things works without hiccups then SB will likely get my $. It's the lack of headless GPU for Quick Sync that kills SB for me right now. That's the one area where it's performance improvements are huge.
From the article: The only system requirement is to always connect the display screen directly to the motherboard’s Sandy Bridge display output (DVI, HDMI, etc).
That means a H67 mobo and no OC at all (IGP only). Or wait for the Z68 chipset.
Silent_Buddha
06-Jan-2011, 11:04
At this rate Intels next tick will blow AMD out of the weeds if they can deliver on the smaller node.
Intel has been content to allow AMD to be competitive in the under 200 USD market. They could easily have stomped them out at any time the past few years had they wanted to.
Sandy Bridge is just more proof that Intel doesn't want to eliminate AMD from the CPU market. Once you get under 200 USD, all Intel CPs will now either be completely locked down and un-overclockable or partially locked down with limited overclocks.
As well, Intel aren't aggressively increasing performance in the sub 200 USD market. With the headroom available on SB chips they could easily increase clockspeed and thus performance across the board from top to bottom if they wished without affecting price or yields.
Once you go above 200 USD, that's when Intel opens things up to make AMD CPUs less attractive. Increased performance per dollar at lower power useage combined with all chips being partially unlocked or fully unlocked.
So basically when AMD becomes more competitive, Intel will increase value of their CPUs to match. And while AMD will appeal to budget enthusiasts at price points below 200 USD, Intel will ignore budget enthusiasts (locked down CPUs) at prince points below 200 USD.
Regards,
SB
BTW anyone see in the datasheet that the new GMA HD core supports DX11 CS function?
If they can do CL, they can do at least CS4.0. Which is what the article says, AFAICS.
From the article: The only system requirement is to always connect the display screen directly to the motherboard’s Sandy Bridge display output (DVI, HDMI, etc).
That means a H67 mobo and no OC at all (IGP only). Or wait for the Z68 chipset.
Yep. But with this baby at least your Z68 won't have to have a monitor on the intel GPU.
⎯ DirectX11* CS4.0 only compliant
does that mean it can do cs4 but no other dx11 instructions ?
does that mean it can do cs4 but no other dx11 instructions ?
CS4 was designed to work with DX10 compliant GPUs, so yes, it can't do anything DX11 other than CS4.
joker454
07-Jan-2011, 23:02
Or, large portions of the AVC flow don't map well to CUDA.
Could be...I'm gonna keep an eye on things and see how it all shakes out. Hopefully Premiere Pro and Vegas Pro will both add decoding/encoding support for quick sync cpu's like the i7-2600k, then we can do direct comparisons. Would be great to not need a cuda card in my office pc!
For those of us that don't care about the integrated GPU, are there any SB CPUs in the pipeline without it?
as far as I know no, and the funny thing is that the faster cpu's (that are more likely to be bought by people with discreet gfx cards) have even more powerful gpu's than the slower chips
That's why I see SB's gpu as nothing more than a good transcoding feature - something I would like to have if they can fix the whole have to have monitor, can't overclock that chipset thing.
For those of us that don't care about the integrated GPU, are there any SB CPUs in the pipeline without it?
You have to wait for LGA2011, if you want more cores (>4) without on-die GPU.
DarthShader
08-Jan-2011, 12:08
You have to wait for LGA2011, if you want more cores (>4) without on-die GPU.
Yup, Anand mentions 4 and 6 cores for the LGA2011 in Q4. No 8 cores though - I guess the power constraints don't allow them to be clocked high enough for the desktop market.
entity279
08-Jan-2011, 12:32
An 8 core SB. Now that would be a monster in DP :grin: ..
Yup, Anand mentions 4 and 6 cores for the LGA2011 in Q4. No 8 cores though - I guess the power constraints don't allow them to be clocked high enough for the desktop market.
That shouldn't really be a problem thanks to Turbo (except for the marketing number Ghz).
Maybe though there will really be only one version (6-core) just with 2 cores disabled (similar to the current Westmere Xeons - heck you can get single core Westmere which is using 6 core die). I think given the much lower volumes this might make sense - even though for LGA1155 there are 3 different dies, and two of them without much of a die size difference (4 core/12 EU/8MB, 2 core/12EU/4MB, 2 core/6EU/3MB - note the latter L3 cache size is just what I assume given the floor plan of SB, and the transistor and die size difference between the chips).
joker454
13-Jan-2011, 01:52
Just got one of these, the 2600k + Asus p8p67 board and the reviews are right, it overclocks like mad! Couldn't be easier to do, the firmware has three buttons for economy, normal and performance. I just clicked performance and the overclocking was all done automatically. I left Vegas Pro 10 to render videos overnight and all 8 cores got locked at 100% use at 4.4ghz for hours with the stock cpu cooler. Ran like a charm, very impressed! It's so clearly faster than my old i7-920 ever was, scrubbing in Premiere Pro CS5 is real time now.
You're making me jealous and wanting to upgrade my old Q6700 but first I need to upgrade the 8800GT.
Just got one of these, the 2600k + Asus p8p67 board and the reviews are right, it overclocks like mad! Couldn't be easier to do, the firmware has three buttons for economy, normal and performance. I just clicked performance and the overclocking was all done automatically. I left Vegas Pro 10 to render videos overnight and all 8 cores got locked at 100% use at 4.4ghz for hours with the stock cpu cooler. Ran like a charm, very impressed! It's so clearly faster than my old i7-920 ever was, scrubbing in Premiere Pro CS5 is real time now.
Locking 4 cores at 100% with 8 threads is not terribly surprising though. For a workload like that would you be better off to get actual cores? Like a 6 core chip. When I looked at reviews it appeared to overclocked 2600k could just match an stock clock hex core chip. I will definitely be waiting until someone releases a decent priced hex core chip.
Silent_Buddha
13-Jan-2011, 16:32
Just got one of these, the 2600k + Asus p8p67 board and the reviews are right, it overclocks like mad! Couldn't be easier to do, the firmware has three buttons for economy, normal and performance. I just clicked performance and the overclocking was all done automatically. I left Vegas Pro 10 to render videos overnight and all 8 cores got locked at 100% use at 4.4ghz for hours with the stock cpu cooler. Ran like a charm, very impressed! It's so clearly faster than my old i7-920 ever was, scrubbing in Premiere Pro CS5 is real time now.
Hmmmm, maybe I'll upgrade one of my machines sooner rather than later. :p Do you know if it bumped up core voltage when it did the stock overclock? And I don't suppose you know what the system power draw (from wall socket) was at stock and stock overclock? :) I don't really do overclocking anymore, but SB has me somewhat interested in it with your report that stock overclock was so large. But potential power increase still has me concerned.
Regards,
SB
joker454
13-Jan-2011, 17:57
Locking 4 cores at 100% with 8 threads is not terribly surprising though. For a workload like that would you be better off to get actual cores? Like a 6 core chip. When I looked at reviews it appeared to overclocked 2600k could just match an stock clock hex core chip. I will definitely be waiting until someone releases a decent priced hex core chip.
Yeah definitely 6 cores would be better, but the 6 core cpu price always seemed to hover around the ~$1000 mark so I never bit, whereas I got the 2600k for $319. I'd love to get a 6 core sb when it comes out but I suspect they will also keep it at enthusiast pricing and at that price I'll probably just stick with my current one and spend that money on video cameras instead.
Hmmmm, maybe I'll upgrade one of my machines sooner rather than later. :p Do you know if it bumped up core voltage when it did the stock overclock? And I don't suppose you know what the system power draw (from wall socket) was at stock and stock overclock? :) I don't really do overclocking anymore, but SB has me somewhat interested in it with your report that stock overclock was so large. But potential power increase still has me concerned.
I just took a quick look using cpu-z, right now it reads like this:
Idle: 1.6ghz, ~0.992v
100% load on all cores: 4.4ghz, ~1.288v
So looks like it does bump it up. I do have a kill-a-watt meter so I can compare power draw idle/load as well, I'll do that tonight when I get back.
I will definitely be waiting until someone releases a decent priced hex core chip.
AMD's are cheap but they don't seem to hold up to SB or even the previous generation. Intel rakes in the dough on their hex cores, because they can of course.
AMD's are cheap but they don't seem to hold up to SB or even the previous generation. Intel rakes in the dough on their hex cores, because they can of course.
I know :) I have an X6 1055T in my machine. I just wish AMD could compete with intel so the prices would come down some. I thought very hard about going to intel in my last upgrade, but I really wanted a 6 core chip and just could not justify the price.
Silent_Buddha
14-Jan-2011, 00:03
I just took a quick look using cpu-z, right now it reads like this:
Idle: 1.6ghz, ~0.992v
100% load on all cores: 4.4ghz, ~1.288v
So looks like it does bump it up. I do have a kill-a-watt meter so I can compare power draw idle/load as well, I'll do that tonight when I get back.
Cool, but what I meant was power draw at stock with no overclocking and then power draw at the auto-overclock speed. I'm interested to see how much power draw increases. If it's not large, I may jump on SB sooner rather than later. Heh, your post got me interested enough that I started looking up prices for MB and CPU on Newegg as well as reading some MB reviews. :p So power draw at 3.4 (3.8 turbo with only 1 core used) ghz versus 4.4 (4.8 turbo with only 1 core or does it just stay at 4.4 regardless of core count at that point?) ghz. :)
Regards,
SB
corduroygt
14-Jan-2011, 18:20
AMD's are cheap but they don't seem to hold up to SB or even the previous generation. Intel rakes in the dough on their hex cores, because they can of course.
Not only that, AMD motherboards used to be cheaper. Now if you want something with USB3 and SB850, it's not any cheaper than a H67 motherboard.
function
14-Jan-2011, 19:40
AMD's mobos still are cheaper - P67s are starting for way above a good overclocking AMD board (even with SB850 and USB 3).
On the subject of the ASUS P8P67 (Pro), anyone else tried out the Intel RAID 1 on the mobo? For some reason mine is real slow - read speeds are slower than a single drive (about a thrid the speed on sequential reads) and way way way below Windows own RAID 1 implementation.
Also getting the strange cold boot behaviour that lots of other P8P67 owners are reporting.
Also, I either got the worst memory sticks ever or memory overclocking is a bit limited at the moment.
joker454
15-Jan-2011, 02:17
Also getting the strange cold boot behaviour that lots of other P8P67 owners are reporting.
I think I have that issue also, where if you cold boot it will try to boot a few times and fail and you have to reset it, then it boots. I don't actually power off my machine though since I always use sleep, hence it's a non issue for me but I presume it's a simple firmware fix anyways.
Also, I either got the worst memory sticks ever or memory overclocking is a bit limited at the moment.
What memory do you have? I have patriot 2400 ram, cpu-z reports timing as 9-11-9-27-2t. I've stress tested the machine quite a bit and it's been solid so far at 4.4ghz.
some sandy bridge fun facts...
http://www.techspot.com/guides/357-fun-facts-intel-sandy-bridge/
Silent_Buddha
15-Jan-2011, 19:41
AMD's mobos still are cheaper - P67s are starting for way above a good overclocking AMD board (even with SB850 and USB 3).
On the subject of the ASUS P8P67 (Pro), anyone else tried out the Intel RAID 1 on the mobo? For some reason mine is real slow - read speeds are slower than a single drive (about a thrid the speed on sequential reads) and way way way below Windows own RAID 1 implementation.
Also getting the strange cold boot behaviour that lots of other P8P67 owners are reporting.
Also, I either got the worst memory sticks ever or memory overclocking is a bit limited at the moment.
Are you sure you're using the Intel raid and not the Marvel raid? I read in one review that raid performance of the Marvel raid on the Asus boards was atrocious. It was far worse than raid over the Intel 3G SATA much less the Intel 6G.
Regards,
SB
and do you have the matrix storage drivers
With regard to memey oc'ing, didn't I read the sb only oc's well via multiplier and tha upclock basically doesn't work?
With regard to memey oc'ing, didn't I read the sb only oc's well via multiplier and tha upclock basically doesn't work?
Upping the Uncore or whatever it's called clockspeed will do something, but A. It can't be raised more than 5 MHZ at most unless you get REALLY lucky. B. The small boost you get from that is just not worth while.
So, effectively you're right, but the answer is a bit more nuanced than that. ;)
Upping the Uncore or whatever it's called clockspeed will do something, but A. It can't be raised more than 5 MHZ at most unless you get REALLY lucky. B. The small boost you get from that is just not worth while.
So, effectively you're right, but the answer is a bit more nuanced than that. ;)
yeah. I was on my phone for that post - hard to be nuanced on such a tiny browser and keyboard :)
yeah. I was on my phone for that post - hard to be nuanced on such a tiny browser and keyboard :)
I would say so!
I've tried browsing with my PSP and DSi. Not exactly the same thing by any means, but the tiny browser/keyboard part does apply. Makes it rather hard to communicate!
Silent_Buddha
21-Jan-2011, 06:43
Well because of that bastard (meant in the kindest way) Joker454's experiences with Sandy Bridge I ended up getting a 2500k and Asus P8P67 pro. I have to say, I'm pretty impressed.
At idle it's already using 32 watts less than my i7-860. And since it only requires multiplier adjustments leaving BCLK at 100 means idle power does increase with overclocking unless you raise Vcore.
Since most review sites mention 44x multiplier at default Vcore as almost universally attainable I jumped right to 45x at stock Vcore on air. Going to leave Prime95 running overnight, but so far it's going along just fine.
I'll be interested to see what load power use at OC'd speeds is tomorrow. First chip I've really bothered to OC since the Athlon 64 days. Almost reminds me of the old 300 mhz Celerons that could OC to a minimum of 450 mhz. Actually looking at overclocks, this could be as good if not better at overclocking than those legendary chips.
Of course, this means I've blown almost half my yearly computer hardware budget already and it hasn't even been a month. :p
Regards,
SB
I'm so tempted. Just wish AMD would get some bulldozer benchmarks out there so I could write it off and get SB (or not).
I'm so tempted. Just wish AMD would get some bulldozer benchmarks out there so I could write it off and get SB (or not).
I suggest you read the Bulldozer thread here and the Realworldtech article on Bulldozer. It will tell you everything you need to know about it in terms of overall performance.
If you're lazy, I can sum it up for you. :P
I suggest you read the Bulldozer thread here and the Realworldtech article on Bulldozer. It will tell you everything you need to know about it in terms of overall performance.
If you're lazy, I can sum it up for you. :P
I have read the thread and skimmed the Realworldtech article and my summary is Bulldozer's performance depends on achievable clocks and buffer/branch efficiencies which loosely translates into "we don't know yet."
[Edit] That and claims that an insider has said Bulldozer will be 50% faster than a 980.
The thing is we know people have working hardware in hand now (or there are some good fake CPUID shots) so I would love a leak.
pjbliverpool
01-Jul-2011, 16:37
I installed my new 2500K yesterday. Damn it's fast!! I had no idea how much my old C2D 6600 (2.4Ghz) was holding back my HD 4890 but since swapping CPU's, tons of my games are significantly faster and smoother. I want to try out the real CPU killer - GTA4 but my DVD drives down atm so I can't. Can't wait to wipe the smug grin off that games face :)
Congratulations for the upgrade! That brings me memories, when I moved from Opteron 165 (Socket 939) to Core 2 Duo E8400 -- noticeable performance boost and smooth work all over the place, both in games and desktop applications, even without using benchmarking. ;)
I recall when I updated from a Northwood based Celeron to a Conroe based Pentium Dual-Core that was OCed to 3 GHZ. Daaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaamn that was a massive difference.
homerdog
03-Jul-2011, 03:36
Athlon X2 3800 to 3.2GHz E6750 was an astounding upgrade for Team Fortress 2. Unfortunately I'm still using the E6750 :(
really i went from a 1.2 tbird -- p4 3ghz -- q6600
and in every case everything ran fine before the upgrade and everything ran fine after upgrade
noticeable difference not much :(
and tf2 ran bad on a x2 really ?
entity279
03-Jul-2011, 08:49
Athlon X2 3800 to 3.2GHz E6750 was an astounding upgrade for Team Fortress 2. Unfortunately I'm still using the E6750 :(
OT: And i'm still using the X2 :D
homerdog
03-Jul-2011, 16:39
and tf2 ran bad on a x2 really ?
On 32 player servers the X2 didn't cope very well. My C2D maintains a pretty consistent 60fps where the X2 would hover around 30fps during moderate action, and in big fights would fall well below that.
Also the X2 would totally fail in X3:Reunion during large battles, where the C2D can keep things at least playable.
I upgraded from the Q6600 to 2600K just the last week. Was going to get the 2500K but they were out of stock. One thing I notice is that my computer startups darn fast :) Before the bios-checks and whatnot took almost 15secs and now it just skips through those. But overall, in programming and regular desktop use the difference is quite small. I have SSD which already had made everything stupidly fast.
I suppose my GPU (5850) is somewhat holding me back now regarding gaming but I think I'm waiting for the next generation before updating. Most of the games seem to run nicely with the 1900x1200 resolution but I'm missing the horsepower required to run the games with 2560x1440.
pjbliverpool
04-Jul-2011, 12:30
The more I test the 2500K the more I realise how much the C2D was holding my system back. Games I've tested so far where I've noticed or recorded a game changing speed up (in some cases this is just the ability to maintain a solid 60fps where I couldn't before):
Assasins Creed 2
Lost Planet 2
RE5 Benchmark - 60fps
Streetfighter 4 Benchmark - 60fps
DMC4 Benchmark - 60 fps
GTA4/EFLC - assumed as I haven't tested this yet but EFLC was near enough unplayable on the C2D.
EDIT: I also had fun with that old Intel quad core demo - Ice Storm Fighters which my C2D couldn't come close to handling at high detail but the 2500K just laughs at it :)
homerdog
04-Jul-2011, 19:05
I can safely say that most modern games are CPU limited on my 3.2GHz C2D. Now I only have a GTX260 but I also only have a 1440x900 monitor so the GPU is usually not the problem. Didn't start to notice this until Far Cry 2, which doesn't go much above 30fps at high settings and graphics options like AA don't make much difference at all.
I've noticed that console ports are especially likely to be CPU limited, which is funny considering how vastly more capable the C2D should be than the Xbox CPU.
pjbliverpool
04-Jul-2011, 21:05
I can safely say that most modern games are CPU limited on my 3.2GHz C2D. Now I only have a GTX260 but I also only have a 1440x900 monitor so the GPU is usually not the problem. Didn't start to notice this until Far Cry 2, which doesn't go much above 30fps at high settings and graphics options like AA don't make much difference at all.
I've noticed that console ports are especially likely to be CPU limited, which is funny considering how vastly more capable the C2D should be than the Xbox CPU.
Yes that's what I've noticed as well. I guess it's because on the PC developers rely more on the CPU than they do on the consoles since CPU capabilities are always completely generalised but you can never guarentee the GPU's capabilities. Hence PC CPU's end up doing more work than console CPU's in the same game. And that's before you get into platform specific optimisations and the fact that PC's have to run Windows etc...
That said I'd be suprised if a 3.2Ghz C2D would ever fall behind console performance. It's 1/3rd faster than my old CPU which aside from GTA4 and Saints Row 2 (both very poorly CPU optimised) could pretty much match console performance in any game. Far Cry 2 in fact was always more than fast enough, definately 30fps+.
homerdog
04-Jul-2011, 23:02
Methinks some developers do a straight recompile for Windows and call it a day. With proper optimization I can't see the Xbox CPU ever approaching a 3200MHz Conroe in a video game.
Streetfighter 4 Benchmark - 60fps
Are you sure your not suffering from the placebo effect ? or vysnc
http://img194.imageshack.us/img194/9917/295wvop.jpg (http://imageshack.us/photo/my-images/194/295wvop.jpg/)
couple of re5 results :
E8400 @ 3.8ghz
4gb DDR2-1066
GTX 260 Core 216 @ stock clocks
Windows 7 build 7600 x64
DX10 mode,1920 x 1200, 4x AA, V sync On, everything else maxed
59.9 FPS constantly through the entire test
DX 9
All High or on
C8xQAA
1600x900
Average 62.1 fps
E6750 @ 3,5 Ghz
2gb ram
8800GTS G92
Vista Dual Core Athlon 64X2 5600+ @ 2.8GHz
Nvidia 8800 GT 512mb
DX10
I average around 57 fps, for a B rank on the variable benchmark. 34fps for the fixed benchmark.
Blazkowicz
05-Jul-2011, 00:09
Athlon X2 3800 to 3.2GHz E6750 was an astounding upgrade for Team Fortress 2. Unfortunately I'm still using the E6750 :(
a nice upgrade I did was from XP2400+ to the lowest end 65nm sempron. it was much faster with 100MHz less, and would overclock till I half-borked the mobo.
it was derided back then as if it were a 486SX, and was well under the line but it was my first CPU both fast and low power.
a modern, but not as cheap equivalent would be the pentium G620, it scores ridiculously high in hardware reviews, if the game isn't too thread heavy.
Blazkowicz
05-Jul-2011, 00:39
Methinks some developers do a straight recompile for Windows and call it a day. With proper optimization I can't see the Xbox CPU ever approaching a 3200MHz Conroe in a video game.
there's the API overhead, especially draw calls, so there's stuff that cheap on the consoles (particles, flying newspapers and debris) but not so much on PC.
what's more, maybe the framerate is already higher on the PC and the shader workload should be relatively low if you're running a "bad ass" GPU (anything that trounces consoles)
best gaming cpu's for your money
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/best-gaming-cpu,2971.html
homerdog
05-Jul-2011, 15:47
I can't see spending the extra $$$ on anything past the 2500K. Would rather get a bigger SSD or faster GPU than a few hundred extra MHz that you'll likely never notice, at least in games.
pjbliverpool
05-Jul-2011, 18:42
Are you sure your not suffering from the placebo effect ? or vysnc
couple of re5 results :
E8400 @ 3.8ghz
4gb DDR2-1066
GTX 260 Core 216 @ stock clocks
Windows 7 build 7600 x64
DX10 mode,1920 x 1200, 4x AA, V sync On, everything else maxed
59.9 FPS constantly through the entire test
DX 9
All High or on
C8xQAA
1600x900
Average 62.1 fps
E6750 @ 3,5 Ghz
2gb ram
8800GTS G92
Vista Dual Core Athlon 64X2 5600+ @ 2.8GHz
Nvidia 8800 GT 512mb
DX10
I average around 57 fps, for a B rank on the variable benchmark. 34fps for the fixed benchmark.
By 60fps I meant a fixed 60 fps, i.e. vsync on and the game never deviates from 60fps. I can get a much higher average with vsync off.
Bare in mind my old CPU was only a 2.4Ghz Conroe so that's quote a lot slower than any of the CPU's your getting a solid 60fps with there. In fact it's not much faster than the 5600+ where your averaging 34 fps.
homerdog
05-Jul-2011, 19:41
I'd like to know what games can't maintain 60fps on a 5GHz Sandy Bridge.
Otto Dafe
05-Jul-2011, 19:47
I can't see spending the extra $$$ on anything past the 2500K. Would rather get a bigger SSD or faster GPU than a few hundred extra MHz that you'll likely never notice, at least in games.
I don't know, maybe if you made heavy use of a hyper-threaded app. Or if, say, you hadn't bought an Intel processor since you had a Celeron 333 and hyper-threading sounded way cooler and more important than it actually was. Hypothetically.
I'd like to know what games can't maintain 60fps on a 5GHz Sandy Bridge.
With only its embedded Intel GPU? Many. :)
On my rig (I'm only running 4.5 GHz) only Crysis and Crysis2 ever show a dip below 60 fps, but I haven't played a ton of other games.
homerdog
05-Jul-2011, 20:16
I don't know, maybe if you made heavy use of a hyper-threaded app. Or if, say, you hadn't bought an Intel processor since you had a Celeron 333 and hyper-threading sounded way cooler and more important than it actually was. Hypothetically.
I should have been clearer that I meant only games.
On my rig (I'm only running 4.5 GHz) only Crysis and Crysis2 ever show a dip below 60 fps, but I haven't played a ton of other games.
Do you think it's the CPU or the GPUs causing the dips?
I'd like to know what games can't maintain 60fps on a 5GHz Sandy Bridge.
SupCom / SupCom FA. ;) Of course it depends on what you're doing but if you get into a big multiplayer game with an AI or two..... Even SupCom2 might be a challenge but it's so simplified that I'm not sure.
Silent_Buddha
09-Jul-2011, 09:33
SupCom / SupCom FA. ;) Of course it depends on what you're doing but if you get into a big multiplayer game with an AI or two..... Even SupCom2 might be a challenge but it's so simplified that I'm not sure.
Heh, those large map multiplayer battles not only pushed the CPU hard, but they also ran into 32 bit Windows 2 GB VA limit fairly rapidly.
Regards,
SB
Forged Alliance is large address aware and can use up to 3GB. ;) The original game got an exe tweak by the community for this too. But if you're not on a 64-bit OS you need to use the Windows /3GB option to benefit.
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