Who's Jumping On Sandy Bridge-E ?

Who's Jumping On Sandy Bridge-E ?

  • I'm all over Sandy Bridge-E !

    Votes: 61 24.4%

  • Waiting for Ivy Bridge first

    Votes: 103 41.2%

  • Not upgrading until 2013

    Votes: 67 26.8%

  • Bulldozer Pwnz U!

    Votes: 19 7.6%
  • Total voters
    250
I *want* to, but I just don't see how I can justify it when the 2600K is already more than I need.
 
Exactly what I was thinking. X58 has had a very good lifespan.

Yes, the 2600k came along later and made the 990X its bitch at a fraction of the cost, but the real winner on the X58 platform was the 920 anyway. Also have to remember the 920 had a good two year lead on the 2600k.

Technology is always moving forward, so there will always be something better down the line. I have waited close to 5 years to upgrade my system. I wanted to jump on the 2600k , but by the time I was in a solid financial situation to upgrade I felt like I should wait just a little bit longer for the next big thing.

When I do jump on it I mean to go BIG. Im talking trimonitor, trigpu, quadchannel, hexacore greatness. So for such large aspirations SB-E is the only way to go.

That doesnt mean I am not price conscious though. I been picking up little pieces here and there when I see an excellent deal. The price of entry for SB-E is high, but I believe that it will be worth it over the long term.
 
Also, SB-E has similar performance to a 2600K according to the preview benchmarks done as I mentioned before. It makes me wonder what makes it an "Extreme" part.

It is an expensive "side-grade" considering that the lowest SB-E with unlocked multiplier and a socket 2011 CPU is around $270 more than the 2600K-- i7 3930K.

Here's one such example:
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/core-i7-3960x-x79-performance,3026-12.html

In Metro 2033, the 3960X is no faster than the 4 core/8 thread 2600K yet the 3960X costs $999 according to Anandtech: http://www.anandtech.com/show/4626/info-on-sandy-bridgee-pricing

When it comes to encoding and productivity, then yes the 3960X is faster but not by a whole lot:
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/core-i7-3960x-x79-performance,3026-11.html

Anandtech has shown similar results.

So, why buy a 3960X when its performance is similar to or close to a 990X or 2600K?

I would surmise the higher core count-- 6 cores versus 4 cores-- and threads-- 12 threads versus 8 threads-- may come into some use for many users out there that continuously use multi-threaded applications. I am also sure it'll probably overclock as good as 2600K or even better since it has a higher Turbo Boost ceiling of 3.9 GHz for the high-end part.

I guess if you're coming from a socket 775 Intel or socket AM2+ or AM3 AMD and haven't switched to either Bulldozer or socket 1366/1155 Intel CPU, then this might be a good upgrade-- if you can justify the extra cost.

On the one hand, you are getting quad channel RAM with an increased speed of 1600 MHz compared to 1333 Mhz, and a newer chipset-- X79, which would expand PCI-E lanes to 40 total.

But, when you think about Ivy Bridge coming next year with its newer architecture, that CPU is going to be compatible with both socket 1155 and 2011 motherboards. It'll also come with on-die PCI-E 3.0 with 16 lanes and a better Intel HD graphics GPU.

If the performance of the SB-E 3000-series wasn't too similar to the 2600K, then the cost would justify the performance but it doesn't from the looks of it.

Would it be smart to spend $294 to $999 now when you may have to spend similar for an Ivy Bridge CPU in a little over a year from now? The i7-3820 is $294 versus $315 retail for the 2600K. One can overclock, the other does not.

For users that don't overclock, I'd say the i7 3820 would be a better buy over the 2600K. However, for $220 retail, the 2500K can overclock but has a slower base clock of 3.3 GHz and lower Turbo Boost of 3.6 GHz. The 2600K is 3.4 GHz base and 3.8 GHz TB for $20 more. It still doesn't justify buying the 3820 unless you want the extra features the socket 2011 platform may bring.

My friend was really considering SB-E i7-3930K but when he saw that the 3960X was no faster than the 2600K, that made him think how well the 3930K would perform. He's now going to end up buying a 2600K instead in a week or two since it'll be more than enough for him. He's going from a Core i7 920 system he built himself.

For me, after seeing the Bulldozer results, I'm now on the fence-- go Intel 2600K now or wait a year from now and see what second gen AMD Bulldozer "Vishera" can show as well as Intel's Ivy Bridge. Maybe they'll be a marked improvement over their previous parts.

I have a little over half the money saved to buy and build either system-- Bulldozer or 2600K-- and hoping I could sell my old one to pay for the rest. It's a bit tough to decide what to do now seeing what a disappointment the FX series is at the moment. Yeah, great for multithreaded applications but single threaded apps, not so much. And the price and power consumption doesn't justify much reason making a switch from my current CPU to the FX one. Another thing is that it's nice to see Intel for once keeping the sockets the same from SB to Ivy Bridge, and I'm glad that the AM3+ will hold out until the next Bulldozer CPU. Now I'm in a bind.

Anyone else have other thoughts or suggestions?
 
Octo, isn't the Ivy bridge scheduled to release in Q1 2012, so you won't have to wait a year to see how it performs.

But you bring valid points... I guess we need to wait for Keplers/7k series. Why? Cause we will see if the Pcie 3.0 in 8/8 isn't slower then 16/16 configuration. Because I don't want to go into platform - 1155 that will hamper performance of dual gpu solution.

At same time we should have Ivy Bridge, so it will be right time to upgrade.
 
MorgothPl said:
Octo, isn't the Ivy bridge scheduled to release in Q1 2012, so you won't have to wait a year to see how it performs.

But you bring valid points... I guess we need to wait for Keplers/7k series. Why? Cause we will see if the Pcie 3.0 in 8/8 isn't slower then 16/16 configuration. Because I don't want to go into platform - 1155 that will hamper performance of dual gpu solution.

At same time we should have Ivy Bridge, so it will be right time to upgrade.
Click to expand...

I forgot what site I read it from, but one site mentioned late 2012. If it's Q1 2012, then that's better than waiting a year and just hold off on upgrading for now.
 
It should be in shops around March 2012... though late 2012 they will release more Ivy Bridge CPUs.
 
Pretty content right now with my ne SB build..Gonna wait and see how PC gaming goes.
 
I'd upgrade if I didn't have to pay $600 minimum for the unlocked part. My 2500K/P67 from my HTPC was sold to a buddy a few weeks ago. My plan was to replace my 2600K/Z68 with a 990FX/Bulldozer and move the 2600K/Z68 back into a mATX for HTPC/Hackintosh use.

Bulldozer isn't going to cut the mustard it seems so now I'm stuck either buying a full ATX Z68 board, which they all kinda suck imo and the one's that have what I need are all $300+ anyways and at that point I'd be better off getting X79.

I kinda got screwed with both the 7 series launch being pushed back until next year and Bulldozer's kind of "meh" release.

I'm gonna be waiting to see what [H] comes up with as far as Eyefinity/Bulldozer. If it can compete with my 2600K then I'll go for it anyways as this machine's main use will probably be gaming now.

I understand why Intel didn't make the 4 core / 8 t SB-E unlocked as it would probably canabilize 2600/2700K sales but it just kinda sucks. I don't really need 6 cores /12 t for my gaming / workstation box anyways.
 
I would say those benchmarks by tom's hardware are very preliminary. Since the actual processor hasn't been released along with not being the latest stepping or final motherboards, judging before actually seeing the final product is a terrible way to judge. Always has been and always will be. The main problem is that we just don't know what tom's hardware was reviewing. Were they reviewing a processor that intel created 4-5 months ago and have significantly improved the design since? Its just too hard to tell.
I'd say settle down, if you want to build a system, the 2600k is a great processor, but if you were seriously thinking about the x79 platform, i would hold off, only about a month to wait until Intel launches x79 if sources are to be believed (Nov. 14-15). Also, for those saying the that four cores is more than enough, that's what was said about two cores back in the day. Frostbite 2 engine (the engine that bf3 is built on) and many other engines are starting to take advantage of more and more cores everyday. Same thing happened with pci-e gen1 to gen2. Its more of a if you build and make it prevalent in modern day computers, then you'll be see people taking advantage of it.
 
pewter77 said:
I would say those benchmarks by tom's hardware are very preliminary. Since the actual processor hasn't been released along with not being the latest stepping or final motherboards, judging before actually seeing the final product is a terrible way to judge. Always has been and always will be. The main problem is that we just don't know what tom's hardware was reviewing. Were they reviewing a processor that intel created 4-5 months ago and have significantly improved the design since? Its just too hard to tell.
I'd say settle down, if you want to build a system, the 2600k is a great processor, but if you were seriously thinking about the x79 platform, i would hold off, only about a month to wait until Intel launches x79 if sources are to be believed (Nov. 14-15). Also, for those saying the that four cores is more than enough, that's what was said about two cores back in the day. Frostbite 2 engine (the engine that bf3 is built on) and many other engines are starting to take advantage of more and more cores everyday. Same thing happened with pci-e gen1 to gen2. Its more of a if you build and make it prevalent in modern day computers, then you'll be see people taking advantage of it.
Click to expand...

I usually upgrade every three years approximately. Graphics card aside, my current system-- CPU, RAM and board-- are already beyond the three year mark. So, basically, my next upgrade has to last three years AND perform well enough for games now and games and software released within the next 3 years. I can feasibly run games like BF3 Beta and Civ 5 and stuff like Photoshop well with my current setup but it's getting long in the tooth so to speak. Lol.

If Ivy Bridge is indeed coming out by March 2012, I'll hold out until then.
 
From my current rig anything is either a sidegrade or an incremental upgrade...given a choice I'd prefer LGA2011, but that entry fee will be high. I'm tempted to club someone over the head and take their i7/970 for a while until Ivy Bridge rolls in...
 
I think SBE is for gamers who are planning to do tri-sli/crossfire.

im waiting for Ivy and kepler.

with kepler and ivy i think you are looking at more than double the performance in just 4-5 months from now.
 
I really dont think 1155 Ivy will be the cats meow that everyone thinks it will be.

I really have a funny feeling that Intel will gimp it to make their Enthusiest platform more differentiated. All that it would really take is to lock Ivy Bridge and to all of those that think Intel would be crazy to take such a step backward I will say Intel is now in a position that they can do whatever they want.

Just look at Intels markeing strategy. They want to create an Enthusiest and Mainstream platform.

X58 was supposed to really kick off the Enthusiest platform, but the Mainstream platforms P67 H67 and (later due to demand) Z68, were able to match it and succeed it due to various factors including the availability of NV200.

Now the NV200 is dead and the only way to get features such as Quad SLI is to jump on the Enthusiest platform.

I really have a suspicion that Sandy Bridge and socket 1155 will be the last Intel platform to bridge the gap between Enthusiest and Mainstream especially now that it seems AMD will be weakend for at least another cycle.
 
EpsilonZer0 said:
I really dont think 1155 Ivy will be the cats meow that everyone thinks it will be.

I really have a funny feeling that Intel will gimp it to make their Enthusiest platform more differentiated. All that it would really take is to lock Ivy Bridge and to all of those that think Intel would be crazy to take such a step backward I will say Intel is now in a position that they can do whatever they want.

Just look at Intels markeing strategy. They want to create an Enthusiest and Mainstream platform.

X58 was supposed to really kick off the Enthusiest platform, but the Mainstream platforms P67 H67 and (later due to demand) Z68, were able to match it and succeed it due to various factors including the availability of NV200.

Now the NV200 is dead and the only way to get features such as Quad SLI is to jump on the Enthusiest platform.

I really have a suspicion that Sandy Bridge and socket 1155 will be the last Intel platform to bridge the gap between Enthusiest and Mainstream especially now that it seems AMD will be weakend for at least another cycle.
Click to expand...

Its weird, its almost like you act as if the x58 platform came out and then a few months later, p67 h67 came out. Which is most definitely not the case seeing as the mainstream sockets (p67 etc.) were released January of this year while x58 has been around for almost 3-4 years now. To be perfectly honest, x58 was a success as an enthusiast platform, it supported a good, cheap processor (i7 920) and had better processors that weren't that great in terms of bang for buck but were there like the 970x 980x etc. As for having tri or quad sli on a mainstream socket like 1156 or 1155, i haven't seen a motherboard that has supported such a thing or anyone that would want to go tri or quad sli on a mainstream chipset as it just doesn't make sense to bottleneck your system like that even with a nv200 chip.

As for creating a separate mainstream and enthusiast platforms, it just makes sense regardless of competition (although right now lack of competition) to create a distinction between the two. Businesses need workhorses, with more bandwidth, more pci-e lanes etc and that is what SB-E is, a derivative of the business platform marketed toward those who want the best (even if they don't need it). In the end its mainstream and Enthusiast/Business platforms.
 
I was hanging out for a Bulldozer for a video editing build that also required decent gaming performance.

Ermm, looks like I need plan-B! My best option would appear to be an i7-3630. Hell, 32Gb of RAM would be mighty useful for After Effects!
 
We'll have to see if there's any real gaming advantage. IB will work with my MB, but I'll spend another $800 if it'll make a difference.
 
short answer.. good for folding (though just buying and building 2 2600k systems would give more points for the dollar spent if done intelligently, given the price point of intel's processors) and good for people who game with multiple monitors using 3 or more video cards.

Other then that, no major difference running windows, playing most games which don't utilize 6 cores anyways, etc. It all comes down to needs. There are plenty that would think nothing of tossing down 600-1000 for a processor, these same people spend 1000-1500 on video cards so there's definitely a market for it.

Choices are nice. Too bad AMD didn't provide some real competition though. I shudder to think what will happen to processor innovation if only Intel is there as the major provider. As somebody who doesn't want companies to hold back faster processors just because there's no competition, I hope AMD gets it's act together.
 
If the world does not end in December of 2012 I will be celebrating by upping my rig in 2013!
 
Rumors of SB-E having chipset issues I may wait and see if revisions are full featured. If it far superior to my 920 I may but if not I will wait for IB.
 
Tiporaro said:
did I miss something?
Click to expand...

Yeah, In that settlment Intel and Nvidia made, Nvidia doesnt have any access to future Intel chipsets, so therfore there is no way to get more PCIe lanes on a mainstream board unless Intel allows it.

The most notable bit here is that the chipset license agreement will now formally define that NVIDIA does not gain rights to DMI/QPI, which the agreement defines as being Intel processors with an on-chip/on-die memory controller. So while the company can continue to produce C2D chipsets, they will not be able to produce a Nehalem or Sandy Bridge chipset. This seems to be quite alright with NVIDIA, who claims they are done making chipsets – as far as we know they wound-down their chipset operations some time ago, and the GeForce 320M chipset (seen in Apple’s 13” and 11” notebooks) was the final chipset for the company. This also recognizes the long-term problem with producing a chipset for these processors, as with an on-die memory controller there’s little for NVIDIA to do on DMI-based CPUs beyond adding a south bridge (although we would like USB 3 support…). One way or another the 3rd party chipset market is dead.
http://www.anandtech.com/show/4122/intel-settles-with-nvidia-more-money-fewer-problems-no-x86/2
Click to expand...
 
I'd not say that Nvidia not making Intel chipsets is bad news... they were not known of the stability and flawless operations :)
 
I'm left wondering why there isn't an i5-2500 equivalent in the SB-E lineup, as in 6C/6T, one bin slower, and a pittance less cache for roughly $100 less. Wouldn't that expand the platform's market considerably?
 
MorgothPl said:
I'd not say that Nvidia not making Intel chipsets is bad news... they were not known of the stability and flawless operations :)
Click to expand...

Totally agree. Nvidia chipsets were garbage. The last Nvidia chipset I had from them was the 790i and it couldn't recognize my GTX 580 Lightning or my LSI raid controller due to memory limits since both of these have to initialize their own bios.

People had the same problem. Just google "Warning: Have Option ROM can not be invoke bios RAID".

Only choice I had was to upgrade to an X58.
 
The 3930K is just way too expensive at $600. If it was like $450 I'd consider it, but even then, that's still a bit much for me.
 
I should have gone X58 year's ago. I didn't. My bad.


octoberasian said:
I guess if you're coming from a socket 775 Intel or socket AM2+ or AM3 AMD and haven't switched to either Bulldozer or socket 1366/1155 Intel CPU, then this might be a good upgrade-- if you can justify the extra cost.
Click to expand...

That's exactly where I'm coming from. See sig.

On the one hand, you are getting quad channel RAM with an increased speed of 1600 MHz compared to 1333 Mhz, and a newer chipset-- X79, which would expand PCI-E lanes to 40 total.
Click to expand...

Yes. I want those 40 lane's. The possible future usefullness of natively supported - (no bridge chip) - PCI-e 3.0 running at x16 - x16 in SLI is part of my thinking.

Would it be smart to spend $294 to $999 now when you may have to spend similar for an Ivy Bridge CPU in a little over a year from now? The i7-3820 is $294 versus $315 retail for the 2600K.
Click to expand...

$999 - no. $294 - absolutely. My rig is for gaming only. Overclocking is also important to me for the fun of doing it and the added performance it brings. 6 core's not needed.

One can overclock, the other does not.
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Well, not exactly. The X79 chipset will bring to the table a feature that I think many people are overlooking or are as yet unaware of. There will be two intermediate reference clock ratio multiplier's available. 1.25x and 1.67x. These will be provided by the chipset and should make some degree of overclocking possible on even a fully locked CPU.
For me this makes for a compelling upgrade. I'm thinking a locked 4 core i7-3820 overclocked as far as possible using this feature will do me just fine for a year or so. Then when the socket 2011 Ivy's come out I'll just sell it and go big with the best fully unlocked Ivy available. Add to this platform a next gen, PCI-e 3.0 card or card's and I'm hoping to get as many years out of this platform as so many got from thier X58 rigs.

http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/cpu/display/lga-2011-idf_2.html

I've never worked with Z68 - 1155 so I don't know for certain, but I don't think they can do this.
 
I'll run X58 for a couple more year's and let X79 mature, and prices drop :D.
 
Those 40 PCI-E 3.0 lanes would do you absolutely no good unless you're running multiple high-bandwidth RAID controllers/PCI-E SSDs (like those revodrives). Graphics cards have yet to completely max out 8 PCI-E 2.0 lanes in all situations.

Just get an Ivy Bridge setup with a PCI-E 3.0 capable motherboard. You won't run out of bandwidth unless you're in the situation I stated above.

djsb said:
I'm left wondering why there isn't an i5-2500 equivalent in the SB-E lineup, as in 6C/6T, one bin slower, and a pittance less cache for roughly $100 less. Wouldn't that expand the platform's market considerably?
Click to expand...

Just look at the history between 1366 and 1156. Was there any similar processor on 1366 to 1156 (4C/4T)? What makes you think 2011 will be any different?
 
If there was a 6 core that was unlocked that was binned lower than the mid ranged sb-e chip. I would be all over that, or even if it wasn't unlocked. The fact that the lower end is only 4 cores is very disappointing. All of the release chips for x58 were 4 cores and then later moved to six cores, its too bad that theres no 300-400 dollar chip that has six cores, as well as the lower end one (the four core) not even being multi unlocked. Enthusiast? ya so what you can change the fsb, you also have to pay a lot to even enter the x79 platform thats pegged as enthusiast. Throw us a bone Intel.

All the processors for the x79 platform at the very least should be six cores. or at the very least of the K variety.
 
EpsilonZer0 said:
Yeah, In that settlment Intel and Nvidia made, Nvidia doesnt have any access to future Intel chipsets, so therfore there is no way to get more PCIe lanes on a mainstream board unless Intel allows it.
Click to expand...
Even if they did have access to DMI and QPI licenses it wouldn't help. Intel mainstream chips don't have any external QPI interfaces and afaict current DMI is a slightly modified PCIe 2.0 x4. The fastest interface on current intel mainstream processors is PCIe 2.0 x16 and that is an industry standard. As we all know NVIDIA produce the NF200 bridge chip that allows running three way SLI or crossfire off an Intel mainstream chip (ATI also allow running three way crossfire with one of the cards connected to the PCH but this configuration doesn't perform as well as a NF200).

Tsumi said:
Just get an Ivy Bridge setup with a PCI-E 3.0 capable motherboard. You won't run out of bandwidth unless you're in the situation I stated above.
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While some current boards may be able to support 3.0 for lanes direct from the CPU they won't support it for lanes from the southbridge. Nor will they support it for lanes from a NF200 (afaict there are not yet any NF200 equivalents on the market that support PCIe 3.0). So while your advice is fine for 1-2 GPU users IMO LGA2011 is more future proof for 3 GPU users.

pewter77 said:
its too bad that theres no 300-400 dollar chip that has six cores
Click to expand...
I bet there will be, it's just it won't be branded as a desktop chip since on the desktop fewer fast cores are generally better than more slow cores.
 
plugwash said:
Even if they did have access to DMI and QPI licenses it wouldn't help. Intel mainstream chips don't have any external QPI interfaces and afaict current DMI is a slightly modified PCIe 2.0 x4. The fastest interface on current intel mainstream processors is PCIe 2.0 x16 and that is an industry standard. As we all know NVIDIA produce the NF200 bridge chip that allows running three way SLI or crossfire off an Intel mainstream chip (ATI also allow running three way crossfire with one of the cards connected to the PCH but this configuration doesn't perform as well as a NF200).


While some current boards may be able to support 3.0 for lanes direct from the CPU they won't support it for lanes from the southbridge. Nor will they support it for lanes from a NF200 (afaict there are not yet any NF200 equivalents on the market that support PCIe 3.0). So while your advice is fine for 1-2 GPU users IMO LGA2011 is more future proof for 3 GPU users.


I bet there will be, it's just it won't be branded as a desktop chip since on the desktop fewer fast cores are generally better than more slow cores.
Click to expand...

And [H] testing has shown that with higher clock speeds, Z68 with a NF200 chip in tri-SLI actually outperforms a standard x58 setup. The NF200 adds minimal latency.
 
I've had my current platform for over 2 years now, time to move on to something new.
 
Tsumi said:
Those 40 PCI-E 3.0 lanes would do you absolutely no good unless you're running multiple high-bandwidth RAID controllers/PCI-E SSDs (like those revodrives). Graphics cards have yet to completely max out 8 PCI-E 2.0 lanes in all situations.

Just get an Ivy Bridge setup with a PCI-E 3.0 capable motherboard. You won't run out of bandwidth unless you're in the situation I stated above.



Just look at the history between 1366 and 1156. Was there any similar processor on 1366 to 1156 (4C/4T)? What makes you think 2011 will be any different?
Click to expand...


Exactly part of my plan ;)

I want to run 3x Gen3 GPUs in SLI/Crossfire and have the fourth slot populated by a Raid controller or an OCZ Revodrive type device.

So far though, I havent seen any boards that have PCI-e 3.0 lanes across all of the slots, for the most part its just been 2 slots and anything beyond that it goes back to PCIe 2

Not necessarily a big con though because GPUs havent fully saturated PCIe 2, so maybe i will throw the Gen 3 Raid controler in the PCIe 3 slot.
 
olsonpm said:
...Well, not exactly. The X79 chipset will bring to the table a feature that I think many people are overlooking or are as yet unaware of. There will be two intermediate reference clock ratio multiplier's available. 1.25x and 1.67x. These will be provided by the chipset and should make some degree of overclocking possible on even a fully locked CPU.
For me this makes for a compelling upgrade. I'm thinking a locked 4 core i7-3820 overclocked as far as possible using this feature will do me just fine for a year or so. Then when the socket 2011 Ivy's come out I'll just sell it and go big with the best fully unlocked Ivy available. Add to this platform a next gen, PCI-e 3.0 card or card's and I'm hoping to get as many years out of this platform as so many got from thier X58 rigs.
Click to expand...

Yeah, this is what I'm thinking about doing myself since it looks like I am finally coming into a position of being able to build a new rig after five years. I'm coming from a $300 Wal-Mart EMachines system with an AMD 250u CPU and built in video that can barely choke out 7-8 year old games...and IT SUCKS.

And since I am coming from basically nothing, I might as well hop on the latest and greatest bandwagon. :)
 
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