The Sandy Bridge Preview (Anand)

[informal]

The 12 Exec. Unit(2C) GPU part would need to be 4x faster than 5450/1C SB's GPU in order to even come close to Llano's 480SP Evergreen part.

[Iconyu]

I'm impressed by the IGP, even more if this is not the fastest version they will have,

but the overclock limitations
if you have the cheapest version without the unlocked multi and without turbo you are left without options? while you can run a clarkdale g6950 at 4.5ghz...
this "100mhz" reference clock, limited OC comment doesn't help, I'm at this moment using a cheap overclocked e5200, it seems this kind of CPU (really cheap with lots of OC potential) is dead.

I understand it sucking for those that don't live in richer countries where having a good job will get you a nice house, but not a nice BMW. But I think Intel have been leaning this way for sometime, first they split mainstream and enthusiast/professional and now they are making their lowest mainstream parts undesirable to overclockers.

If (I admit it's a pretty big 'if', as BD does look pretty good) Bulldozer can't beat the higher end Sandybridge CPU's, then at least they'll have a bigger area to work with. Very unlike the Core 2 launch where every Core 2 product was more desirable than the AMD line.

As for the IGP, I think the higher end AMD's will eat Intel alive on that.

[terrace215]

The 12 Exec. Unit(2C) GPU part would need to be 4x faster than 5450/1C SB's GPU in order to even come close to Llano's 480SP Evergreen part.

I think you're overestimating how that Evergreen part is going to perform when integrated with Llano

[terrace215]

BTW, IPC gains are higher than thought.

In addition to the L3 cache being smaller on Sandy, the other Westmere comparison parts were allowed to Turbo (!), so it is not clock-for-clock at all, particularly on single-threaded workloads.

The i7 880 can hit 3.73GHz, 20% higher clock than the non-turboing 3.1GHz Sandy.

[Manicdan]

I think you're overestimating how that Evergreen part is going to perform when integrated with Llano

what do you mean? that 480SPs will not be fully utilized when paired with Llano?

[Vapor]

Im flabbergasted by cheerfull acceptance for limiting overclocking here

57x for the 2500k and 2600k should be WAY more than what air/water OCers can use.

Will be interesting to see what the lower, partially locked chips can do. Let's say they give 6 multipliers above top turbo bin and bclk can range between 95-105, then you can hit 4200MHz with the 2400, 4100MHz with 2120, 3900MHz with the 2100. Not awful clocking on the low-end parts....and the 2500K is probably ~$200, so the cheapest unlocked is the same price as the cheapest quad core (i5 760) right now.

[Manicdan]

sadly 57x sure dosnt sound like it can break any world records for the most xtreme users we have here.

[Hornet331]

The 12 Exec. Unit(2C) GPU part would need to be 4x faster than 5450/1C SB's GPU in order to even come close to Llano's 480SP Evergreen part.

I still have my doubts about the 480SP part (not that there is going to be such a SKU)... that thing will be so bandwidth starved, it will be ugly. Sure it will beat every other igp out there, but there will be so much performance given away...

A 5670 has 68 GB/s... Llano at best can offer 25.8 GB/s, maybe 34 GB/s if they support DDR3-2133. Half of what a 5670 offers, and it has 80SP less.

[Vapor]

sadly 57x sure dosnt sound like it can break any world records for the most xtreme users we have here.

Agreed, WR-class benching will be on Westmere and then LGA2011, IMO.

[slaveondope]

Looks like Llano is going to have a tough job keeping up with mid-range Sandy Bridge(4c non HT/2c w/HT) on the cpu side.

[Manicdan]

I still have my doubts about the 480SP part (not that there is going to be such a SKU)... that thing will be so bandwidth starved, it will be ugly. Sure it will beat every other igp out there, but there will be so much performance given away...

A 5670 has 68 GB/s... Llano at bast can offer 25.8 GB/s, maybe 34 GB/s if they support DDR3-2133. Half of what a 5670 offers, and it has 80SP less.

maybe someone here can test that for us.
whoever has a 5670, please downclock your memory by alot and see what your scores drop by

[xVeinx]

I'm flabbergasted by cheerful acceptance for limiting overclocking here

I don't think people are cheerfully accepting anything, but more waiting to see how things play out. Even the Anandtech review indicates that some of this may not be finalized yet. Part of the change is likely due to architecture, and people adapted to Nehalem-based processors just fine when that made adjustments to how overclocking was done. The techniques may change, but the ability will still be there, in one form or another. Pricing is a a big ? for now, although basing prices off of current sku's makes the most sense. Affordability may decrease this generation, which is unfortunate, yes. Let this play out first before getting all worked up though .

[informal]

I think you're overestimating how that Evergreen part is going to perform when integrated with Llano

I think you are underestimating Llano altogether . The GPU part in Llano will be 32nm hk/mg SOI instead of 40nm bulk,so clocks can be different from Evergreen discrete parts.There is a new IMC specially designed for the Fusion parts and higher DDR3 speeds will be supported with the new IMC. Altogether Llano's game performance should be in another league compared to SB.

[Iconyu]

Maybe not for myself (main reason being this am2+ socket just wont die ;-) ,but ive build quite a few systems for clients /friends family around intel chips, mainly in the core2 era, getting a cheap FAST chip was pretty easy with intel then, so the price to performance ratio was solid.During phenom I fiasco i havent recommended even once this chip.

Don't worry about it, I've found that if you're overclocking a CPU for someone they are rarely the type to notice when it's not overclocked. If you're in a position to do so, make sure the CPU has a decent turbo mode (some of the cheaper chips listed have a boost of about 1ghz). I'd certainly prefer it like this over having to overclock, then test for stability, and explain why it's crashing in July...

This stuff is going to make my life a load easier.

[RaV[666]]

Optimistic thoughts about the future

Well i get that that it wont be that much of a horror initially.
But get this.
Thats step one.
If it goes smoothly, whats gonna intel do next with ivybridge ?Limit more ?
Totally limit ?
Intel has been doing small steps starting with nehalem introduction for milking the enthusiast community.If people will be that happy about every little change, in few years overclocking could be limited only to 999$ chips with corresponding mobo ram and etc.

And cpu is only part of a platform, remember that intel wants to limit memory clocking on H chipset.And because you dont have full bclk control, you cant extract every bit of mhz from cpu or ram.
It becomes dumbclocking.
Buy some expensive stuff, change two multis (cpu and maybe ram).Done.Wheres fun ?
And there is more stuff they can block, no dram timings, no voltages...
For me its scary.

EDIT
Theres one light of hope tho, mainboard makers arent gonna be exactly happy bout this, maybe they will work something out.

[Olivon]

Cool ! Thanks Vapor

[ajaidev]

I still have my doubts about the 480SP part (not that there is going to be such a SKU)... that thing will be so bandwidth starved, it will be ugly. Sure it will beat every other igp out there, but there will be so much performance given away...

A 5670 has 68 GB/s... Llano at best can offer 25.8 GB/s, maybe 34 GB/s if they support DDR3-2133. Half of what a 5670 offers, and it has 80SP less.

5570 offers 28.8 GB/s and has 400SP's. While it is not as powerful as the 5670 "Other stuff has also been taken out" its not a performance disaster due to low bandwidth. Also the 5570 works on 650mhz core and 1.8Ghz memory.

http://www.techspot.com/review/245-a...570/page4.html

Looks like Llano is going to have a tough job keeping up with mid-range Sandy Bridge(4c non HT/2c w/HT) on the cpu side.

Yep but that was expected and has not changed ever since it was known that llano is based on K10.5 aka stars cpu.

[~CS~]

i still get lost with things.

i do know that what we get this xmas is 80SPs (ontario)
and Llano is built more for desktop, but also works for medium to high powered laptops and will have a gpu good enough to be called a gaming laptop.

im not going to try and assume if bobcat is ontario, cause i honestly forget lol

Bobcat is a core design,not a CPU.There is no bobcat cpu,whether or not Liano or Ontario will be using bobcat cores or k10's is not very clear,maybe I missed it.

Sorry for the off topic post.

[onewingedangel]

Launching these mid-range Sandy Bridge would kill off the high-end single socket bloomfield and gulftown sales.

[Calmatory]

BTW, IPC gains are higher than thought.

In addition to the L3 cache being smaller on Sandy, the other Westmere comparison parts were allowed to Turbo (!), so it is not clock-for-clock at all, particularly on single-threaded workloads.

The i7 880 can hit 3.73GHz, 20% higher clock than the non-turboing 3.1GHz Sandy.

I see no IPC gains, which you preached about some time earlier. Maybe you meant single thread performance boosted by turbo?

[570091D]

this is what shocked the crap outta me

[terrace215]

I see no IPC gains, which you preached about some time earlier.

Erm, 10% faster on average against a part that clocks 20% higher on all single-threaded tests?

Check your eyes.

[ajaidev]

Bobcat is a core design,not a CPU.There is no bobcat cpu,whether or not Liano or Ontario will be using bobcat cores or k10's is not very clear,maybe I missed it.

Sorry for the off topic post.

Ontario will use bobcat and liano will use stars.

I see no IPC gains, which you preached about some time earlier. Maybe you meant single thread performance boosted by turbo?

There is no turbo in this ES.

[Calmatory]

So the improvement wasn't because of turbo? Then why there is no such improvement in multi threaded workloads?

[Don_Dan]

Interesting read, thanks for posting the link!