No overclocking for mainstream Nehalem?

[Swatrecon_]

as far as I'm concerned, it's pointless to even discuss this until we hear something solid. Like it's been said, this could just be FUD being retarded and misinterpreting something Intel's been saying for the past 15 years. Or not, it doesn't matter, we won't taste Nehalem for quite a while yet, so why worry?

[strange|ife]

32nm may limit some headroom in oc anyway. People are already seeing this with 45nm, some chips just cant take the vcore for substained periods like 65nm. Im sure third party board's will support multiplier changes and ratios though, just not the intel made boards.

[adamsleath]

yeah, but just in case you better go and buy that 65nm based system, to offload the older stock...er i mean "while stocks last"

- sorry, i had to say it - usual marketing spiel preying on fear and ignorance.

[Blauhung]

I believe this article is true. It's not that Intel won't support overclocking because it is being locked out after the fact. The way the mainstream Lynnfield/Havendale designs are setup they have no northbridge to do the clock splitting. There most likely will be a locked multiplier on the chip, but it's probably going to be based directly off the clock started on the clock generator. I believe the only way to alter the operating frequency of the mainstream CPU's will be to alter the frequency of the clock generation IC, and that will mess with many other things.

The high end chips will have a northbridge that sets interconnect speed (Tylersburg) and that will be a lever for people to alter the clock frequency that the CPU is based off of.

[BrowncoatGR]

I've been saying this for while and ppl have been calling me crazy. I think we'll soon see who was blind to the truth. That said i expect the high-end platform to reach high mid-end sooner or later so there will be some overlap imho. What won't be possible is getting a $150 cpu+mobo and OCing it to $1000 levels.

[T_M]

So, what would happen about all those power saving features from board designers that turn down clock speed when not required?

[Brother Esau]

Sounds and seems like now that Intel has undermined AMD Financially by promoting overclocking and getting all of the flys in the spiders web they will now Pull the Plug and renig on what they are currently offering which is highly overclockable chips. Tssk , Tssk , Tssk imagine that!
\\\
Now for high frequency and overclockable chips me thinks the future will bring Incredibly Overpriced Xtreme Edition CPU's at a XTREME PRICE

GO ........INTEL FRAT HOUSE HA...HA!

[Blauhung]

So, what would happen about all those power saving features from board designers that turn down clock speed when not required?

speed step will still exist. along with dynamic auto-overclocking of single cores when only single threaded workloads are running just like in mobile Penryn.

Sounds and seems like now that Intel has undermined AMD Financially by promoting overclocking and getting all of the flys in the spiders web they will now Pull the Plug and renig on what they are currently offering which is highly overclockable chips. Tssk , Tssk , Tssk imagine that!
\\\
Now for high frequency and overclockable chips me thinks the future will bring Incredibly Overpriced Xtreme Edition CPU's at a XTREME PRICE

GO ........INTEL FRAT HOUSE HA...HA!

there most likely will be locked multi lower price versions of bloomfield, not only limited to extreme chips. Although you're still probably looking at $400 or so

[Bobsama]

I can't afford $400 on a CPU+Mobo+RAM, much less on a single CPU! Those three components TOGETHER, for my current build, cost under $250. Maybe I can afford them in the future, when I get a job and earn a few thousand and then spend it on a DP Beckton system. Even then, I'll have to use lower-speed processors.

By the way--no doubt the enthusiast community keeps on growing. It's still very small--and it is believable that Intel's Northbridge-on-Die setup just won't work well. Maybe it's just the first or second designs for the mainstream that will have this problem. I hope that Intel will start using several clock-gens to fix this problem.

I started this entire enthusiast thing about 2 years ago--though that was following Tom's Hardware, and later Anandtech and X-Bit Labs. Many people realize just how absurd Tom's HW gets so they look at other sites and join communities. I doubt there's many people who leave this forum, especially compared to those others.

[ShiningArcanine]

Or maybe intel is seeing that there is no competition and tries to make some more money out of it by selling chips that o/c in higher prices.

Before the Core 2 Duo debuted, AMD raised the prices of their existing processors, which is something that Intel has never done.

Never throw stones from a glass house.

[Jimmer411]

Again, quite wrong. Now with the "a lot of". As I said, maybe 1% of consumers will overclock their computers themselves. If you look at the number of overclockers, which I'd estimate to be about 200,000 people at a maximum, you also have to consider non-overclockers too, which accounts for many millions of users. Maybe the entire base of people who will build computers is 3%--I find that quite likely and very believable. Not everyone who builds a computer...
1) Knows what they're really doing
2) Chooses the best components
3) Plans to overclock
4) Overclocks
5) Has a limited budget or a lust for 100+% overclocks

You see a lot of people who do things we may consider stupid. I consider buying high-end OEM computers to be stupid. I'm a computer enthusiast--I know enough about computers to know about overclocking, and I know enough about overclocking to overclock.

Really, 1% of the market is not "a lot". We are a niche--and we will buy computers nonetheless. Intel would feel very little recoil if they decided to disable most overclocking--they'd still have a fraction of the overclocking market who will spend $1000 on a CPU and $350 on a motherboard. Arguably, those are the people you'd rather serve, as the profit margins are extraordinary. Intel's real cash cows are the OEMs and "Extreme-edition" enthusiasts. Intel really makes little money directly off of non-"Extreme-edition", especially compared to OEMs.

As I have said before--I highly doubt that Intel will lock all overclocking on non-enthusiast processors.

QFT! Ill add in its those people that do most of the promoting for intel that have those chips. So in the end we would still see the legends posting insane overclocks, where us little people would be SOL. Intel still wins.


Its no longer about whos the best tweaker like it used to be anyways. Its all about who can buy the most expensive hardware that no one can afford. Look at orb.

[Movieman]

QFT! Ill add in its those people that do most of the promoting for intel that have those chips. So in the end we would still see the legends posting insane overclocks, where us little people would be SOL. Intel still wins.


Its no longer about whos the best tweaker like it used to be anyways. Its all about who can buy the most expensive hardware that no one can afford. Look at orb.

But isn't every hobby/Sport that way?
There are the top people, the middle and the bottom.
There is room for all to play
Then realistically look at what is available today for short money.
An E8400 for the gamers that clocks very nicely and the Q6600 where many do 3600 on air and thats a pretty powerfull machine at that speed.
Both machines pretty cheap to build.
I'm into the dual socket boards.
I just tested a $3000.00 pair of X5482's(borrowed), punched them up to 3600 and on wPrime32m time was less than 1 sec faster than a guy with a $550.00 pair of 5420's at 3225..
There is still the cheap way to attain almost the speeds of the top chips but at much less money spent.

[alucasa]

Its no longer about whos the best tweaker like it used to be anyways. Its all about who can buy the most expensive hardware that no one can afford. Look at orb.

That is if you want to show off.

I am a big fan of rackmounts (2U especially) and dual socket server motherboards, and I always purchase the cheapest available. (or close to. It varies on situation of course.)

It's called hobby. I am not doing all those to show off. I am doing this and that to enjoy myself.

When you have to, or feel like you have to, purchase the best stuff to get the highest scores to please others around you and make them drool, then I don't think it's a hobby anymore.

[Hornet331]

That is if you want to show off.

I am a big fan of rackmounts (2U especially) and dual socket server motherboards, and I always purchase the cheapest available. (or close to. It varies on situation of course.)

It's called hobby. I am not doing all those to show off. I am doing this and that to enjoy myself.

When you have to, or feel like you have to, purchase the best stuff to get the highest scores to please others around you and make them drool, then I don't think it's a hobby anymore.

qfe.

[GoThr3k]

But isn't every hobby/Sport that way?
There are the top people, the middle and the bottom.

in sports you can train, training doesnt cost much, it depends partly on talent
if you are a talented tweaker/overclocker, but you dont have the $$$$ you will never be able to reach the top

[Hornet331]

in sports you can train, training doesnt cost much, it depends partly on talent
if you are a talented tweaker/overclocker, but you dont have the $$$$ you will never be able to reach the top

depends on the sports or on the hobby -> car tuning, without $$$ nothing happens there.

[STaRGaZeR]

depends on the sports or on the hobby -> car tuning, without $$$ nothing happens there.

Bad example there. That's not a real "sport", even if some people want to call it like that.

[Seraphiel]

in sports you can train, training doesnt cost much, it depends partly on talent
if you are a talented tweaker/overclocker, but you dont have the $$$$ you will never be able to reach the top

Training costs time - time is very releated to money.

There are various ways to show your talent of overclocking, even without alot of money. However, no doubt luck and having contacts / networks, which can give huge advantage, means alot.

In the end, though, money is everything in terms of OC in its maximized extreme. Willing to pay a couple of millions for a custom Yorkfield + setup, that will destroy everything, then you will get what you pay for. Skill only means so much, and money can negate skill more than vice versa - in terms of end performance in a particular benchmark.

[annihilat0r]

I don't know why that should mean Intel is shooting itself in the foot. I don't think a sizeable portion of PC consumers overclock their chips. Most even don't know the word, and most of the ones who do know the word think a 10MHz overclock will burn their chips.

[Seraphiel]

Sounds and seems like now that Intel has undermined AMD Financially by promoting overclocking and getting all of the flys in the spiders web they will now Pull the Plug and renig on what they are currently offering which is highly overclockable chips. Tssk , Tssk , Tssk imagine that!
\\\
Now for high frequency and overclockable chips me thinks the future will bring Incredibly Overpriced Xtreme Edition CPU's at a XTREME PRICE

Either you are ignoring facts, have a personal agenda, or have completely missed the picture.

I believe, you're smart enough to figure it all out, or wait for the reality and real reasons, of whatever will happen, before making such harsh judgements... right?

[GoThr3k]

depends on the sports or on the hobby -> car tuning, without $$$ nothing happens there.

now, thats a good example, i always compare overclocking to car tuning, you also have different categories (Drag with different classes, circuit, etc.) altough you will get the best results if you have the most money, you can easily beat a similar car then yours in a different class(lets say, max 250hp) if your skills or luck are better then your opponents.

[Blauhung]

now, thats a good example, i always compare overclocking to car tuning, you also have different categories (Drag with different classes, circuit, etc.) altough you will get the best results if you have the most money, you can easily beat a similar car then yours in a different class(lets say, max 250hp) if your skills or luck are better then your opponents.

couldn't have said it better

[largon]

Then ofcourse, there are those people that don't give a crap about benchmarks. Those that just OC for the fun of it and think preoverclocked, overpriced, high bin/extreme edition chips are boring. Those people that Intel says "screw you" to when "OC locking" low/mid end.
Well. I say, screw you too, Intel.

CPU is sooo dead...

[XSAlliN]

If by some stupid idea they decide that looking the chip is a good Idea, then AMD would be again the number 1 in my book.

[bowman]

http://www.infoworld.com/article/08/...arranty_1.html

Intel gives users the tools to squeeze extra performance from their systems by overclocking the processor, but don't expect the warranty to cover you if things go wrong.

Overclocking capabilities are a main feature of Intel's 4 series chipset, said Eric Mentzer, Intel's vice president and general manager of the Graphics Development Group, in an interview at the Computex exhibition in Taipei

"We spend a lot of time working with our motherboard partners to figure out all the hidden bits inside, helping them figure out how to bring the best out of these platforms," Mentzer said.

That same ability is available to users, but it hasn't always been. Intel used to lock down its chips to prevent overclocking, but the company's mindset has changed. Overclockers are now viewed as an important market segment, rather than troublemakers.

"There's a very small segment that just love to play with this stuff," Mentzer said. "They're very important to us because they are also the people who set the tone for what they think is a good chipset."

But embracing the market doesn't mean the warranty on Intel chips will cover overclocking. Intel puts its chips through a strenuous testing process, and the chips are guaranteed to perform reliably to the levels tested -- and no further.

"When we do that, inherently there's a lot of margin. We know you can overclock and deliver greater performance, because effectively you're tapping into the margins we've designed into the product.... But of course, we can't stand by that because we'd have to test to that (level of performance)," Mentzer said.

Do you expect them to say this and then months later lock their future products? Seriously?

Anyone who believed this FUD might want to reconsider now..