Intel Core i7 Review Thread

[cool_case]

7 years is way, way too short. What do you mean anyway? 50% (X%?) of chips should die after 7 years 24/7 loads?

I'm pretty sure temperature and OC is important, but voltage is probably most important.
Low end cooling cannot stop chips running high voltage from throttling due to temperature -> no overclock...

The reports my EE colleague referred to said that Intel uses 7 years as the life span of server chips on 24/7 load. He is not an Intel employee, but worked on studies that Intel used. An Intel employee working in testing could clear this up quickly - though the information may be proprietary.

Voltage is definitely a big factor, but it's not the only factor. First, we know that with extreme cooling, voltages could be in the 1.9v range for c2d's, without doing damage. You wouldn't have even been able to post if trying that kind of a voltage with air or water. With Nehalem, I haven't seen anyone trying a voltage above 1.6v yet. ( I'll be putting my 965 on LN2 this week, so that will provide a little more data.)

Second, electronic components don't like heat. The throttle temperature is set because if the chip hits that, damage would almost instantly be done. But, below the throttle temperature, especially as you get closer to that temperature, there is gradual depredation of the chip's electronics that increases as the temperature gets closer to the throttle temperature. If you run a chip 24/7 at 5-10 degrees below throttle, vs. 30 degrees below throttle, it just makes intuitive sense that depredation of the components will happen significantly faster in the hotter case.