Core i7 870 Tested

[initialised]

4GHz is just about there, working out some stability problems but temps are OK (70C) on air.

[RPGWiZaRD]

Retail Core i5-750 OC Test at the different clocks (3.6, 3.8 and 4Ghz)....

(Source: playwares.com)

Game Test with 6 different CPUs at the same clock (3.6Ghz)

(Source: playwares.com)

Now that's what I call a useful test of i750's. :o Average vcore for 4GHz out of those 10 samples is 1.4v, pretty much same as i7 920 and OC ratio is pretty much the same too. A good sample may allow for 4.2GHz overclocks and the worse ones tops out at around 4GHz on air if we're sticking to somewhat reasonable voltages (1.45v).

[informal]

Now that's what I call a useful test of i750's. :o

Yep,quite useful test. What's also interesting is the fact how well Yorkfield and Deneb performed at 3.6Ghz(compared to Lynnfield @ 3.6Ghz) in games with high end gfxcard.

[Chad Boga]

Thanks. Using 295GTX perfectly illustrates why faster CPUs are required for today's games.

It is also why AMD could be in a spot of bother when new gen video cards come out in a few months and games like Far Cry 2 etc, won't be as GPU limited as they currently are.

[ownage]

W00t, finally new CPU's, and its even slower than last year stuff!

[RPGWiZaRD]

W00t, finally new CPU's, and its even slower than last year stuff!

Remember it's i750 though, I bet a i7 8xx CPU would be quite neck and neck with the i920 at same clock.

[Spawne32]

wow, look at that i5 beat the crap out of the high end c2q's, thats rediculous

[ajaidev]

Bit sad with the temps... but ok i guess have to wait for 32nm quad for lower temps around 4Ghz

[Chumbucket843]

Bit sad with the temps... but ok i guess have to wait for 32nm quad for lower temps around 4Ghz

thats why i hate deep pipelines. damn you prescott!

[JaD]

I wouldn't have expected such a high power consumption difference for the two platforms. 60W in real world at the same clocks is quite a bit, could it be exacerbated by HT?

[jmke]

everybody who gets an 1156 system soon and likes it, well, welcome to yesterday, you could have had this 1 year ago already :P

for the same price no doubt.
ow wait; no of course not.

let's fix this for you then?

everybody who gets an 1366 system soon and likes it, well, welcome to yesterday, you could have had this 2 year ago already :P

point here is not the performance; but upgrade from S775, mainstream platform.

[RPGWiZaRD]

Well personally I see i7 860 as a perfect upgrade from 775 dual core users like me. I'm not really seeing quad core CPU really useful yet but personally I just want some new hardware to play with and get away from my micron D9GKX RAM killing platform (2 kits died in less than a half year at 2.15v).

[Bobsama]

My favourite graph:


The measly sub 200$ Core i5 750 "clubbing" the 920 in GTA4. Granted it's just this one benchmark but at the price it's going for I think it nicely demonstrates how common users might benefit from expanded turbo mode over SMT.

The 870 generally left the 920 in a cloud of dust except in synthetic memory benchmarks (well duh!). Too bad that it comes with capped multis. Imagine the implications of Intel releasing an unlocked CPU at ~500$ (it will cost near 500$ within months eventhough it may launch @ ~560$, or at least it will in euros). Eventhough it's basically still robbery people would be all over it. I know I would.

1.8% is hardly a cloud of dust. That's well within the margin of error.

Very interesting graph indeed.

I'm disappointed that they don't do a real "apples-to-apples" comparison, especially as these lower-end chips are likely going to see 40% higher-than-tray prices for the opening month or even quarter. It took a long time for i7 prices to stabilize even.

[Salavat23]

for the same price no doubt.
ow wait; no of course not.

let's fix this for you then?


point here is not the performance; but upgrade from S775, mainstream platform.

WTF? That makes no sense. People upgrade for performance.

If the point is not performance, why upgrade to anything? S775 cpus are cheaper, run cooler, and use less power.

You're not fixing anything in that "repaired" quote. You are just adding your delusions into the mix.

And you could not have i7 performance 2 years ago. You have to understand that not all people only play games.

[haylui]

all I see was : GG AMD
with the performance and targeted market, AMD really need to earn much less even with their Phenom II X4 955BE and everything below.

[Bo_Fox]

thats not true, i upgraded from a cheap athlonxp system to a cheap 754 system and the performance boost was quite noticeable... and going from 939 to c2d was quite a boost as well...

going from p3 to athlon or p4 was a big boost
going from athlon to athlonxp was a minor boost
going from athlon xp to k8 was a big boost
going from k8 to k10 was a minor boost
going from k10 to k10.5 was a minor boost
going from core2 to corei7 was a minor boost

lately the perf boosts by new cpus are smaller and smaller... cause they push for more and more cores which dont help in most scenarios, and most software is now written for mainstream, to run on as many systems as possible, even 5 year old ones... i guess those are the reasons...

there was a notable performance boost in my experience...
but yes, its not like you ever needed the latest gen cpu to really do something you couldnt do before...

yeah but what will sata3 and usb3 be good for i ask you... running several ssds in raid maybe, but who does that? and will it really make a notable diference?
and usb3... faster external hdds, but do we really need that?

P3 and Athlon were neck-to-neck most of the time, LOL! Fastest Athlons were usually ahead of the P3 by about 50Mhz, beating it to 1GHz in April, 2000. When Athlon was first released, it came in 550, 600, and 650 Mhz variants, to counter Intel's 550Mhz P3.

Just some good ol' nostalgia!

It all depends on what matters to you the most. What defines the biggest boost for you? Some boosts are "feature" boosts, like PCI-E over AGP, SATA over IDE, DDR2 over DDR, etc.. Some are sheer speed boosts, like going from a 500MHz P3 to a 2GHz AthlonXP, to a 3GHz AthlonX2, finally to a 4GHz Corei7. Some of us do not need those boosts, but some upgrade because those boosts are needed so badly, even if it's only for 1 favorite game.

SATA3 will be the "feature boost" next year, while USB3.0 will probably come the year after, in 2012, given the snail-pace progress of finalizing and approving specifications + delays.. and PCI-3.0 might come out sooner than that. We'll just be seeing 6-core 32nm processors or Clarkdale+IGP, etc.. I find the IGP part interesting as it might eventually lead to a new standard for 2D/low-3D hybrid graphics, mainly for power-saving features while the add-on GPU cards sit idle. The next "speed boost" for me would be at least 5GHz on air, using 12 threads while consuming less than 150W or so for the CPU. Right now, when most of us overclock our i7's to 4GHz, our CPU's eat around 200W under load, which is well over the 110-135W TDP. Add in 4GB sticks of 2500MHz 7-7-7 DDR3 that will eventually become cheap in 18 months or so. Everything's gonna be focused on SSD's anyways, like the shift from CRT's to expensive LCD's, from single AGP video card to expensive SLI, etc..

[onethreehill]

W00t, finally new CPU's, and its even slower than last year stuff!

What last year stuff are faster than these new CPUs?

[onethreehill]

i5-750 vs i7-920
http://namegt.tistory.com/224

[Chad Boga]

i5-750 vs i7-920
http://namegt.tistory.com/224

The i5-720 seems somewhat uninspiring.

[WeeMaan]

Who cares if 870 beats 920 when both are running in default speed?
They should overclock both CPU's to max and then compare, and overclock both CPU's to the same speed and compare clock for clock.

+1 Thats the only thing that matters for me.
The real competition comes when comparing a max stable clocked i7 920 vs 870.
I think the 920 is indeed the champion, atleast in the beginning.

[LinkinParkBoy]

+1 Thats the only thing that matters for me.
The real competition comes when comparing a max stable clocked i7 920 vs 870.
I think the 920 is indeed the champion, atleast in the beginning.

You cant compare the 920 vs 870 in that way of reaching a max stable clocked. The 870 has a higher stock clock, obviously that it will reach a higher max stable clock

Also from the prints that i have been looking the P55 has better overclocking capability than X58. And it uses dual channel instead of trichannel wich makes more easy to overclock because it stresses less the NB

[onethreehill]

We should wait for more reviews and compare:
Core i7 870, 2.93 GHz /Core i7 950, 3.06 GHz - same price - $562
Core i7 860, 2.80 GHz /Core i7 920, 2.66 GHz - same price - $284

[WeeMaan]

You cant compare the 920 vs 870 in that way of reaching a max stable clocked. The 870 has a higher stock clock, obviously that it will reach a higher max stable clock

Also from the prints that i have been looking the P55 has better overclocking capability than X58. And it uses dual channel instead of trichannel wich makes more easy to overclock because it stresses less the NB

Yeah, I guess we will just have to wait and see.
920 is a pretty darn good clocker, I don't belive it's that obvious, but I do agree it is likely that 870 gets a little higher.

[Shadov]

Quite frankly speaking I'm not impressed by the results.

That way I will just stick to the (IMHO) best price / performance AMD Phenom II 955 and stay with socket AM3. When AMD brings Istanbul to desktop then ill consider an CPU upgrade.

On a side note I wonder how Intel will screw everyone with all these new sockets. Its going to be amusing to watch all these "upgrades", where users find their motherboards incompatible.

[zalbard]

That way I will just stick to the (IMHO) best price / performance AMD Phenom II 955 and stay with socket AM3. When AMD brings Istanbul to desktop then ill consider an CPU upgrade.

AMD has been better price / performance wise for a while. If you want the best performance, you go i7, pretty simple.