The Hardware and Quick Overclocking
The Core i7-6950X heat spreader has changed in appearance, but it’s mostly superficial.
6950X (left), 5960X (right)
6950X (left), 5960X (right)
Interestingly, the package on Broadwell-E is thinner than on Haswell-E:
6950X (left), 5960X (right)
To help with testing of the new Core i7-6950X, ASUS sent over the X99-Deluxe II motherboard, an updated version of the board I used in my Core i7-5960X review.
Corsair provided me with new Dominator Platinum memory (4x8GB) running at 3200 MHz and an RM1000x power supply to keep the juices flowing.
Overclocking the Core i7-6950X
While Turbo Boost Max Technology 3.0 is great, I am sure many of you are more concerned about how well you might be able to overclock Broadwell-E. I think the variance of overclocking will be pretty wide from SKU to SKU, but I only have the 10-core part in-house for testing. Still, results are pretty impressive.
Using the ASUS X99-Deluxe II motherboard, overclocking the Core i7-6950X was straightforward and essentially an identical process to previous platforms. Adjusting multipliers and voltages with unlocked processors is an easy game and I quickly found that my stable point with this processor was 4.3 GHz.
I was able to run the Core i7-6950X at 4.3 GHz on all cores completely stable, using a Vcore of 1.35v. That is a substantial voltage increase over stock, so be sure you are using a competent cooler if you are going to attempt to reproduce it. (I was using a Corsair H100i GTX 240mm water cooler.) Temperatures stabilized around 75C during extended burn-in.
Hitting 4.3 GHz on all 10-cores (!!) produces some amazing performance increases.
- CineBench 11.5
- Stock: 19.05
- 4.3 GHz: 23.62
- 24% increase
- POV-Ray
- Stock: 3556.71
- 4.3 GHz: 4262.92
- 20% increase
- Handbrake
- Stock: 2551.23
- 4.3 GHz: 338.89 FPS
- 14% increase
Getting up to 24% better performance with a simple overclock, though it does require better cooling than a standard air cooler can provide, is fantastic. As it turns out, applying an 800 MHz overlock to 10 cores nets you quit a bit!
I was disappointed that overclocking seems to be more limited on Broadwell-E than it was with Haswell-E; in my review of the Core i7-5960X I was able to run all 8-cores at 4.6 GHz. I’ll wait and see what the rest of the community finds with the other parts in the BDW-E lineup.
Price cut when they realize
Price cut when they realize they gave out more review samples than people actually bought?
If the 10 core was only
If the 10 core was only $1200-1300, it might be a viable option, but not over $1700
Clearly Intel don’t aim the
Clearly Intel don’t aim the average Joe market…
edit: doesn’t
edit: doesn’t
Its worth $1000 just like
Its worth $1000 just like every other extreme CPU
At $1700, isn’t it cheaper to
At $1700, isn’t it cheaper to buy a dual socket board with two 6 core parts?
I miss the CPU wars of a decade ago. I hope zen is something worth replacing my 4770k with.
If it isn’t worth it to
If it isn’t worth it to upgrade your 4770k to SkyLake, then it probably isn’t going to be worth it to upgrade to Zen either. I was still using a core 2 duo laptop up until recently, and it did everything I wanted it to fine. Most general use applications just do not need that much processing power.
So with overclocking,
So with overclocking, Broadwell-E on average basically offers around the same per core performance, and no better?
I guess the “sweet spot” is probably still a the 6 core model. Something we’ve had around for several generations now. If you can call a $617 CPU a sweet spot.
As a mere mortal and gamer,
As a mere mortal and gamer, I’m much more interested in how the Broadwell-E 6850k and 6800k compare to the Skylake 6700k than I am about the 10 core/20 thread behemoth.
I’m hoping to see PCPer do some gaming benchmarks that compare these platforms in the near future, especially for slightly older titles that aren’t necessarily written with much multi-threading in mind.
They only had the 1 sample, I
They only had the 1 sample, I am sure more reviews are to come. I love how TTL was pushing the 6850k over 6800k,not worth it IMO considering its only more pcie lanes.
They only had the 1 sample, I
They only had the 1 sample, I am sure more reviews are to come. I love how TTL was pushing the 6850k over 6800k,not worth it IMO considering its only more pcie lanes.
I remember seeing people talk
I remember seeing people talk about the 1499 MSRP rumor for the 10c/20t CPU and saying, “It’s not going to be that high. It’s going to be $999 just like the previous gen.”
Lo’ and behold, it’s more than anyone could have anticipated.
Nothing short of a scam, please Zen don’t be Bulldozer2.0
Do you know the Murphy’s
Do you know the Murphy’s law?
By some vaseline while you can afford it. :o)
edit: buy
edit: buy
Anyone see benchmarks in
Anyone see benchmarks in modern games with a 1080?
I am considering upgrading from a 970 -> 1070/1080. However I am still on an i7 3770k @ 4.1. Wondering if that and the 1600mhz ram is limiting me.
So skylake would be easy upgrade – or the 6 core would not be that muchi more here with the 28lanes of PCIe..
DO you need an older CPU to
DO you need an older CPU to update the bios or can you update the bios with this new CPU installed?
Contact you motherboard
Contact you motherboard manufacturer.
Holding pattern for Zen…
Holding pattern for Zen… The lack of competition in this market is really showing.. Or what we’re seeing is the real devaluation of the USD.. You guys are printing money like nVidia and Intel make new chips..
really make you think doesn’t it…
Even with EUR or GBP it won’t
Even with EUR or GBP it won’t be significantly cheaper…
$1700? You could get a
$1700? You could get a *cough*https://pcper.com/hwlb*cough* dream gaming PC for that, with cash left over for some Steam credit. I guess this part is not intended for me.
Alright, maybe only ‘high
Alright, maybe only ‘high end’, but still – better than my trusty old Thuban rig..
This illustrates why Intel
This illustrates why Intel doesn’t want to be in the GPU market. The 1080 is actually a big chip for 16 nm, but Nvidia has to sell the GPU, plus 8 GB of new, super high speed memory on a PCB with an expensive cooler for $700. Intel gets $1700 just for a bare CPU. I would of guess that the die size for this CPU is similar to the 1080 GPU. The problem with not wanting to be in the GPU market is that the consumer market is quickly merging with the GPU market. Mobile will probably be going mostly APUs. There is quite a bit of power savings to have everything on one die. I don’t know how acceptable APUs will be in the desktop market, but an HBM based APU could be a very powerful device. Intel does not have a competitive GPU at all. The stuff with on-package didn’t fair too bad, but that was comparing an Intel 14 nm device with an AMD 28 nm device. Intel GPUs will not be able to compete with AMD or Nvidia 14 or 16 nm devices. Intel may have a lot of competition in the enterprise market also. Power processors and Nvidia GPU compute are going to be very competitive for HPC. There is also possible AMD HPC APUs and possibly ARM server processors. The new ARM core is only about 0.65 mm2 die area on 10 nm. They could put a large number of cores like that on a die with a huge L3 cache and have a very high throughput server device.
I have $156,000 in the
I have $156,000 in the business bank account ready to purchase 100 of the through the channel. We’ll be selling them for $1750+ and using them in my company’s Pro Workstation 3 Desktops. They will pair well with the $4000 Quadro’s that we will using.
Fuck yeah, America. And keep crying, all your low energy, aids Skrillex and Bernie Bot Cuck tears taste so yummy. So salty. MMMMMMM
#PoorPeopleSuck #Trump2016 #PeasantsOnPCPer
Here’s your reply
Here’s your reply
Anyone else feel like Intel
Anyone else feel like Intel is milking this CPU generation as much as possible until AMD releases Zen?
I think the pricing should have been;
10 Core = $1000
8 Core = $750
6 Core = $450
6 Core = $250
I hope that the prices change when Zen is released…
I’ll wait for zen and go for
I’ll wait for zen and go for it, whatever it is. Boycott whoever play the monopolistic game proudly as Intel is clearly doing.
well, greed has no
well, greed has no limits.
and lack of actual competition as well 🙂
i agree with above, until AMD has some competing products …
intel can drag their feet, milk the cows, and act basically
like comcast in that onion video spoof ….
“we don’t give a f….”, what are you gonna do ? …etc. etc. etc.
sorry Intel, love your products butz …something doesnt add up
I can get three i7-6700k and still be under $1000.
so don’t bullshit that its a cost ble ble ble …3 freaking skylakes ….still cheaper than one 10-core CPU …
at least CEO, COO, CFxxxO will get the bonuses 🙂
For the price of one private
For the price of one private jet you can get many compact cars without being able to reach half of the sound speed…
What are you trying to demonstrate?
Except the right analogy is
Except the right analogy is between a Ferrari and whatever muscle or sports car is in the same price ratio, your private jet example is stupid like you.
Does it change anything (the
Does it change anything (the best performance for the worst price) in the logic? No.
Insulting people doesn’t make you right either.
If Intel could lower the
If Intel could lower the price of the I7 6950X from 1700 to 1000 then the entire line is approx 47% overpriced……
Just saying……………..