Hey everybody and welcome to our Intel Core i7-3960X (Sandy Bridge-E) and X79 platform preview. A rather uncommon and slightly unexpected article to write alright, as the architecture behind both, the X79 chipset and the Sandy Bridge-E processors really (initially) were intended for the server platform, but somehow its finding its way towards the consumer channel.
Intel launched the P67/Z68 chipsets and accompanying four core Sandy Bridge processors like the Core i5 2500, Core i7 2600 and recently released Core i7 2700 as mainstream products. That means that the enthusiast segment has a gap that needs to be filled as an X58 with a Gulftown processor like the 980X/990X is already two-three years old. It's exactly there where Sandy Bridge-E and X79 comes into play.
The actual release of Sandy Bridge-E is somewhat peculiar to market... but with a thirst for high-end all manufacturers designed and then redesigned a series of new motherboards that will blow you off your socks.
The biggest competitor for Sandy-Bridge-E, believe it or not, is the X58 platform released in 2008, pop a nice Core i7 980X/990X on there and the raw performance is still fantastic. In retrospect as such one could say that X58/980X (Gulftown) and Z68/2600K (Sandy Bridge) have been products that might have been a little too good.
Today however, we have an article covering the Intel Core i7-3960X (Sandy Bridge-E) and X79 based motherboard. An update to the true high-end six-core processor series aimed at consumers. A processor based on 32nm technology that comes with most of the bells and whistles we have learned to like and love of the current Sandy Bridge processor generation.
Three processors will be released; two Sandy Bridge-E CPUs will have six cores, one model has four cores, hyper-threaded to either eight or twelve threads, the AVX instruction set is here and all processors have a steep but fair 130W TDP. Then there's of course that overclocking potential that the 1st generation Sandy Bridge processors offered, it alone could make this platform downright impressive if that gets your freak on.
Impressive yes, but sure there are obstacles as well, the processor needs a new motherboard as it comes on a new processor socket, LGA 2011. That means reinvesting in a new high-end motherboard probably costing say 200~300 EUR, and then investing in a new Sandy-Bridge-E processor which is probably going to cost you a steep 900~1000 EUR for the most high-end model (which we will test today).
Before we dive into the article, let me make you aware of the fact that we test with a final sample X79 motherboard from MSI. This article will also review the MSI X79A-GD65 8D. Next to that the fellas from G.Skill provided a Sandy-Bridge-E quad channel memory kit, that blew us off our feet. 16GB G.Skill RipjawsZ series memory that with the flick of a BIOS setting to XMP runs stable at 2133 MHz -- in quad channel.
Anyway, head on over to the next page where we'll discuss Sandy-Bridge-E processors, the respective models. We'll also have a chat about MSI's X79 motherboard and chipset and then will throw a decent photo-shoot and a benchmark suite at the products and get an indication what performance is like with the Intel Core i7-3960X (Sandy Bridge-E) and X79 Platform.
Next page please, and please do enjoy.
In several test runs, we'll see if we can overclock the processor a little while we have it at hand so we'll pop in an ASUS MARS II graphics cards (review here), and see if I can shatter my own dual-GPU record. For that to happen we'll need to lock in a high clock frequency though!
Anyway, here's the reference default performance. The card used is the ASUS MARS II graphics cards. This is the MSI X79 motherboard and the Core i7-3960X processor at default reference settings. Memory is set at 1333 MHz C9 (Quad-channel). The PSU used is the Enermax MaxRevo 1350W PSU (review here). OS is Windows 7 64-bit SP1 all patched and updated running with the latest NVIDIA WHQL drivers.
Reaching new heights - Overclocking
With so much ridiculous horsepower in the system, (engineering samples we must add) we could not resist trying out overclocking. We're keeping it simple, but anything over Gulftown on LCS (roughly 4.2 GHz) would be a win in my book for this six-headed beast.
Pretty much we need to take a couple of steps if we want to overclock. Invest in good hardware by the way, the cheaper motherboards often are not well tuned for enthusiast overclocking.
Manual overclocking
The true guru3d audience overclocks from the BIOS and try to find the maximum stable limit. The generic overclock procedure for multiplier based overclocking is as follows:
Let's have a quick look at a Prime95 stress test with all four cores active and stressed at ~5000 MHz. As you can see, you'll need a rather reasonable cooler as temperatures are on the borderline of acceptable. Then again, six-cores all at 5 GHz with a high-voltage, we didn't expect any less.
At a later stage (not included in this article) we got the CPU steady at 5.2 GHz as well on all six cores. So the OC potential is enormous, especially combined with 6 active CPU cores.
The new Sandy Bridge E based processors are a bit of a redesign alright and as a result they are quite energy needy processors with a 130W TDP. What you'll notice a lot, is that in idle these things kick ass in matters of power consumption, whereas at peak TDP they behave quite normally.
In an IDLE state the PC (X79 / 3960X / 16GB memory / GeForce GTX 580 / SSD) consumes 86 Watts. Mind you that we measure the ENTIRE PC, not just the processor's power consumption.
When we place load on the CPU and we see the power draw rise, the system now consumes roughly 201 Watts. This is with merely an SSD, memory and the GTX580 installed. Your average PC will draw a little more power if you add optical drives, HDDs, soundcards etc.
Overclocked power consumption by added voltage ... um yeah well we'll discuss that on the next pages ok?
I want to make it very clear that power consumption measurements will differ per PC and setup. Your attached components use power but your motherboard can also have additional ICs installed like an audio controller, LUCID chips, network controllers, extra SATA controllers, extra USB controllers, and so on. These parts all consume power, so this is an indication.
Next to that, we stress all CPU cores 100% and thus show a PEAK power consumption. Unless you transcode video with the right software your overall/average power consumption will be much lower.
Intel launched the P67/Z68 chipsets and accompanying four core Sandy Bridge processors like the Core i5 2500, Core i7 2600 and recently released Core i7 2700 as mainstream products. That means that the enthusiast segment has a gap that needs to be filled as an X58 with a Gulftown processor like the 980X/990X is already two-three years old. It's exactly there where Sandy Bridge-E and X79 comes into play.
The actual release of Sandy Bridge-E is somewhat peculiar to market... but with a thirst for high-end all manufacturers designed and then redesigned a series of new motherboards that will blow you off your socks.
The biggest competitor for Sandy-Bridge-E, believe it or not, is the X58 platform released in 2008, pop a nice Core i7 980X/990X on there and the raw performance is still fantastic. In retrospect as such one could say that X58/980X (Gulftown) and Z68/2600K (Sandy Bridge) have been products that might have been a little too good.
Today however, we have an article covering the Intel Core i7-3960X (Sandy Bridge-E) and X79 based motherboard. An update to the true high-end six-core processor series aimed at consumers. A processor based on 32nm technology that comes with most of the bells and whistles we have learned to like and love of the current Sandy Bridge processor generation.
Three processors will be released; two Sandy Bridge-E CPUs will have six cores, one model has four cores, hyper-threaded to either eight or twelve threads, the AVX instruction set is here and all processors have a steep but fair 130W TDP. Then there's of course that overclocking potential that the 1st generation Sandy Bridge processors offered, it alone could make this platform downright impressive if that gets your freak on.
Impressive yes, but sure there are obstacles as well, the processor needs a new motherboard as it comes on a new processor socket, LGA 2011. That means reinvesting in a new high-end motherboard probably costing say 200~300 EUR, and then investing in a new Sandy-Bridge-E processor which is probably going to cost you a steep 900~1000 EUR for the most high-end model (which we will test today).
Before we dive into the article, let me make you aware of the fact that we test with a final sample X79 motherboard from MSI. This article will also review the MSI X79A-GD65 8D. Next to that the fellas from G.Skill provided a Sandy-Bridge-E quad channel memory kit, that blew us off our feet. 16GB G.Skill RipjawsZ series memory that with the flick of a BIOS setting to XMP runs stable at 2133 MHz -- in quad channel.
Anyway, head on over to the next page where we'll discuss Sandy-Bridge-E processors, the respective models. We'll also have a chat about MSI's X79 motherboard and chipset and then will throw a decent photo-shoot and a benchmark suite at the products and get an indication what performance is like with the Intel Core i7-3960X (Sandy Bridge-E) and X79 Platform.
Next page please, and please do enjoy.
Overclocking - the Core i7-3960X on MSI X79
Prior to the official benchmark session we want to show you some l33t / g33k stuff first. On this page we'll fire up two 3DMark benchmark sessions, first we take the reference / baseline results with 3DMark Vantage and 3DMark 11.In several test runs, we'll see if we can overclock the processor a little while we have it at hand so we'll pop in an ASUS MARS II graphics cards (review here), and see if I can shatter my own dual-GPU record. For that to happen we'll need to lock in a high clock frequency though!
Anyway, here's the reference default performance. The card used is the ASUS MARS II graphics cards. This is the MSI X79 motherboard and the Core i7-3960X processor at default reference settings. Memory is set at 1333 MHz C9 (Quad-channel). The PSU used is the Enermax MaxRevo 1350W PSU (review here). OS is Windows 7 64-bit SP1 all patched and updated running with the latest NVIDIA WHQL drivers.
Reaching new heights - Overclocking
With so much ridiculous horsepower in the system, (engineering samples we must add) we could not resist trying out overclocking. We're keeping it simple, but anything over Gulftown on LCS (roughly 4.2 GHz) would be a win in my book for this six-headed beast.
Pretty much we need to take a couple of steps if we want to overclock. Invest in good hardware by the way, the cheaper motherboards often are not well tuned for enthusiast overclocking.
Manual overclocking
The true guru3d audience overclocks from the BIOS and try to find the maximum stable limit. The generic overclock procedure for multiplier based overclocking is as follows:
- Leave baseclock for what it is right now
- If optional in the BIOS, increase your TDP limits of the processor to 250 Watts (by that you are allowing a higher power draw)
- Leave your base multiplier at default e.g. 34
- Set the per core Turbo multiplier at a maximum of your liking, we applied an MP of 50 on all six cores
- Increase CPU voltage, though setting AUTO might work fine, we applied 1.5V on the processor cores
- Make sure your processor is properly cooled (we used the Corsair H100 LCS cooler at performance settings)
- Save and Exit BIOS / EFI
At a later stage (not included in this article) we got the CPU steady at 5.2 GHz as well on all six cores. So the OC potential is enormous, especially combined with 6 active CPU cores.
Power Consumption
Here's where we'll slowly move into physically testing the processors and respective chipsets.The new Sandy Bridge E based processors are a bit of a redesign alright and as a result they are quite energy needy processors with a 130W TDP. What you'll notice a lot, is that in idle these things kick ass in matters of power consumption, whereas at peak TDP they behave quite normally.
When we place load on the CPU and we see the power draw rise, the system now consumes roughly 201 Watts. This is with merely an SSD, memory and the GTX580 installed. Your average PC will draw a little more power if you add optical drives, HDDs, soundcards etc.
Overclocked power consumption by added voltage ... um yeah well we'll discuss that on the next pages ok?
I want to make it very clear that power consumption measurements will differ per PC and setup. Your attached components use power but your motherboard can also have additional ICs installed like an audio controller, LUCID chips, network controllers, extra SATA controllers, extra USB controllers, and so on. These parts all consume power, so this is an indication.
Next to that, we stress all CPU cores 100% and thus show a PEAK power consumption. Unless you transcode video with the right software your overall/average power consumption will be much lower.
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