Wolfdale 4.7GHz on air! Why not?

[Deimos]

http://www.nordichardware.com/news,7049.html

Unfortunately, I didn't get anywhere near there with little old E5200.. 1.5V was plenty too much and couldn't get 3.9Ghz stable.

But, whats point of clocking so high? Its not like games or 98% of things I do will benefit. Even at default 2.5Ghz, x264, bluray etc runs fine.

Some interesting things occured to me:
* slowest 65nm Core2 chips ran at ~1.8Ghz
* clock speed spread from slowest to fastest (1.8 to 2.93): about 163%

* slowest 45nm Core2 chips run at ~2.5Ghz
* clock speed spread from slowest to fastest (2.5 to 3.33): about 132%

(for reference, Pentium3 from 500 to 1000Mhz, clockspread 200%).

But, Intel price range from <$100 to nearly $1000 is still there as always.

What does this mean? There's never been a better time to buy!Even slowest 45nm CPU is plenty for most folks, and not far behind the fastest most expensive.. (note: not including quad & nehalem here for simplicity).

Looking at it from overclocker standpoint, 30% clockspeed bumps look like this:
1.80 GHz
2.33 GHz
3.00 GHz only ~650Mhz
3.95 Ghz
5.10 GHz now almost 1200Mhz for 30%

So, whats the point ? Not only do most programs NOT scale linearly with clockspeed (diminishing returns), and you also have memory, fsb, gpu etc bottlenecks, but you need vastly bigger clockspeed jumps to get some % improvement. Starting at 4Ghz you need almost twice clockspeed jump to get 30% improvement than when starting at 2.3Ghz. And, not even considering exponential power and vcore required to hit those huge clockspeeds. Bottomline, its not worth it trying to squeeze those last few drops of clockspeed.

So when your friend boasts running 4Ghz when all you can manage is 3.7Ghz, dont get upset you're missing a whole huge 300Mhz. Its actually less than 10%. Its not like the old days when you counted Pentium overclocks in 10's of Mhz.

[board123]

What does this mean? There's never been a better time to buy!

Actually, the best time to buy was summer 2008, when computer hardware prices, especially Intel CPUs, hit rock bottom. Today's prices are **** compared to 9-10 months ago. E8400 for over $200? Are you kidding me? Dell was selling it for $140.

The best price ever for E8400 (E0) was the last week of December, when that VoodooPC guy was liquidating them at $100 on Ebay. I need my 4.1 GHz to run the PCSX2 emulator smoothly with most games. Shadow of the Colossus will not run well with some crappy 3 GHz chip. It maxes my CPU and even then, there were still some minor slowdowns in a few areas.

[flyz]

Psh. 5.6GHz i7 with 8 threads is where it's at.
Link

[mingyang]

Actually, the best time to buy was summer 2008, when computer hardware prices, especially Intel CPUs, hit rock bottom. Today's prices are **** compared to 9-10 months ago. E8400 for over $200? Are you kidding me? Dell was selling it for $140.

The best price ever for E8400 (E0) was the last week of December, when that VoodooPC guy was liquidating them at $100 on Ebay. I need my 4.1 GHz to run the PCSX2 emulator smoothly with most games. Shadow of the Colossus will not run well with some crappy 3 GHz chip. It maxes my CPU and even then, there were still some minor slowdowns in a few areas.

Just recently finished off my FFXII on my PC, managed to xfer my save from my ps2 on a USB drive. E6300@ 3.0Ghz, only lagged in towns.

[Seiphas]

Still trying to play Katamari Damacy with it. I've gotten it to run perfectly, at the great speed of 2fps.

Seriously though, I play Tales of the Abyss / FFX on it. Both run amazingly well. The great thing is being able to ramp up Anti Aliasing, and playing PS2 games without lots and lots of jaggies.

[B0000rt]

M E2180's been running at 3.4GHz (400x8.5 on a P35) since Oct 07

Btw, the slowest 65nm "Core2" is the E1200 (1.6GHz 512 L2) or the E2160 (1.6GHz 1024 L2)

And technically speaking your E5200 is a Pentium Dual-Core, as the above is a Celeron and Pentium Dual-Core respectively

Actually, the best time to buy was summer 2008, when computer hardware prices, especially Intel CPUs, hit rock bottom. Today's prices are **** compared to 9-10 months ago. E8400 for over $200? Are you kidding me? Dell was selling it for $140.

That's more to do with the strength (or lack of strength of the Canadian) of the American dollar

[board123]

Just recently finished off my FFXII on my PC, managed to xfer my save from my ps2 on a USB drive. E6300@ 3.0Ghz, only lagged in towns.

I finished FF12 with a E6300 @ 3.2 GHz. FF12 is nowhere near as intensive as Shadow of the Colossus, or to a greater extent, Xenosaga I.

That's more to do with the strength (or lack of strength of the Canadian) of the American dollar

My argument still holds. Last summer was the best time due to our dollar. Right now you're paying a lot more during economic turmoil.

[Oversized Rooster]

Wow 4.7GHz is darn fast! The fastest I've achieved with a dual core Core 2 Duo chip was 4.2GHz and that was with a 65nm E6850 CPU. If I had an E8500 or E8600 I can certainly see 4.5GHz, maybe more.

[Deimos]

Wow 4.7GHz is darn fast! The fastest I've achieved with a dual core Core 2 Duo chip was 4.2GHz and that was with a 65nm E6850 CPU. If I had an E8500 or E8600 I can certainly see 4.5GHz, maybe more.

what kind of insane rig did you use to get 4.2Ghz out of a E6850???

board123, completely missed all those sales last year...
heck by the time I heard about the December one, literally everyone had E8400 but me.

And I guess it never occurred to me how much juice emulators require. But, considering the hardware they are emulating, its just a matter of code optimizations to VASTLY improve performance.

[Chocolinx]

I finished FF12 with a E6300 @ 3.2 GHz. FF12 is nowhere near as intensive as Shadow of the Colossus, or to a greater extent, Xenosaga I.


My argument still holds. Last summer was the best time due to our dollar. Right now you're paying a lot more during economic turmoil.

You guys play PS2 games on your PC? O.o It works 100%?

And higher clockspeeds even from 3.7 to 4.0 is a big difference to me! Encoding x264 stuff, that could mean the difference of 0.5fps or an extra 1fps, which then translates into hours less of encoding time

[board123]

And I guess it never occurred to me how much juice emulators require. But, considering the hardware they are emulating, its just a matter of code optimizations to VASTLY improve performance.

This is true to some extent. Another thing that really affects its performance is your hardware's capability. For example, the Graphic Synthesizer emulation runs much faster and more stable if you have DX10.

You guys play PS2 games on your PC? O.o It works 100%?

And higher clockspeeds even from 3.7 to 4.0 is a big difference to me! Encoding x264 stuff, that could mean the difference of 0.5fps or an extra 1fps, which then translates into hours less of encoding time

I built my original Core 2 system to play FFX, and that worked almost perfectly back then. The emulator is still being developed and it definitely doesn't work 100% for all games. Not even close.

[Deimos]

Too lazy to start another thread, and its already been discussed in forums like a million times:

CPU temperatures.

I dunno why some folks are obsessed that theirs are lower/higher or something wrong.. if it works it works - don't fiddle around or you will break it.

Intel has all the details:
http://intel.wingateweb.com/taiwan08...2_Nov_1006.pdf

long story short, diff programs show diff num. Some avg, some instantenous, some off because not updated, etc... as long as heatsink isn't boiling to the touch and whatever tool you use shows <70C you should be fine. Most processors are rated to 80-100C max, and even then they just throttle (ie run slower).

As for idle temps... dont even bother trying to compare to your friend's even if he has same CPU and heatsink. Since the CPU's are calibrated at the max, the lower the temperature the more inaccurate the reading.

just a friendly thought you should know...

[board123]

As long as it's not something ridiculous like 15 degrees, it's all good.

[Seiphas]

The emulator, PCSX2, is extremely buggy right now. However, there are quite a few games that work perfectly, assuming you have a ton of processing power to throw at it.

The best advantage to playing PS2 games on a computer is the fact that they actually look good. For example, with PCSX2, it's possible to render games at 1920x1200, with 16xAA. Pictures can't do it justice.

[Oversized Rooster]

what kind of insane rig did you use to get 4.2Ghz out of a E6850???

It wasn't even an insane rig! The CPU was simply "that" good. I had ordered on like day 1 of its release date from NCIX. I think even posted like the first OC results on RFD for that CPU model. I had used an Asus P5K Premium motherboard, a 2GB set of DDR2-1066 RAM and a Thermalright Ultra 120 Extreme CPU cooler with a 1600rpm 120mm fan. That cooler still serves me today.

I know the "all time" records are all set either with water cooling or some sort of phase change but to be honest I find overclocking on air much more exciting. Why invest HUNDREDS of dollars into water cooling gear when these days with proper air cooling you can achieve 80-85% of the same OCing result?