CPU, APU & Chipsets News - Page 143

The first three models of Intel's upcoming next-gen "Sandy Bridge-E" Core i7 processors has been made available. We're still going to see an Enthusiast and Performance release, Performance including BClk multiplier-unlocked six-core chips as well as locked quad-core chips. The new series is set to include the 3000 series of processor model numbering, this means that the new processors will be part of Intel's 3rd generation Core processors, even though they're based on the Sandy Bridge architecture.

Leading the CPUs will be the Core i7-3960X Extreme Edition, six-core (12 threads with HTT) has a stock clock speed of 3.30GHz with 3.90GHz Turbo Boost, features 15MB of L3 cache. This chip is expected to have a four figure price tag. This will of course have its BClk multiplier unlocked for some insane overclocking. Next we have the Core i7-3930K which is again a 6 core, 12 threaded chip with a stock clock speed of 3.20GHz and Turbo Boost speed of 3.80GHz, inclusive of 12MB of L3 cache and features an unlocked BClk multiplier.

The most affordable LGA2011-based CPU will be the Core i7-3820 which is a quad-core, 8 threaded chip with a stock clock speed of 3.60GHz and Turbo Boost of up to 3.90GHz. With just 10MB of L3 cache, it is definitely the smaller sibling in the family. This chip has its BClk multiplier locked.

We've seen some impressive overclock results out of our in-house A8-3850 sample with Shane kicking it into high gear at around 3.7GHz without too much effort - this using a trusty Corsair AIO water cooling solution on a GIGABYTE A75-UD4H.

But if you think that's pretty impressive, try this on for size :-

That aint no photoshop folks. What you can see there is 4906MHz, not too far off the magic 5GHz mark with an A8-3850 CPU. Of course, though, this couldn't have been achieved without the help of :-

Doing what they do best, CPU World has fished out some fresh details on an expansion to Intel's range of mobile processor offerings. A new ULV (ultra low voltage) 32nm Celeron M model has just been released, The Celeron 787, and also four new Core i7 chips.

The Celeron 787 is just a little single core chip which clocks in at 1.30GHz with a single thread, 1MB of L3 cache, a 17W TDP and carrying a price of $107.

As for the four new Core i7s, these are scheduled to debut in Q4, comprising three quad-core variants and a dual-core one. The quad core models include the i7-2960XM Extreme Edition, i7-2860QM and i7-2760QM, with the dual-core being the i7-2640M.

It was only a few weeks ago that reports were out that Intel's next-gen Sandy Bridge-E and Waimea Bay platform had been delayed until 2012 but new information has popped up and is suggesting that Intel is trying very hard to get the new platform onto the market this year. This means that Intel will have to make some compromises on a lot of the platform features.

According to sources, Intel is having issues with the platform in the form of issues with storage, PCI Express problems and even CPU revisions. This sounds like bad news for a company wanting to launch their next-gen enthusiast platform. There are various platform SKUs coming in the form of Patsburg -A, -B, -D and -T. The X79 chipset is known as Patsburg-X and was meant to be similar to what Patsburg-D brings to the table.

Patsburg-D is set to offer not only four additional SATA/SAS 6Gbps via the SCU but also a PCI-Express 3.0 uplink to the CPU where Patsburg-T gains another RAID level but other than that is identical to the Patsburg-D. Patsburg-X was meant to obviously come with the features of the -D version but since Intel has run into various issues, they've decided to downgrade the feature set and it will be more in line with the Patsburg-B flavor of chipset. What does this mean? Prepare for tears.

Right now, AMD would be on top of the world. Their Radeon series of GPUs are phenomenally successful with their next-gen 7000-series just around the corner, their APU is rolling out right now, and they're already powering consoles; the Wii and Xbox 360. Rumor has it that they might end up getting jiggy with all three console makers come next-gen. The Wii-U is set to be AMD-based and now its looking like the Microsoft and Sony console will be powered by AMD solutions.

Both Microsoft and Sony have of course not verified this news, but HardOCP have a reliable tipster roaming the halls of E3 last week. Based on their information, they say that AMD's future console dominance is already a "done deal." Of course, NVIDIA will be... green... with envy but keep in mind they are powering a slew of Tegra 2-based Tablets and Smartphones. AMD are also set to have an opportunity to win contracts for microprocessors for the next PlayStation.

Right now, all three consoles are sporting Power-based IBM processors, even the PlayStation 3's Cell chip has a PowerPC component sharing die space with SPE co-processors.