What's very concerning to me is the very low turbo speed of 3.3GHz, even with IPC improvements HW brings to the table over IB it's going to be slower then 4960X in ST workloads and low-threaded workloads like games. Compared to 6-cores HW it's going to look even worse. On a positive note I think that the low stock clocks are attributable to the abysmal stock cooler which I guess haven't changed at all compared to previous CPUs with that TDP. With a proper cooling it should pass 4GHz with ease but anything over 4.5GHz might require a custom loop. I don't know why enthusiast whose most stressful workloads are games flock to this CPU. 6c/12t is going to be plenty for games for the foreseeable future. I think the only reason is e-peen. For the wast majority of users Core i7-5930K clocked at 3.5GHz base/ 4GHz boost is going to be faster, especially in games.
That's 16% higher base frequency and that's a lot. 16% higher frequency should be better then 33% more cores in a majority of contemporary workloads. As for overclocking crowd, for those with custom loop coolers that would allow the 8 core monster to stretch its legs it should makes sense as that frequency gap should erode. IMHO both CPU should hit a wall well before 5GHz, the 6-core version maybe getting 100-200MHz more.
Considering what they do to engineering samples, I would not be surprised if that ES had been damaged already by the massive stress tests they usually put them through.
What matters at this point is, can the 8 core version overclock to 4.5 GHz, assuming enough cooling is available? If it can do at least 4 GHz, maybe. If not then it's not useful as a gaming chip and the 6 core is a better buy.
They raised the TDP, and still had to keep the clock that low. 4GHz on all cores would be a golden chip. Making a custoom turbo profile would be better for gamers who want this CPU. Broadwell-E should be a significant improvement, though.
Well let's make an assumption. You have a 5% chance of getting a "bad" core. That means a 95% chance of getting a good core. Let's define a bad core as say, need a ton of voltage to get to 4.5 GHz on Haswell 22nm. So you have a 0.95^4 or about 0.81 chance of getting a decent Haswell 4 core. Looking at the overclocks around, 20% not making 4.5 GHz is probably likely. Haswell seems to top out at 4.7-4.8 GHz no matter what on air, even with a delid. That means that the 6 core will be 0.95^6 and 8 core will be 0.95^8.
There are other issues of course. Not everyone on overclocking websites even have the same level of experience/skill overclocking.
All 8 cores on 4GHz is probable I think, assuming enough cooling. The problem is going to be getting all 8 cores to 4.5 GHz on water, which I doubt many chips will be able to do.
I'm not as optimistic about Broadwell. All those delays probably mean that Intel is having yield, heat, and leakage issues. That in turn probably affects the overclocking headroom those chips will have. For Broadwell 4 core to break even, it must be able to run at least at 4.4-4.5 GHz, assuming it's 3-5% faster clock for clock than Haswell DC, which ran at 4.7-4.8 GHz. The only thing Broadwell E will probably offer is more cores. All in all, I expect that Broadwell will be like Sandy to Ivy. Not much of an upgrade and perhaps even a downgrade in some cases.
Devil's Canyon I think has (mostly) addressed the issue, although there is still some grumbling around about having to delid. The gap is not as big I think with the 4790Ks, they use somewhat less power, and they run mostly cooler.
The issue I see is that even with the gap addressed or if you delidded, you still did not get much more than say, 4.7-4.8 GHz on air no matter what on air. And getting the last 100-200 MHz saw power consumption skyrocket.
What it suggests is that even with the solder, I think many of the E versions will struggle to make 4.5 GHz.
For the wast majority of users Core i7-5930K clocked at 3.5GHz base/ 4GHz boost is going to be faster, especially in games.
agree. This seem to be an inherent limitation of the process.
I would even go as far and say that the 4790K will be even faster in a lot especially older games, say Starcraft 2.
Anyone else remember when Intel changed from using thermal paste to solder back with Prescott, and people complained about no longer being able to delid their Pentium 4s and cool them directly from the die? Times have definitely changed.
As for the 5960K, I guess it's not really much of a surprise that the base clock's that low, but isn't this the kind of chip that would really benefit from being able to turbo up several speed bins (i.e. to ~3.8GHz) for single-thread apps? Or do the extra cores just generate too much heat even when they're idling?
Regarding all the pessimistic comments that announce no more than 4-4.5GHz overclock: is that because you saw the low stock speeds or logic reasoning like thermal constraints etc? Because the soldering and the huge die seem to point elsewhere: it's a die-harvest from 12 core chips and all that dark silicon (the 4 disabled cores) should help a lot to spread heat.
Also I'm curious if the 6-core variants are a different die or have 6 cores off...