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[O/C]Intel i7 2600K (Sandy Bridge) Review

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Kinda kicking myself for buying a hex now. This arch. is impressive :attn:

Reading this review made wakeing up a pleasent experience today :D

I guess the hex would be ok for htpc duties :shrug:
Nah, don't kick yourself. The 970 is still a killer chip and with two extra cores / four extra threads, it still whips SB for anything that can use all 12.

Glad I could make your morning a little better. :)
Hokie, this is one of the best reviews I have seen at this site. Tremendous work!!!

As far as the architecture, all I can say is WOW and I suppose this answers the question if this is a sidegrade or to upgrade to Intel's new chip. For most people, it looks like a winner.
That's one heck of a compliment, thank you very much!

I completely agree too. There is a subset that may want to pass for a couple reasons, but it's a small subset and everyone else that's considering an upgrade should be happy this just fell in their lap. :thup:
 
If I were to look at an upgrade from say 775 platform or even getting into from scratch then this platform is great value for money IMO for a strong 24/7 system.
 
Does i7-2600K support DirectX 11?
Cuz still thinking between it and i7-950

If you're referring to the on-die GPU, no. It supports DX 10.1 and Open GL 3.0.

Since you need a discrete GPU for the 950 anyway though, I wouldn't let that influence your thinking. :)
 
And do we still need to buy a GPU with the i7-2600K. I ain't sure since it says it's integrated with GPU already.
 
Depends on what board you get. If you get a P67 board, yes you have to buy a GPU. If you go H67 you don't, but you lose the ability to go with dual GPUs as well. If overclocking, I'd highly recommend P67 + discrete GPU as it doesn't seem the H67 features allow it to overclock.
 
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Note that the integrated CPU is not going to let you play BFBC2 at 1920x1080 with high settings, it is not really for gaming, more for those that want to work in Windows but dont want to buy another GPU, it is for everyday use.
 
so i kind of grazed through, are these going to be compatable with x58? or are these a different chipset?
 
Will these "Sandy Bridge" chips be any faster at converting your high-definition camcorder .mts files to the other editable formats like .avi or .wmv? Right now, it seems like it takes a good 45 minutes to convert a 10-minute .mts video clip to .wmv, and .avi's always come out looking bumpy when you play 'em back.
 
The socket has lost a pin: now 1155 instead of 1156 IIRC.
 
finally a real look at this thing, thanks Hookiealumnus

Why do they call it I7 ?
for me it has been confusing to use the same name?
the socket is not compatable?
it has built in grafics, does a normal I7 have built in grafics?

The i7-8xx and i7-9xx chips don't, IIRC. The i3s and i5s do.
 
Depends on what board you get. If you get a P67 board, yes you have to buy a GPU. If you go H67 you don't, but you lose the ability to go with discrete GPUs as well. If overclocking, I'd highly recommend P67 + discrete GPU.

Wait say what? H67 does not allow you to disable the onboard GPU like P67 does? Some guy on XS was saying you can't overclock with H67, is that true as well?
 
very nice review Jeremy. rather informative, with lots of stuff that others havent really alluded to. and is the best review I have seen on the sandy bridge.
 
Will these "Sandy Bridge" chips be any faster at converting your high-definition camcorder .mts files to the other editable formats like .avi or .wmv? Right now, it seems like it takes a good 45 minutes to convert a 10-minute .mts video clip to .wmv, and .avi's always come out looking bumpy when you play 'em back.
Faster, yes. How much? Depends on where you're clocked at right now. IF it's comparable to rendering -and I'm not sure it is-, you'd may see a 10-15% improvement clock-for-clock (based on cinebench results).
finally a real look at this thing, thanks Hookiealumnus

Why do they call it I7 ?
for me it has been confusing to use the same name?
the socket is not compatable?
it has built in grafics, does a normal I7 have built in grafics?
Geesh, gimme a computer that goes together like http://www.amazon.com/Tupperware-Shape-O-Ball-Toy/dp/B000CFZP3A something i can understand.
Good questions. They do separate them a bit though in that they designate them as the second iX generation. The naming scheme is iX 2xxx. The first X is the 7/5/3 (i.e. i7), the 2 designates second generation Core iX series and the last three are CPU #.

Previous i7's didn't have built-in graphics. Some i5's and i3's did though.
Wait say what? H67 does not allow you to disable the onboard GPU like P67 does? Some guy on XS was saying you can't overclock with H67, is that true as well?
Err...that was a mistatement and I need to edit my prior post. You can use discrete graphics on H67, but you can not use Crossfire/SLI (see chipset diagram). The P67 doesn't allow use of the integrated graphics at all.

According to this comparison chart, if raising the K-series multiplier = "Performance Tuning", that's correct and the H67 boards don't overclock.
very nice review Jeremy. rather informative, with lots of stuff that others havent really alluded to. and is the best review I have seen on the sandy bridge.
That is a bold statement so I won't hold you to it, but I'm very flattered. Thank you very much!
 
*ponders*

What boards will do at least 8x/8x SLI/Xfire on the cheap? Not looking to drop an arm and a leg for a motherboard.

Any P67 board with two PCIe x16 slots should suffice. Just check their specifications to make sure they didn't do something quirky. Sandy Bridge chips all support 8x/8x but only when paired with a P67 PCH.
 
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