Intel C1 Update

Capacitor Theory Pops

It doesn’t look like having capacitors arranged in 3.06 style makes any real difference in performance, folks. I’ve seen enough reports from people who have a 3.06GHz arrangement but aren’t reaching 3.06 to conclude that this is not a sure-fire or even often-fire way of getting a great chip.

Maybe It’s The Mobo?

A number of people have suggested that for whatever reason, the 845PE chipset just doesn’t quite cut it. Personally, I’m a bit skeptical about that, but checking on this will be easy enough

Maybe These Chips Just Suck?

I think there’s something to be said for that. 🙂

There’s an interesting pattern emerging in our CPU database. If you look at the results from PIVs rated at 2.66GHz or better, you see that the CPUs are pretty much hitting 3GHz with little voltage increase. This is the pattern expected from the lower-speed C1s.

What I suspect is happening is that Intel is getting middling high-end yields. In other words, more than is needed by high-end CPUs, but hardly universal.

So the cream of the crop becomes 3.06s; the better than average become 2.66 and 2.80s, and everything else goes into 2.53 and below.

It may be that matters have improved on the most recent (and I mean recent CPUs, like week 45) CPUs, but I won’t swear to that.

I can say that I’ve heard about enough week 41 CPUs to conclude that no great fix was in place then.

If you need 3GHz, but you don’t want to spend $300 for a 2.66GHz, wait.

Ed

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