Now that Intel is increasing their stock clock speeds, is overclocking as relevant?

[VirtualLarry]

Just thinking of how Intel is releasing their E6800 CPU, 3.3Ghz stock speed, for a wolfdale.

I remember back when Intel introduced their "value" C2D chips, like the lowly E2140, at 1.6Ghz, and I overclocked them 100%, to 3.2Ghz. At the time, the max overclock on ANY 65nm C2D chip was around 3.0-3.4, maybe 3.6 for a lucky few. But I knew roughly what the average ceiling was, and I aimed for that, starting at the cheapest point I could find.

Now, looking at the average ceiling, and the stock clocks, it seems like there is much less extra headroom, on a percentage basis.

Is it even worthwhile to overclock anymore, if it only squeezes out 10% more performance, at the cost of more power, and potentially (at least in the 775 case) of losing out on power-saving features like C1E and EIST?

I guess I'm getting more power-concious, now that my electric bill went from $60/mo to $180/mo. But it wasn't all the computers, in fact, while I'm on vaca, my electric bill was still $136/mo, with all of the computers shut off. Only the main AC was running, set to 78F.

So $44/mo for a quad-GPU F@H box, a C2D E2140 @ 2.8Ghz, an BE-2400 @ 2.875Ghz, and a laptop, plus lights and an electric stove and microwave, isn't that bad at all.

On the other hand, since I run DC, things like the power-saving features aren't really all that useful to me, so why not overclock anyways. I guess that's one reason why.

I use my laptop as my primary machine these days, mostly because it's low-power. I let my desktop rigs crunch DC.

 

[OCGuy]

The great thing about over clocking is that you can buy a base model and OC it to equal the top model which could cost up to $800 more.

Buying the top model and overclocking it may not give you the same boost.

(For instance...you could have bought a stock Q9450 and overclock it to the speeds of a stock QX9770 ($1499). Instant savings of over $1K.

 

[Idontcare]

Both VirtualLarry and OCGuy are Lifers now? When did that happen? (i miss all the parties )

Congrats to both of you! :thumbsup:

 

[VirtualLarry]

Huh? I've been a Lifer for a while now. Should I schedule you for an eye exam, IDC?

Really, though, Intel is sort of crashing the overclocking party that's been going on the last few years with them moving all of the clocks onto the CPU on SB.

 

[RavenSEAL]

e8500 right here. While not cheap...overclocked to 3.8ghz, it destroys stock i3 and stock i5. Not to mention that it can go higher on air, up to 4.2, and some people with water cooling have touched 5.0ghz.

 

[OBLAMA2009]

ive been looking forward to the 6800 chip even though i have no use for any more computers. how could you go wrong with 3.3 for 80 bucks? i sometimes wish my 3 ghz machines would break so id have an excuse to get new ones...

someone please go buy the 6800 and post some benchmarks...

 

[Lonyo]

Going forward, overclocking will become less relevant because clockspeed will become less relevant as a differentiator.

Obviously clockspeed will still be there, but when you consider that now Intel has:
6 core/12T
4C/8T triple channel
4C/8T dual channel
4C/4T
2C/4T
2C/2T

While in the past it was typically 2 or 4 cores. So even without different clockspeeds or cache, there are 6 different models which cannot be "upgraded" through clockspeed.

Basically overclocking becomes less relevant because Intel have differentiation in other manners, and clockspeeds are not as variable as in the past.
Clockspeeds range from 2.66GHz (i5 750, IIRC) to 3.6GHz (i5 640? or something), which isn't a massive range, and it's not even top and bottom that have those clocks, because the difference is beyond clockspeeds, it's cores, threads, memory and cache, things overclocking don't change.

 

[taltamir]

supposedly we will see cheap K series (unlocked) CPUs from intel. As long as that happens overclocking isn't only still here, its easier than ever. You get an unlocked multi CPU and overclock it easily and effectively.

There is also still AMD. Buy an OC an AMD CPU to compete with un-ocable intels.

A huge threat to overclocking that I see is actually intel's turbo boost. It competes with overclocking for effectiveness, especially in single threaded apps.

 

[NoobyDoo]

core unlocking is the new over clocking.

;-)

 

[ElFenix]

try undervolting. my c2q undervolts like a champ.

never did try overclocking my e2140.

 

[Flipped Gazelle]

e8500 right here. While not cheap...overclocked to 3.8ghz, it destroys stock i3 and stock i5. Not to mention that it can go higher on air, up to 4.2, and some people with water cooling have touched 5.0ghz.

Anandtech heartily disagrees with you.

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/54?vs=109

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/54?vs=145

 

[DrMrLordX]

Overclocking will still be relevant, but it will cost more to buy into a chip that can make any sort of gains. It looks like i3 Sandy Bridge may not overclock at all, for example, since they have announced no K-series chips for their next-gen i3s, and non-K overclocking will be based around turbo mode (which the Sandy Bridge i3s will not have).

To even think about overclocking a Sandy Bridge, you will probably need a quad.

edit: what amounts to a "cheap" K-series chip is a matter of perspective. The 2500K is supposed to be a, what, $200-$240 CPU? If that's the minimum buy-in for any real overclocking . . . bleah. Take a look at what you can do with a Sempron 140, especially if you win the unlock lottery. I'm not saying an OCed 140 = OCed 2500K (not even close), but the amount of CPU horsepower you can gain from tweaking some BIOS settings on a 140 is ridiculous.

Now the new "darling" chip may be the x2 220, since it unlocks to what is essentially a Phenom II x4 925, all for about $50. Again, not in the same class as the 2500K, but the value . . .

Even an i3-530 @ 4.6 ghz seems like quite the value vs. what Sandy Bridge will offer. You can get those chips for as little as $70-$75 in the right combo deals.

 

[taltamir]

Overclocking will still be relevant, but it will cost more to buy into a chip that can make any sort of gains

but you could save on mobo and ram costs, since unlocked multiplier based OC is much less stressful for the mobo and ram then FSB based OC.
I expect the whole thing to be more noob friendly too.

 

[cusideabelincoln]

I use my laptop as my primary machine these days, mostly because it's low-power. I let my desktop rigs crunch DC.

Do you run it without the battery? I'm curious to how much electricity is wasted, or used inefficiently, powering up the battery which in turns powers the computer. If you leave the battery in and keep the laptop plugged into the wall, surely some energy is used just to keep the battery at full charge since it will lose its charge over time. Wonder what that amount is? Likewise if you just run it off the battery and recharge it, I wonder how much energy is wasted in this process?

Things might be insignificant to you since a laptop uses so little power, but I'm just curious about the matter.

 

[taltamir]

using your desktop for most daily things will have a negligible impact on its DC crunching... you will actually be saving power by using the desktop instead of the laptop.

 

[OCGuy]

core unlocking is the new over clocking.

;-)

Ewww...core unlocking is assuming that your chip was a better chip, but had cores disabled. I will still assume that there was a high % of defective cores, so they disabled one to avoid the garbage bin.

 

[DrMrLordX]

but you could save on mobo and ram costs, since unlocked multiplier based OC is much less stressful for the mobo and ram then FSB based OC.
I expect the whole thing to be more noob friendly too.

Possibly. I don't think any of us know how much LGA1155 is going to cost at launch. The overclocking should be simpler, though I don't know, Intel keeps adding new features to their IMC that make things complicated on that end. Not that that's a bad thing.

 

[Idontcare]

Ewww...core unlocking is assuming that your chip was a better chip, but had cores disabled. I will still assume that there was a high % of defective cores, so they disabled one to avoid the garbage bin.

Silent data corruption FTL :thumbsdown:

 

[RavenSEAL]

Anandtech heartily disagrees with you.

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/54?vs=109

http://www.anandtech.com/bench/Product/54?vs=145

OVERCLOCKED

The ones on that comparison are stock, i've tried it before, and stock, they are about the same except for video stuff, which my hd5670 helps handle just fine.

 

[Flipped Gazelle]

OVERCLOCKED

The ones on that comparison are stock, i've tried it before, and stock, they are about the same except for video stuff, which my hd5670 helps handle just fine.

Add 14% to the E8600 scores, and there's your 3.8ghz. Still loses.

And you didn't say "about the same" in your previous post. You used the term "destroys".

 

[betasub]

"destroys": a light and careless use of hyperbole. Still, credit to Raven for avoiding the tasteless "rapes" that seems to be employed far too often in these comparisons.

 

[OILFIELDTRASH]

I'd be happy if I could just get an affordable 300+ gb superfast ssd to run all my games and apps. I notice hard drive lag far more than any speed increases from an overclock.

 

[Axon]

Overclocking is already all but irrelevant for me save in a game or two and synthetic benches. I guess if I was doing encoding it would matter. But the i7 920 is so powerful that even at stock it wipes most games I play. There are other factors at work, of course - the less-demanding console gaming development environment being one of them - but there is no question that both AMD and Intel have beastly CPUs that can run virtually every game extremely well.

But to answer the original point: the importance of overclocking is diminishing, yes. And as Oilfield said, the change to SSD use is, in my eyes, the largest user environment improvement I've seen since the jump to Pentium 4. I can't really tell the difference between my i7 920 at 3.0 or 4.0, but I could easily notice an SSD vs. a ball bearing HDD. The change to flash memory seems inevitable, though it may take 5-10 more years.

 

[extra]

But to answer the original point: the importance of overclocking is diminishing, yes. And as Oilfield said, the change to SSD use is, in my eyes, the largest user environment improvement I've seen since the jump to Pentium 4. I can't really tell the difference between my i7 920 at 3.0 or 4.0, but I could easily notice an SSD vs. a ball bearing HDD. The change to flash memory seems inevitable, though it may take 5-10 more years.

You mean *from* pentium 4, not too, right? Just checking. I agree on the SSD though. Holy crap, the difference is HUGE. Mind blowing, night and day. Bigger than the diff going from single to dual cpu. In fact, I'd say the biggest single performance improvement in actual computer use that I've ever seen.

 

[RavenSEAL]

Add 14% to the E8600 scores, and there's your 3.8ghz. Still loses.

And you didn't say "about the same" in your previous post. You used the term "destroys".