Will Intel Broadwell Be Any Better Than Haswell?

[jpiniero]

It sure looks like the E line has taken those price points that the E6700 and X6800 had.

 

[jhu]

The wiki is wrong as usual.

The E6700 launched at 530$:
http://www.anandtech.com/show/2045/2

I see what happened: 3 and 5 are switched on wiki

 

[ehume]

Most noticeable thing you can do to a aging laptop is throw in a SSD. I've extended the life of countless older C2D and Pentiums for friends, family, and work.

I really don't know that waiting almost a year from today for Broadwell is worth it over a current Haswell offering in a laptop.

You are right about the SSD breathing new life into Core2 Duo laptops. But you still have the 2 hour battery life and the sheer weight. If you carry one more than once a year, it's hardly worth it.

 

[lamedude]

Introductory prices don't tell the whole story. We used to get prices cuts. The Q6600 went from $851 to $266.

 

[coercitiv]

Let me correct it for you.

Intel C2D E6700 $530
Intel Core i7-870 $562
Intel Core i7-2600K $317
Intel Core i7 3770K $342
Intel Core i7-4770K $339

And thats even without accounting for inflation.

So yes, its never been cheaper.

If you're going to correct it, be honest about it: adding CPUs from the $500 bracket as if that bracket does not exist anymore is hardly honest, isn't it?

Moreover, "correcting" the real $313 launch price (see Anandtech & Tom's) with the current boxed price of $342 isn't helping.

Moving on , of course we're not taking inflation into account, if we did that we'd also have to factor in other variables such as GDP growth, customer demand, production costs etc.

The fact remains that prices are roughly similar going from one generation to another, which hardly supports the "prices have never been lower" theory.

 

[kimmel]

Introductory prices don't tell the whole story. We used to get prices cuts. The Q6600 went from $851 to $266.

Of course you pick a specific instance where a premium was able to be charged at the beginning when quad core was something uncommon and then became common. This only really shows what happens when something becomes mainstream vs a niche market.

Moving on , of course we're not taking inflation into account, if we did that we'd also have to factor in other variables such as GDP growth, customer demand, production costs etc.

Which is why this "if only intel had competition meme" gets old really fast. Nothing is held constant over time making the comparisons to Intel vs AMD in a vacuum uninteresting.

 

[tential]

The 4770k was also available at Micro Center for $280.

Price to performance ratio has NEVER been better. I was SO happy with purchasing the 4770k for $280 at launch.

 

[Makaveli]

Indeed, and I'm impressed by how long Intel has been able to improve things, Haswell included. Going from i7 920 to 4770K some of my number crunching code got twice faster. OK that's 2x faster for 4.5 years, but that still is very good IMHO.

OTOH I guess the current micro-architecture is reaching its limits, but I have no doubt Intel is working on some brand new micro-arch to start from.

I would be curious to see those numbers at equal clock speed since that is 2.66 vs 3.4 + IPC and instruction set improvements.

I bought a i7-4770K in the summer, and IMO I do not want to buy a Broadwell.

Why would you have too?

you don't need to upgrade every new processor that comes out.

Why do you think I stayed on my rig for 5 years.

You will easily get 3+ years of useful life if not more out of a 4770k.

There is buts.
The but of your ignorance about recent performance improvements.


My i7 920 is nice, but it get's is ass kicked by mobile Ivy Bridge and Haswell i7's, while the latest have less then half power consumption.

'No matter how long it was worked on', Nehalem to Haswell was an enormous leap too.

I would love to see this since most people running a 920 have them overclocked at 3.6-4Ghz vs a Mobile ivy or haswell that is thermally restricted in that laptop case and with no overclocking headroom.

 

[FalseChristian]

What we need is more competition from AMD. You're never going to see a Nehalem to Sandy Bridge-type of improvement again without AMD getting serious about gaming CPUs.

 

[Eric1987]

I just hope I have a reason to upgrade my 2500k in the next 10 years. From a gaming perspective of course.

 

[coercitiv]

Which is why this "if only intel had competition meme" gets old really fast. Nothing is held constant over time making the comparisons to Intel vs AMD in a vacuum uninteresting.

Good thing thing we have inflation bringing down prices by 1-3% every year. This won't ever get old.

 

[Nothingness]

I would be curious to see those numbers at equal clock speed since that is 2.66 vs 3.4 + IPC and instruction set improvements.

Yes, and add much faster memory (though my Haswell is not OC I use DDR3 RAM) and turbo freq. My point was for about the same price I got a x2 speedup over a 4.5 years period. But it's very specific because it depends a lot on imul speed which was improved by Haswell.

I agree it would be interesting to measure at the same frequency, but frequency increases are part of the improvements Intel make (one could argue the i7 920 was not the fastest Nehalem at launch, but the price of i7 940 was more than $500 IIRC). Perhaps digging into SPEC 2006 results could answer part of your question.

 

[jhu]

Yes, and add much faster memory (though my Haswell is not OC I use DDR3 RAM) and turbo freq. My point was for about the same price I got a x2 speedup over a 4.5 years period. But it's very specific because it depends a lot on imul speed which was improved by Haswell.

I agree it would be interesting to measure at the same frequency, but frequency increases are part of the improvements Intel make (one could argue the i7 920 was not the fastest Nehalem at launch, but the price of i7 940 was more than $500 IIRC). Perhaps digging into SPEC 2006 results could answer part of your question.

Probably no need for that part. Just use anandtech.com/bench. Then normalize results for clockspeed.

eg. POVRay:
Core i7 920 @ 2.67 GHz = 3528 pps --> 330.34 pps/core/GHz
Core i7 4770K @ 3.5 GHz (3.7 GHz turbo) = 6544 pps --> 442.16 pps/core/GHz

So 4770K is about 34% faster per clock than the 920 for this program. That's useful info for Povray users.

 

[Homeles]

What we need is more competition from AMD. You're never going to see a Nehalem to Sandy Bridge-type of improvement again without AMD getting serious about gaming CPUs.

With or without AMD, it won't happen. The low hanging fruit has been picked. There won't be big jumps until a disruptive technology comes into play.

 

[Mk pt]

I would love to see this since most people running a 920 have them overclocked at 3.6-4Ghz vs a Mobile ivy or haswell that is thermally restricted in that laptop case and with no overclocking headroom.

That doesn't make sense.
Stock cpu vs stock cpu makes. Unrestricted in oc and power/thermal desktop vs 'no oc on a laptop' doesn't.


In that case is a better comparison an i7 920 @3.9/4Ghz ['average max oc on air'] vs i7 4770k @ 4.3 Ghz ['average max oc on air'].
Guess how much i7 4770k @4.3Ghz is better. And, again, with a lower power consumption.

 

[Makaveli]

That doesn't make sense.
Stock cpu vs stock cpu makes. Unrestricted in oc and power/thermal desktop vs 'no oc on a laptop' doesn't.


In that case is a better comparison an i7 920 @3.9/4Ghz ['average max oc on air'] vs i7 4770k @ 4.3 Ghz ['average max oc on air'].
Guess how much i7 4770k @4.3Ghz is better. And, again, with a lower power consumption.

Overclocking headroom is an advantage a desktop PC holds over a laptop I was just pointing it out.

Your other post was comparing desktop vs laptop was it not?

Now you are changing it.

 

[mrmt]

What we need is more competition from AMD. You're never going to see a Nehalem to Sandy Bridge-type of improvement again without AMD getting serious about gaming CPUs.

Where's AMD putting their hard earned money, on desktop chips or in ARM/GPU/Embedded projects? Desktop is not a priority, not even for AMD. Had AMD more money, we'd probably see them putting their money on mobile chips for tablets or even phones, not on desktops.

 

[NTMBK]

Where's AMD putting their hard earned money, on desktop chips or in ARM/GPU/Embedded projects? AMD is not a priority, not even for AMD. Had AMD more money, we'd probably see them putting their money on mobile chips for tablets or even phones, not on desktops.

I'd hope AMD isn't that stupid. The mobile ARM SoC market is absolutely cut-throat, and insanely hard to compete in. AMD has no modem technology, which is essential if you want to compete against the likes of Qualcomm. It's a market which has chewed up and spat out NVidia, despite them having significantly more resources than AMD- AMD would do no better. At least the microserver market is virgin territory with opportunities for AMD to carve out a niche and make a name for themselves, plus they have existing relationships with server vendors and customers. But going after phones and tablets would be suicide.

EDIT: Though I do agree with the basic point that AMD have bigger priorities than "big core".

 

[mikeymikec]

With or without AMD, it won't happen. The low hanging fruit has been picked. There won't be big jumps until a disruptive technology comes into play.

Oh, I don't know, AMD could wait until Intel has totally run out of puff / can't be arsed to innovate any more in the desktop arena, and then go VOOM! Like a rat out of an aqueduct.

Hopefully not VOOM: In the sense of fan speeds required to cool their products though.

 

[jason166]

In my mind the only competitor Intel has is it's past self... And the current Intel isn't doing so well in this match up.

I just dropped a $120 cpu (X5650) in my X58 platform that can out bench a $300 overclocked 4770K @ 4.4GHz in Cinebench R15.

If they would stop trying to centrally plan the market and gimping their products for "market segmentation" reasons I think they would be making a much stronger case to many of us holdouts.

Speaking as a holdout.. I want more value for my money, and Intel can literally add value with no cost to many of their CPUs (by not gimping them), they just choose not to.

That doesn't make sense.
Stock cpu vs stock cpu makes. Unrestricted in oc and power/thermal desktop vs 'no oc on a laptop' doesn't.


In that case is a better comparison an i7 920 @3.9/4Ghz ['average max oc on air'] vs i7 4770k @ 4.3 Ghz ['average max oc on air'].
Guess how much i7 4770k @4.3Ghz is better. And, again, with a lower power consumption.

 

[Homeles]

In my mind the only competitor Intel has is it's past self... And the current Intel isn't doing so well in this match up.

I just dropped a $120 cpu (X5650) in my X58 platform that can out bench a $300 overclocked 4770K @ 4.4GHz in Cinebench R15.

If they would stop trying to centrally plan the market and gimping their products for "market segmentation" reasons I think they would be making a much stronger case to many of us holdouts.

Speaking as a holdout.. I want more value for my money, and Intel can literally add value with no cost to many of their CPUs (by not gimping them), they just choose not to.

No, you dropped in a $1000 CPU (that you purchased for $120) that outperforms a $300 4770K.

Meanwhile, while you're winning at Cinebench Hero, you're losing out on power consumption, single-threaded performance, < 4-threaded performance (and undoubtedly < 5-threaded as well), Quick Sync, AVX, AVX2; not to mention all the new standards supported by an up to date chipset (USB 3.0, PCI-E 3.0, SATA 6Gbps).

 

[Makaveli]

No, you dropped in a $1000 CPU (that you purchased for $120) that outperforms a $300 4770K.

Meanwhile, while you're winning at Cinebench Hero, you're losing out on power consumption, single-threaded performance, < 4-threaded performance (and undoubtedly < 5-threaded as well), Quick Sync, AVX, AVX2; not to mention all the new standards supported by an up to date chipset (USB 3.0, PCI-E 3.0, SATA 6Gbps).

I don't think looking at the price of the cpu matters that much my $400 i7 970 and anything gulftown/westmere with 6 cores and when overclocked will beat the 4770k in that application.

Surely you are missing out on all those things you pointed out aswell. However in my daily use and with the apps I use it has not been a great loss hence the reason i'm still on the platform.

PCI-E 3.0 doesn't mean much in single GPU configurations.
You can raid 0 on x58 to give you the speed of a single Sata 6 SSD.
USB 3.0... I still use ESATA!
Power consumption is not a huge deal on a full powered desktop pc the machine will sleep when not in use.
The extra cores and encoding on gpu more than makes up for not having Quick Sync.
And list of application that support AVX,AVX2 still isn't huge.

I should also point out the obvious if your building a new system now you would be foolish not to build with haswell.

For some of us holds out still on westmere,gulftown skipping SB,IVY,Haswell and going straight to Haswell E just makes more sense as a whole platform refresh.

 

[jason166]

As Makaveli said, many of those features you list, in reality have no impact on performance. You're points on only being competitive on some workloads is valid. For me, it just happens to be fairly competitive on the workloads I care about. (Video Encoding & BF4)

As far as your pricing point, what matters is the market price today. Intel is competing with this, not the $1000 it originally sold for.

The fact is that a x58 system, going on 5 years old can be kept competitive with the top end consumer segment system of today. For a net cost of about $70-100 (After ebaying your old cpu).

Is it any wonder people are spending the extra $70-100 and saying "Maybe I'll wait until Haswell/Broadwell/XYZ ? (Rather 10X that).

My other point was that Intel has some things they can do to make a better case to enthusiasts for an upgrade that have little or no cost but until now they have not seemed to care.

There is some promising news lately though that they are going to rekindle the Enthusiast relationship with talk about better thermal packaging and even some low end unlocked Pentium parts. If Intel does make some small shifts towards more enthusiast friendly policies I think they will be rewarded in kind.

Regards,
Jason

No, you dropped in a $1000 CPU (that you purchased for $120) that outperforms a $300 4770K.

Meanwhile, while you're winning at Cinebench Hero, you're losing out on power consumption, single-threaded performance, < 4-threaded performance (and undoubtedly < 5-threaded as well), Quick Sync, AVX, AVX2; not to mention all the new standards supported by an up to date chipset (USB 3.0, PCI-E 3.0, SATA 6Gbps).