Intel Sandy Bridge

[[Chris]]

Yeah, What are your views on the Sandy Bridge range of processors?
They dont seem to be worth the upgrade if you already have a i5/i7..

Should i go straight for the i7 950, OR Wait for Sandy Bridge?

[Recursion]

If you're on the I series, skip the Sandybridge generation, unless you have money to burn IMO

[[Chris]]

Yeah, i was thinking of going for the setup i currently have planned
http://img815.imageshack.us/img815/6483/ariapce.png

[Stephen!]

If you're already on Socket 1156 or 1366, then no. But if you're coming from 775 like me, then it's going to be a huge upgrade.

Clock for clock, an SB i7 is roughly 15% faster than a current i7.

And if you're in to overclocking, then you can easily get them to 4.7, 4.8, 4.9 or even 5GHz on air cooling.

If you're not overclocking, then if you wait for Sandy Bridge, the price isn't going to cost much more (the i7-2600k will cost around £250). The motherboards will be around the same price for the basic models.

[[Chris]]

What would you recommend i do then, Go straght in for the 950, or wait it out?

[Stephen!]

I would wait it out. It's not even a long time.. You will be able to buy the stuff in 10 days.

[[Chris]]

10 days? When are they being released?
I thought it was longer than 10 days

[Stephen!]

The product launches on the 9th, although that's a Sunday so you can probably get them on the 10th.

Pretty much 10 days. Maybe 12.

[[Chris]]

Ah, alright then. Thanks for that. I'll hold out and see the prices.

[AgnesIO]

Perhaps put an SSD on to your build and put the os and stuff on it? If you can afford that little bit extgra.

Sweet build though chris! Wouldn't mind using that build haha

[[Chris]]

Lol. I was hoping to throw another 6970 in there when the time comes along. But im going to wait for Sandy Bridge. If its TOO expensive or not worth getting, i'll go for that.

[Luke]

someone's got cash? :P i'm jealous.

[[Chris]]

Ive been saving up for SO long. And ive had to borrow money to get it. Which i have to work to pay back ;/

[AgnesIO]

When I built mine all this 'core i' stuff was new :L

My machine must have dropped in value.. a lot.

[[Chris]]

Thats technology for you :/ Im not bothered though, if it performs well. Theres no need to upgrade.

[Stephen!]

Hmm, a 2nd GPU? In that case I think you best go with 1366. The lower end Sandy Bridge boards will have more than one PCI-E slot, however only one of them will be full speed (x16). The rest will probably be 4x.

[[Chris]]

Yeah, i noticed that. Only Dual Channel DDR3 aswel as far as i saw?

I'll have a look at some boards now

I can just wait. see what the Release-date boards ar elike

[Stephen!]

Dual channel vs tripple channel, no performance gain at all really.

But the PCI-E could be more troubling. Unless you go for a slightly higher end board.

[[Chris]]

Yeah, i'll just have a look when the time comes.
But i chose that board in the original post because it was Triple channel (Dont need more than 6gb ram really) and had 3 Pci-e x16 slots.

[Jam]

What are the specs of the cheapest SB? I'm only doing a HTPC build but I do a boat load of encoding so it'd be nice to do it with speed. I was going to go with a i5 760 but depending on price I'l go with one of these. That and the mATX mobos have 3 or 4 PCI-e in comparison to 2, good for tuners and such.

[Stephen!]

http://tbreak.com/tech/files/sandybridge_price.png

[Jam]

Are those retail price or manufacturer? Don't know to go with the low wattage i5 2500T or the slightly cheaper 2300 or 2400. Neither should bother the 400W PSU I plan on but I need to wait and see how much the new HD PVR takes.

[Stephen!]

Those are retail prices per 1000 units, so you can expect prices to be slightly higher.

If you're doing video editing, the i7-2600 will do wonders since it has hyperthreading.

[Jam]

Not really editing just transcoding and some encoding to iPod resolution. HTPC's are usually Core 2 Duo or i3 so I won't be going any higher than a base i5, its really just so I see a difference between it and my laptop while maintaining a sensible price point.

[Recursion]

Interesting pricing, may have to go for a Sandybridge tbh

[N!ck]

Interesting pricing, may have to go for a Sandybridge tbh

Same, I might get myself an i5. Probably the 2500K for overclocking. Will need a new motherboard and RAM though :(.

And I imagine the prices will be approximately what you see there but in pounds. So about £180-220 for the i5 range.

[Flisker]

I also think I will give the i7-950 a miss and go for a Sandy Bridge.

[Stephen!]

This is the 2500k

http://www.lambda-tek.com/componentshop/index.pl?origin=gbase29.5&prodID=C-2115483

Decent price.

I'm going for the 2600k myself.

http://www.xbitlabs.com/images/cpu/sandy-bridge-microarchitecture/i7-2600.png

[Markeh]

Good lord, it's like the launch of Sandy Bridge is akin to the Pope, Barack Obama and Kim Jong Il taking off in a spaceship to Mars... Very random I know.

Although one of those Pentiums would be good for a basic Boxee HTPC for 720p methinks.

[Jam]

Although one of those Pentiums would be good for a basic Boxee HTPC for 720p methinks.

If your doing just a playback HTPC, atoms can playback 1080p (from a file not a BD) fine.

[Recursion]

If your doing just a playback HTPC, atoms can playback 1080p (from a file not a BD) fine.

*dual core

Although if I was going for a HTPC I'd go for something with Nvidia ION for the 1080p playback.

[N!ck]

*dual core

Although if I was going for a HTPC I'd go for something with Nvidia ION for the 1080p playback.

No, you'd just put a C2D in there and save lots of hassle.

[Recursion]

No, you'd just put a C2D in there and save lots of hassle.

Until you're looking for something that runs quietly on an mITX board in an mITX case :P

[Jam]

*dual core

The Atom does not need be Dual Core.

[Recursion]

The Atom does not need be Dual Core.

Since when did single core Atoms handle 1080p without a decent video card to off load it onto?

[Stephen!]

Since when did single core Atoms handle 1080p without a decent video card to off load it onto?

This. From a simple google search this is obvious.

[N!ck]

Until you're looking for something that runs quietly on an mITX board in an mITX case :P

It can run quietly. Just not the mITX case...

I'd much rather have a slightly bigger C2D HTPC than a smaller atom based one.