Intel Core 2 Duo E6750 Sample Preview

MojoKid writes "Intel took the wraps off a new Core 2 Duo desktop chip today, dubbed the E6750. Though this chip shares the same basic clock speed as the Core 2 Duo E6700 at 2.66GHz, this new processor also runs on a faster 1,333MHz Front Side Bus. The new chip's additional bus bandwidth affords it up to a 5% performance advantage over standard 1066MHz FSB-based Core 2 chips. However, what's perhaps more promising is this new chip's overclocking head-room of up to 3.92GH and beyond on standard air cooling."

Comments

All on one page

[edgr]

The link to the article all on one page is http://www.hothardware.com/printarticle.aspx?artic leid=989

Re:Overclocking...

[commlinx]

Exactly, and why the chip is sold as 2.66GHz not the 3.92GHz that the marketing department would prefer. Semiconductor manufacturers do a stellar job of testing and specifying things over the complete operating range of the device. Ignoring obvious differences in things like ambient temperature and power supply fluctuations when you overclock a device you risk a number of factors for reliability. Any temperature measurement is always taken at a single point and if another point on the surface of the silicon is hotter, for example because your application of heatsink compound was not so great or it contains higher speed switching and more dense circuitry in that area you always run the risk of frying things. Not to mention there is a difference between running a game that might place peak demands on the CPU and allow it to cool versus compute-intensive applications where you might want to drive all cores at 100% over a long period. And they might be using a different section of the processor, and your CPU might be from a different batch, and...

Re:Good marketing?

[jawtheshark]

Yes, it's all market related... but not how you think.

There is no such thing as a xyz GHz chip. They are all the same (except for caches on chip and so, but let's neglect that) The chips are all made from the same wafers and then are tested: those that are tested at high speeds and work, get sold als "high speed chips", the chips that fail are tested at lower speed and then, if they work, sold for that speed.

Now, that's fine in theory, the problem is that when the yields of high speed chips are very high. At that point Intel has a problem: their high-premium chips are plentiful and hence they should sell them at lower cost. Especially that they don't have lower speed chips that are for the middle and low-segment market. But wait! Why not just sell the chips that work at high speeds, but tell the customer that they are slower speed chips. The (average) customer will not test if it runs higher speeds, and frankly, it is not in their interest to do because they would lose warranty.

That's what really happens...