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  • khirareq - Friday, April 1, 2005 - link

    Um, sorry, but i feel that i need to point something out


    You state a number of times that the pins need to be twisted in order to secure the HSF - If you read the leaflet thats included with the CPU, it staes that the Pins are twisted in order to relase the HSF for removal

    Intels Manual DOwnload (>10meg):
    http://support.intel.com/support/processors/sb/CS-...

    Screenshot of the page:
    http://photobucket.com/albums/v337/khirareq/?actio...

    I discovered this at work the other night after spending some time trying to work out how to remove one, and resigned to reading the manual (turn out the HSF was faulty and jammed in the board anyways)
  • Pete - Tuesday, June 29, 2004 - link

    Anand, not to get too confrontational, but have I offended you in such a way that you choose not to reply to my questions? I'm not sure why my surprise at the 6800U's gains in Far Cry aren't worth remarking on.

    I'd appreciate an answer. If you take exception to my questioning your numbers, I'd be satisfied with a reply to that effect, and I'd readily apologize if I've offended you with my perhaps overly blunt questioning.
  • justly - Sunday, June 27, 2004 - link

    Anand, thank you for the response, and for the effort you put forth in getting it.

    A few (minor) questions could still be asked about mechanical stability, but it is much more believable than the electrical issue.

    Again, thank you.
  • Anand Lal Shimpi - Friday, June 25, 2004 - link

    justly

    As promised, I got together with Intel to talk about their statement. Intel has revised their statement and instead state that the ~40 lbs of pressure is used for mechanical stability and not for the stability of the electrical connections - good call :)

    As you already mentioned, LGA-775 is a different story since it needs the pressure to keep the contact with the pins. Apparently the heatsink doesn't need to apply as much pressure as before since the mechanical stability isn't an issue with LGA-775.

    So in the end it wasn't a heat transfer issue or an electrical issue, purely mechanical.

    I've made the appropriate corrections to the piece.

    Take care,
    Anand
  • Pete - Tuesday, June 22, 2004 - link

    Hi Anand,

    Any comment re: my previous post on the 6800U Far Cry numbers? Just checking if they're right. Thanks.
  • Cygni - Tuesday, June 22, 2004 - link

    Ive actually discussed Prescott a little with a designer at Intel's Folsom facility (although this person worked on the Granite Bay chipset and then some Centrino work). He cant really figure out the chip either, but he believes that the entire purpose of Prescott hasnt been taken out from under wraps yet. Possibly mechanisims to combat the problems with increases in clock speed etc... things that are on the core, just not activated (ala HT). I guess we will see. Maybe the purpose of Prescott is to ready technologies and proccesses to combat Hammer's successor when it appears? Neither of us were sure.
  • stephenbrooks - Tuesday, June 22, 2004 - link

    Those software compilation scores do not look pretty for Intel. Looks like they'll be approaching 5GHz before a Prescott-like processor will beat even an FX-53! 8-\ New CPU core, please...
  • araczynski - Tuesday, June 22, 2004 - link

    very nice article, like the depth.

    sounds like the bottom line (for my tastes) is to get the 6800U and forget the intel line for another year.
  • Anand Lal Shimpi - Tuesday, June 22, 2004 - link

    ThePlagiarmaster

    Sorry, I completely forgot to post my reply to your post :)

    We started using Gordion Knot because that's what we found was most recommended for high quality DivX ripping. Instead of just benchmarking every codec/ripping tool for our CPU reviews, what I'd rather do is compare all of the codecs/tools and figure out which one truly offers the best quality - then it's the performance using that configuration that matters. After all, who cares if AMD or Intel is faster if it's on an application that no one actually uses; that's not the point of a real world benchmark.

    Give us time, and we will not disappoint. I've already talked to Derek about doing such an article, but now I think I'm going to push up its priority a bit.

    Take care,
    Anand
  • ThePlagiarmaster - Tuesday, June 22, 2004 - link

    Anand.

    I take it no comment means you're off benchmarking dvd2avi for a divx showdown?? :)

    Pumpkinierre,

    You're welcome :) Hopefully we'll get some benchmarks here, proving once and for all who's rules the divx roost. At least Anand's users would be more informed in the end. For anyone interested LOOK HERE:
    http://www.hardocp.com/article.html?art=NjMwLDU=
    Looks like a 20% victory for AMD64 in Divx (dvd2avi). A quick look lower on the page shows Intel(3.6ghz 3.4EE) with about the same 20% victory in Divx(Xmpeg frontend). Perhaps Anand can end it all by testing one against the other?

    Maybe a whole article could be done on this? With say, Ripping to Divx, Ripping R9 Retail to DVD5 (CCE/Tmpeg etc?), Ripping MP3's etc. I'm sure there are more CPU intesive ideas, but the point is finding the best app to do the same job on both platforms. Rather than a blanket statement like 'intel is better than amd at divx' when it's not clear that's true. Not with so many frontends to choose from that do the same job, and CLEARLY they perform DRASTICALLY different on each cpu (amd/intel). With games it's cut and dried (no frontends, just the game itself), but apps are a different story.

    Plag
  • Anand Lal Shimpi - Monday, June 21, 2004 - link

    justly

    I actually found out about the MTBF on Socket-478 at the launch of the Extreme Edition two IDFs ago. It's not that the motherboard will fail completely, it's that there may be some no-POST errors and (I'm guessing at this one) there may be some reduction in overall stability thanks to signal degradation depending on the issues with the contacts themselves. We easily can go through 20 insertions in a week at AT, and we encounter a *ton* of motherboards (especially those used as our regular testbeds) that just start acting up after a certain period of time. I even started to wonder how many of our random issues with stability are caused by things like the MTBF on CPU sockets...

    I've already asked to talk to an engineer in greater depth about the issue, I'm hoping to have a response tomorrow. You and I both are concerned with making sure the right information gets out there; I published it because I trusted the source, but more information is definitely necessary.

    I appreciate your last response tremendously, there's no offense taken - we're both out for the same goals.

    Take care,
    Anand
  • justly - Monday, June 21, 2004 - link

    Anand

    I would be quite surprised if Intel can validate this claim. Either way I would be very interested in what they had to say.

    I hope my previous post was not offensive, I just feel strongly (having 20+ years mechanical engineering experience) that Intel is pulling your leg.

    The LGA-775 is a totally different animal. Since it does make contact at the tip of the pins it will be required to have a downward force exerted on the CPU. As for a reason to change the heatsinks force the answer is unclear. This reduction in force could be due to any number of reasons (prevent damage to motherboard or LGA-775 interface, more efficient heat sink design, or just that the extra force provided no tangible benefit) but I fail to see this being based on an electrical connection issue.


    KF, before my last post I was trying to find a exploded view of a ZIF socket, nothing I found was clear enough to link to, but I do remember seeing some ZIF insertion numbers reaching as high as 10,000.
  • KF - Monday, June 21, 2004 - link

    >You advise 'business users' to chose AMD...
    Also total nonsense, any entry
    > level value processor will do, they don't need teraMips...
    Besides the processors which are the subject of the article, AMD makes entry level value processors that outvalue, so your point is what? That if you want a sad POS processor, buy a Celeron? If performance is a consideration (which is why you might be reading the article), choose AMD. If not, choose AMD.
  • KF - Monday, June 21, 2004 - link

    I too wondered how a ZIF (= Zero Insertion Force) socket's electrical contact could be affected by vertical pressure. The whole engineering premise is that vertical force should be irrelevant, I thought. But I have never seen an actual socket 478 disassembled.(Plenty of socket 370s and such, though) Do they have a contacts at the bottom in addition to the side squeeze contacts? Seems unlikely.

    Until this claim of 20 insertions MTBF, I was under the impression that a ZIFs life was indefinate. They use ZIFs (admittedly beefed up versions) for programming ROMs, and they must undergo thousands of insertions. So Intel engineers devised some ultra-super-pathetic duty spec just for Intel CPUs? Now, the heat sink mount I could believe would have 20 cycles MTBF.

    >Who to trust? Anand and Intel... or some random web posters? Hmmm.. totally tough call there.

    Not everyone is as blissfully uninformed as yourself. But loads of Anandtech posters have had direct experience with ZIFs, some having popped the tops off and removed a contact or two for mods, or at least seen the pics, and are not prepared to "trust" what is contrary to experience.
  • Pumpkinierre - Monday, June 21, 2004 - link

    Thank you for your post Plagiarmaster. I often wondered why the excellent bandwidth of dual channel a64s did'nt translate into better encoding and thought software bias might have been the problem. It seems that the a64s have just about got it all.
  • Cygni - Monday, June 21, 2004 - link

    Who to trust? Anand and Intel... or some random web posters? Hmmm.. totally tough call there.
  • ThePlagiarmaster - Monday, June 21, 2004 - link

    OOPS..Re: my previous post, I should have said it COULD be up to 40%. Not that the difference IS 40%. It's just a rough guesstimate. Of course it could be less, but when you're talking hours and hours of a multipass rip (CCE anyone?) you need to be using the best app you can get for your chosen cpu correct? Maybe there is only the gain of breaking even. But even in that case you're talking 15-20% or so. That could mean hours. My guess is DVD2AVI is better on AMD because a guy like us wrote it (not some company, with big RD), and he likely did it on an AMD system.
  • ThePlagiarmaster - Monday, June 21, 2004 - link

    RE: this statement "DivX encoding is one of the few remaining performance advantages that Intel holds over AMD." from your article (and every article on cpu's). It's a bit misleading. Try using DVD2AVI as a front end and you will say the EXACT opposite, with an even larger victory for AMD. You can check any HardOCP review for this info. Since we all know Xmpeg loves Intel chips shouldn't you run the favorite frontend for AMD chips also? HardOCP shows each has a favorite (but don't use comparable results), but I wish you guys would go that ONE STEP FURTHER. Rip the same movie on Divx/DVD2AVI for AMD, and for Intel use Divx/Xmpeg. Who is REALLY FASTER? Your users should be told that anybody using xmpeg instead of dvd2avi while owning an AMD CPU is making a mistake (like waiting an extra 40% in time, for every rip-thats 20%loss for using xmpeg, and around 20%gain using dvd2avi). You might not be able to do this for all benchmarks, but here both frontends do the same exact job. Why not use the best for each cpu? It's the same amount of testing, just a different app for each CPU.

    I see this same problem with Musicmatch. It's not too kind on AMD cpu's. Personally I use EAC/Lame but I'm after CLEAN mp3's not speed. Finding the best app with mp3's for AMD I'll leave to someone else (Anandtech??). At any rate, saying Intel is faster in DIVX encoding is innacurate at best. Yet you keep repeating it in every review. Time to fix that I think.
  • Anand Lal Shimpi - Monday, June 21, 2004 - link

    danidentity

    I'm looking into the overclocking lock, we hadn't heard anything about it until THG posted that article. At Computex we heard that manufacturers were having unusually low overclocking success with the 925X chipset but they weren't attributing it to a lock, rather issues with the chipset itself. We're working on finding out the full story right now, give us time and we'll let you know :)

    Take care,
    Anand
  • Anand Lal Shimpi - Monday, June 21, 2004 - link

    justly

    I believe the justification was that to maintain proper long term connection between those pins and the contacts, some of that ~40 lbs of pressure was necessary. If you try to install something in the new LGA-775 socket you do notice that the lever puts a *lot* of force on the pins, and that the heatsink puts a lot less force on the chip.

    Intel comes up with these numbers on their own through extensive reliability and stress testing, much more than can be reproduced within our labs. I will push Intel further on the issue to see if I can get some clarification/explanation as to how they believe the pressure from the heatsink helped, because I do agree that it does seem suspect but they were convinced of it.

    Take care,
    Anand
  • Pete - Monday, June 21, 2004 - link

    *Sweet.

    I'm thinking those 6800U benches are probably input errors on AT's part, as most other sites show:

    1) scores nowhere near that high, especially at that res, &
    2) A64s outperforming P4s.

    You may be using a very GPU-limited, or at least not-CPU-limited demo, though.
  • Pete - Monday, June 21, 2004 - link

    Swet, fancy Moses! Anand, can you explain the ginormous "vanilla" Far Cry gains by the 6800U? Was IQ the same as the 61.11s (still "point-filtery" in some places compared to ATi) with such prodigious (70%!) gains?
  • justly - Monday, June 21, 2004 - link

    Anand

    I don’t care if that info is strait from Intel or not, it is plain wrong, and I think you are wrong for not questioning this and more so by putting it in print.

    Conduction is increased with pressure (be it heat or electrical) but for downward force to affect electrical contact/conduction of a CPU in a socket the pins would have to make contact at their tip. A ZIF socket does not do this, it makes contact on the side of the pins when a sliding plate forces the pin against a contact. If contact was made at the tip of the pins then the CPU would not lay flat against the top of the socket when inserted. This would also prevent aftermarket adapters like this one from powerleap http://www.powerleap.com/PL-iP4.html from being used between the CPU and the socket because it would prevent the pins from contacting.

    Once the CPU is inserted into the socket and the lever is locked down the CPU is locked flat against the socket so even if downward pressure was applied it would only help with heat transfer.
  • Runamile - Monday, June 21, 2004 - link

    I agree with #4. The ZIF socket takes care of all contact needed. And as #15 said, there is a sideways force that makes contact with the pins. Ever seen that Tom's Hardware video with the PIII and P4 running w/o a heatsink, albeit very slowly due to freak overheating? They did 'need' the extreame downwards force. Thats all for heat transfer. Period.

    All in all, very enlightening article. Basicly shows that the entire 925X/LGA-775/Prescott/DDR2/PCI-X release is a mediocre waste of our money. At least for the time being.
  • paulvds - Monday, June 21, 2004 - link

    478 pin electrical contact is by a pinching
    sideway force on the pins produced by the ZIF
    lever, top down force is totaly irrelevant!
    How could you gobble-up that marketing nonsense ?

    You advise 'business users' to chose AMD...
    Also total nonsense, any entry level value processor will do, they don't need teraMips...

    You should go write poetry or novells...
  • danidentity - Monday, June 21, 2004 - link

    Great article Anand...

    Do you have any info on the supposed Intel-imposed 10% overclocking limit described in Tom's Hardware Guide's LGA775 article here?

    http://www.tomshardware.com/motherboard/20040619/s...
  • retrospooty - Monday, June 21, 2004 - link

    Nice article...

    It just basically proves what we have all suspected all along. DDR2, PCI express, and socket 775 dont offer any compelling reason to upgrade (for now anyhow).

    Of course in the future (maybe 2005 if we're lucky), when graphics cards can utilize the extra bandwidth of PCI express it will be faster than AGP 8x.

    Of course in the future (maybe 2005 if we're lucky), when DDR2 800 mhz is standard, it will be faster than low latency DDR400

    Of course in the future (even if hell freezes over) the message is clear socket 775 has failed :D

    LOL !
  • T8000 - Monday, June 21, 2004 - link

    I think the pins in the LGA775 socket are a lot longer then the CPU needs.

    So adding some kind of non conductive shim around the pins could make this socket a lot more reliable.

    It could be as simple as a thin plastic plate with 775 holes in it, that could be inserted before the CPU, leaving just enough pin length to mount the CPU, without the risk of bending those pins.
  • Anand Lal Shimpi - Monday, June 21, 2004 - link

    phobs

    Thanks for the heads up, we added the last two pages of benchmarks after the fact and I forgot to remove that line :)

    Take care,
    Anand
  • Anand Lal Shimpi - Monday, June 21, 2004 - link

    justly

    That information is straight from Intel - the force of the heatsink was used to maximize heat transfer, but not that much force is necessary to maximize heat transfer. The rest of the force is needed to ensure that there is good contact between the pins and their contacts.

    Take care,
    Anand
  • Phiro - Monday, June 21, 2004 - link

    Great article, good pics on the new socket.

    I'm glad to see PCI-E performance is within a % or two of AGP-8X, and that Nvidia & ATI are neck and neck, no big hit on either one.

    I think it was clear to anyone who has been following the move to PCI-E that the onus wasn't on a performance increase on a single card - the move to PCI-E is an engineering one, not a siloed performance gain. The idea is we have a much more robust bus, we can have many cards with tons of bandwidth instead of one, and we add alot of versatility.

    It's like the move from VLB to PCI - anyone remember that? PCI was a good, good standard. While graphics cards didn't make a huge jump in performance, you finally got away from those damn ISA slots.

    Anyhow. I think PCI-E is a good standard, and I'm going to have it in my next system.
  • RyanVM - Monday, June 21, 2004 - link

    Why weren't there more comparisons between equal processors on the different platforms, such as LGA775 P4E vs. S478 P4E (2.8, 3.2, etc)? It seems to me that those would better isolate the chipset.
  • ZobarStyl - Monday, June 21, 2004 - link

    I don't think AMD solutions with PCI-E will be any faster...the reason that the benches using the new chipset with DDRII were considered even ground is that the companion article on the new Intel chipsets showed there is at this point no difference between the two setups in terms of performance, only in price. This generation of PCI-E solutions based on AGP designed chips (from both camps) wasn't really built with PCI-E bandwidth in mind, so the gains on any system are likely neglible. Once chips (and games too, I would assume) can be built with the bandwidth of PCI-E in mind perhaps we will see a gain, right now let rich kids upgrade while you sit back on a much cheaper AGP solution that gives the same perf. =)
  • CU - Monday, June 21, 2004 - link

    I think ATI said they were buffers and not a bridge. I could be wrong though.
  • elephantman - Monday, June 21, 2004 - link

    I'd have to agree with justly on that last one

    Also..I believe nvidia had posted an xray of ati's pcie core which showed a bridge solution and not a fully native pcie solution as stated...maybe we'll get a response from ati on this soon
  • justly - Monday, June 21, 2004 - link

    This quote from page two is pure rubbish.

    "It used to be that the heatsink, not the socket's lever, was what provided the majority of force on the CPU itself to ensure proper contact with the socket."

    The force exerted on the CPU by the heatsink is used to maximize heat transfer. If the heatsink force was to provide "contact with the socket" then there would be no need for a lever (at least on a ZIF socket). This would also mean that no one should worry that a CPU could burn up without a heatsink, as it would not have "contact with the socket" without the force of the heatsink pushing down on it.

  • mkruer - Monday, June 21, 2004 - link

    To be fair I would use the P4E for rendering IF it wasn’t a power hog. But since I doen render anything movies, I guess not.
  • mkruer - Monday, June 21, 2004 - link

    Hum interesting PCI Express offers virtually no gain because of DDR-2 latencies? I wonder how much better PCI Express would be on an AMD 64 with DDR-1? You don’t have the DDR-2 latencies issues, plus because of HT, that’s Hyper Transport for you Intel people out there, I wonder if in the long run the AMD systems will perform better for the graphics card on average then any Intel chipset. Anyway this confirms my suspicion, “never buy any first generation product form either company” and in Intel’s case this time you might want to wait for the Merom, Conroe and Tukwila, chips because I think everyone should stick a fork in the P4 it’s done! (pun intended)
  • phobs - Monday, June 21, 2004 - link

    Interesting read,
    Bit of a error on page 22, you say "concluding our AGP vs. PCI Express performance investigation." and then go on to have 2 more pages of benchmarks...

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