GabethePilot 1 Posted January 4, 2011 Report Share Posted January 4, 2011 I was considering an i5 or i7 upgrade early this year, but the Sandybridge range looks amazing. No mention on "1155" motherboard prices, but the recommended SB CPU (i5 2500k) at around £170, will be faster than the i7 980 Extreme in some apps(currently £700) and significantly faster than mainstream i7 s. They appear to be around 10% faster than the i7 875 clock-for-clock, but overclock better - up to around 4.5GHz at 1.3 volts and can employ DDR 3 up to 2133 MHz. Here's a typical multi core game bench - WIC: These are at stock speeds !!! These differences are higher when you o/c. Intel Core i5-2500K: 91fps - £170 Intel Core i7-2600K: 96fps - £250 versus: Intel Core i7-870: 78fps - £285 Intel Core i5-750: 75fps - £150 Intel Core i7-980X: 90fps - £700 Read more: http://www.techradar.com/reviews/pc-mac/pc-components/processors/intel-core-i5-2500k-917570/review?artc_pg=3#ixzz19nUPex2F Well, I for one, am waiting for it. I'd rather wait until the summer for this, than get a dyfunct 1156 or over-priced i7 now. Here is the link for your perusal: Bit Tech Review "...The Sandy Bridge CPU range is incredible, and has the potential to change the entire PC industry...." Bit Tech And here for the unlocked 2500k i5 SB: Tech Radar i5 2500k Link Link to post Share on other sites
mutley 4,498 Posted January 4, 2011 Report Share Posted January 4, 2011 That sounds like a good idea to wait Gabe. A whole new architecture typical! As you imply a new motherboard would be required too. Thanks for the links Link to post Share on other sites
GabethePilot 1 Posted January 6, 2011 Author Report Share Posted January 6, 2011 The thing is, as I need an immediate and decent "bump" in performance pretty much ASAP, I was going to double up my DDR 2 RAM and get a small Quad or fast E8400 CPU for a 50 % boost in both sims. But, given the "bits" I've got already, I've realised that an i3 550 with DDR3 and H55 UD2H m/b, will actually only cost me around £75 more, and give me around 80% the performance of an i5 750 - both clocked to 4GHz. {apparently, FSX benchmarks have shown that the hyper-threads in the (essentially dual-core) of the i3 5-series CPUs, are utilised by FSX to an efficiency of some 85%. ie FSX is "fooled" (almost completely) into thinking it's a full quad ! This will give me an immediate 75% boost in FS9 and around 250% (between a doubling and tripling) of FSX - not to mention curing the awfull out-of-memory errors !!! So, for £200 investment, I reckon that's a good start in the next month or two, and svae for a full -blown Sandy wotsit, towards the Autumn Fall... by which prices and the usual Stepping revisions have stabilised. I'll probably add in a GTX 460 - which are faster than the GTX 280's fro just £120 - a month or so later for general gaming. But, I'm certainly by-passing the full i5/ i7 Quad systems in the light of this news. :icon_thumbup: Link to post Share on other sites
Tim_A 997 Posted January 7, 2011 Report Share Posted January 7, 2011 Sounds interesting, but my current i7 rig has to last me until at least 2012! Link to post Share on other sites
MartinW 0 Posted January 8, 2011 Report Share Posted January 8, 2011 {apparently, FSX benchmarks have shown that the hyper-threads in the (essentially dual-core) of the i3 5-series CPUs, are utilised by FSX to an efficiency of some 85%. ie FSX is "fooled" (almost completely) into thinking it's a full quad ! Are you sure about that? I'm not sure how that could be possible when FSX isn't coded to make use of hyper-threading. Any further info? Link to post Share on other sites
GabethePilot 1 Posted January 8, 2011 Author Report Share Posted January 8, 2011 Yes, positive. Can't remember where, but benches show it is "quite good" at uutilising the threads as full cores, even though an i7's cannot be used. Don't forget, that FSX doesn't fully utilise all 4 cores ina Nehalem quad anyway. In fact, the latest from "Nick's crew" is that you may be better setting FSX to use just 3 cores. When you consider that an i3 550 will clock to 4.2 GHz and give you around 85-90% the performance, of a full i5 750 at 4 GHz, and it costs less than half the price. Not a bad chip and currently Tom's Hardware's best budget CPU. It is certainly a good stop-gap until the P67 and Sandybridge 2200k is out. BTW, the P67 m/b will be around £120, with the i5 2200k coming in at £170. Together with standard DDR3 RAM, they can overclock to 4.5 GHz and outperform the i7 Extreme (£700)therefore , by around 20%. So, I reckon it's worth waiting for. It also usss less power, so no need for expensive 1000 W PSUs unless you're running SLi. Link to post Share on other sites
GabethePilot 1 Posted January 8, 2011 Author Report Share Posted January 8, 2011 Found one thread from TH, that had some guy doing loads of tests on different CPU configs for FS. Amongst his conclusions was this statement: "...Although I prefer Asus boards for their tight Vcore / Vdroop characteristics, the new P7H55-M Pro i3 compatible motherboard you specified doesn't have much of a track record just yet. Regardless, I configured my i7 920 in BIOS as a dual core with hyperthreading enabled @ 4.0 Ghz, in order to simulate an i3 530 dual core with hyperthreading enabled @ 4.0 Ghz. I was very impressed with the frame rates throughout the test flights. There was less than a 10% difference in FPS between 2 cores HT on, and 4 cores HT off. Obviously the i3 will impersonate a quad core by performing as a "virtual" quad. Cudos to Intel for a clever concept. So, based upon these test flights, I've taken the liberty of building you a low cost FSX "paper airplane" with the i3 compatible 1156 motherboard you chose:..." Now, whether this pans out or not when I set up my system, remains to be seen (!!!), but for a CPU that costs around 65-70 quids, it's worth a shot. It certainly beats upgrading my Core 2 system (which would cost around the same ***) - good money after bad I reckon !!! 888 (For example, you can pick up 2x2GB DDR3 1600 RAM, for £35... this compares to 2x2GB DDR 2 800 Mhz DDR2 RAM for around £60 for branded kits) Madness ! Link to post Share on other sites
MartinW 0 Posted January 8, 2011 Report Share Posted January 8, 2011 Still not convinced. :biggrin: I'll need to see some links. I'm happy with my i7 920 at 4GHz anyway.Have had it as high as 4.3GHz with the Noctua NHD-14, very cool and quiet and 100% stable. And HT is off of course saving 10 degrees under load. All I need now is a new graphics card. Hoping to get a 570 at the end of the month. Link to post Share on other sites
GabethePilot 1 Posted January 9, 2011 Author Report Share Posted January 9, 2011 Well you wouldn't be interested in a downgrade anyway would you ! ? Trust me, an i3 is a great budget system that kicks Core 2's ass for half the price - both CPU and the RAM. The i3 5-series has been Toms Hardware Guide's Best Budget Buy for months, and there are loads of threads on Simforums and AVSIM praising the virtues of it in FSX. It is basically half an i7 without Turbo boost. ie. A dual-core with Hyper Threading. For some reason, FSX actually uses the threads, to around 80% efficiency. This puts it very close to an i5 750's performance, clock-for-clock. And, it can go to 4.2 GHz on air. But, it's half the proce of an i5 750. So, I reckon that makes it pretty good value. Anyhoo, my latest strategy is now to "bypass" the i3/i5 completely and wait for the Sandybridge at Easter. £500 gets a i5 2500k at 4.5 GHz , 6GB 1600 DDR3 and a GTX 460. That kicks an i7 Extreme's ass. At up to 1920x1080 res., it's the "dogs" for FSX. Clearly if you on multiple monitors, a better GPU would be desirable. (But the GTX 460 is an amazing card for a little as £115 - even for GPU-dependant games) For anyone interested, link for 4.5 Ghz o/c - on air - is here: OVerclock the new SB i5 2600 k Link to post Share on other sites
MartinW 0 Posted January 9, 2011 Report Share Posted January 9, 2011 Well you wouldn't be interested in a downgrade anyway would you ! ? Of course not! I was just expressing my satisfaction with my rig. Hope your strategy bestows upon you flight sim nirvana. :001_th_smiles89: But the GTX 460 is an amazing card for a little as £115 Odai, over on the Just Flight forum was unimpressed with his. Might be an idea to nip over and do a search. Just warning you in case there's an issue there you don't know about. Link to post Share on other sites
GabethePilot 1 Posted January 31, 2011 Author Report Share Posted January 31, 2011 {apparently, FSX benchmarks have shown that the hyper-threads in the (essentially dual-core) of the i3 5-series CPUs, are utilised by FSX to an efficiency of some 85%. ie FSX is "fooled" (almost completely) into thinking it's a full quad ! Are you sure about that? I'm not sure how that could be possible when FSX isn't coded to make use of hyper-threading. Any further info? Benchmark here showing that an i5 is only some 15-20% slower than an i3... clock-for-clock... but only some 10% when you overclock the i3 - which seems to be capable of a bigger o/c than the i5**. (Wierd that FSX actually uses the Hyperthreading in the i3 but ignores it in the i5 and i7s) Benchmark ** The only downside seems to be that you need a decent (ie. expensive !) cooler to hit > 4 GHz with the i3 to get full value... due to higher temps. Link to post Share on other sites
MartinW 0 Posted January 31, 2011 Report Share Posted January 31, 2011 Wierd that FSX actually uses the Hyperthreading in the i3 but ignores it in the i5 and i7s) I still say it isn't coded to use HT no matter what the CPU. :smile: Phil Taylor did say, that Aces noticed thread collisions with multiple threads, so FSX was coded for physical cores only. Or something like like that. I'm willing to be proven wrong if you can show me evidence. Link to post Share on other sites
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