CM 212+ for Sandy Bridge?

hogan773

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Hi all - couple questions. I am expecting to build a SB based system with either 2500k or 2600k and a CM 690ii case.

I notice that MC will have the CM Hyper 212+ on BF sale for less than 20 which seems a great price.

Questions:

1) will I have any issues putting 212+ in the CM 690 ii?

2) will it even be necessary to have a cooler and do some light to medium OC-ing of SB? Or can I get by with the stock cooler and do a little OCing? I realize that nobody actually has the SB chip yet, but was more looking for your predictions based on the 95W TDP dynamics.

Even though its a good price, I might talk myself out of it based on (i) taxes (ii) drive to Microcenter costs gas and time and (iii) maybe I should wait and see if the stock cooler can allow me to do some OCing.
 

Just a nickname

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Yes. It'll fit on the CM690II

This cooler is probably going to be enough for a "medium" overclock. You should check some benchmarks and see if this cooler with give you enough room for your needs.

I think you have to buy two or atleast an extra fan for a push pull set-up so you can add a good 10-20$ to the price.

The stock cooler is really bad. You hit 70C around 3.2GHz with the i5-750 and it will probably wont be better on the SB paltform...
 

hogan773

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I didnt know if the 32nm SB chips might have a better ability to overclock without getting as hot. I had seen some snippets about SB "overclocking to 4.9ghz on stock cooler!!!!" and such......

I dunno - maybe I'll see whether I feel like driving 30 mins each way to save $12 on the 212+. Although when I factor in gas, the savings is getting less and less.....

Maybe Newegg will have it on sale for BF or Cyber Monday and if so, I'll buy it there in a heartbeat. For $20 its worth having just to give me more OCing headroom, I think. I'm a little worried about futzing around with a new mobo to try to install the bracket and possibly messing up the mobo, but obviously others have been successful.
 

hogan773

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Well sorry Microcenter.....the Egg has this for fifteen bucks after rebate.

I think for that price I gotta buy it.

Are there any coolers that would offer better performance/price equation for a low to mid overclock?
 


Good idea.

1) The K processors may not come with a cooler. The 655K processors did not.

2) 1155 and 1156 sockets have the same cooler requirements.

3) A large cooler will keep your cpu cooler and quieter. The limits of your overclock will be thermally limited.

4) The difference in effectiveness of coolers is not that great. at $15 I don't think you will be disappointed.
 

hogan773

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yeah if Im spending 300+ on a chip with K unlock, might as well spend 15 more to get the thermal ability to actually use it. I was just wondering if the new SB chips might OC better without generating as much heat as current chips, therefore not needing anything but stock cooling. I guess the extra cooling cant HURT though.
 


Exactly right. I think there will be no stock cooling anyway for the K chips.
I have no doubt that the 32nm SB will OC better than the current i7 45nm chips.

Best Anandtech guess is that the 2600K will be $562 in 1000 sized lots.
The 2500K $ 216!!!
 

hogan773

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I hope not - if so, I'll prob buy 2500k. More than 2x the price just to add hyperthreading seems a lot of dough.
 

Just a nickname

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Wait. You don't need unlocked multi unless you're going for the sub zero stuff!

Also, the 1155 socket is going to suck according to recent motherboard manufacturer (low overclocking capacity) as everything is going to be linked, an increase of 5MHz could make your system instable!

Just adding: the reason why intel did that is because it's going to cost less to make the boards. Also, they probably want to force consumers to buy for higher clock CPU....
 

hogan773

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I am not following your drift here. And what is "sub zero stuff"?

Unlocked multi lets one overclock simply by changing the multiplier, without having to adjust everything else. Intel has apparently locked down some of the other stuff so the only way to overclock the new chips is with the unlocked multiplier.

I saw on another thread that the 2500k is 220ish and the 2600k is 320ish. If that's true, not bad prices at all!
 

Just a nickname

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I am probably not up to date with the modifications on the SB... Actually, you don't have a lot of benefit from unlocked multi if you're a regular overclocker. It's useful when you go for extreme cooling solution such as dry ice or LN2 (sub zero cooling) as you can set lower BCLCK to stress less the mobo.

Most overclocker go for the 200MHz for their 1600MHz ram so it doesn't have any real advantage for a 24/7 set-up.
 


Normal BCLK overclocking is gone with SB. Perhaps only 2%. Possibly there might be some way to increase the max turbo limit. Raising the multiplier with the K chips is the only known way for not. It seems approprate to me to make this available on the higheest clocked versions of SB.
 

hogan773

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Yes - if this is true it will be a tough decision as to whether HT is worth 45% more price.
 

The hyperthreading might be good for multi core enabled tasks that can use more than 4 cores. That is not usually the case for gaming.

I would expect both K processors to be able to be overclocked to about the same high levels. They are, after all, the same chip with parts disabled.

The really interesting question to me, is the extra 2m of L3 cache going to improve performance significantly? I think the answer may be dependent on the program/s running. Benchmarks may(or may not) tell.
 

hogan773

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Yeah it will be interesting. I am not a gamer, so I am purportedly buying this system to speed up video editing/conversion tasks.

If you look at it as "wow that's almost 50% more price to get a [15%?] increase in performance on certain tasks" then it sounds expensive.

That said, I might pull the old "but its only $100 more and I will use this PC for probably the next 4-5 years if my personal history holds up, so for only 20 bucks more per year, I might as well get the better chip now" rationalization. I can certainly afford $100 more....I'm just the kind of guy who always analyzes "value" (sometimes too much probably!)

Can't wait to see. Jan 9th will be an interesting time as we'll all be frantically searching for some good benchmarks, info on the best mobos, etc etc. Will probably be a lot of information and misinformation shooting around in the ensuing days.
 

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Problem I see is that the HT may holds the CPU. From what I've seen, the 100 BCLCK is enough to bring the chip to 5GHz (x50) and max it to 6.5Ghz (x65) if not mistaken.
The HT, generating more heat, could make you unable to reach the 6.5Ghz.
If I was you, I'd wait and see the benchies of buyers to compare the real overclock//performance difference

Cannot tell you how the guy reached these speeds, it's in chinese or japanese and I can only understand the CPU-Z screen shot...
 

hogan773

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Why does HT generate more heat?


Hmmm, I guess I do need to watch for this real-world benefit of HT (or not). If its just a feel-good benchmark increase then I'd be better off just OCing my 2500k and pocketing the 100 bucks. If I'm spending 20% of my time doing video editing or anything that can benefit from HT, and I get a 15% increase in performance, then I guess I need to decide whether its worth 100 bucks to wait a few extra minutes every once and awhile.....

may also depend on whether more and more programs will make better use of HT over the next 4-5 years I own the PC.
 

Just a nickname

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I don't have any study or can't find any reliable information source but most user of HT cpu notice temperature decrease with HT off (around the 5-10C).

Check this:
http://www.overclock.net/intel-general/671977-hyperthreading-games.html

Conclusion: HT is useless if gaming
Higher clock > lower clock HT enabled

Leads to a second conclusion: HT may not be the best solution.
You should, as I said, wait until decent benchmark post the results of both CPU. If the non-HT gets higher clock, I'd personally go for it simply because I don't use heavy threaded application!

 

hogan773

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You are saying that with HT turned off one could overclock to a higher Ghz on the same chip theoretically. I agree that if that's the case, it could result in better overall performance (plus without paying the px premium). Unless the 2600 chips are all better binned than 2500 so they all OC higher anyway.
 
You can usually turn HT off in the bios, and since it lessens the thermal load, it stands to reason that you can clock the 4 full cores higher.

The real question to me, is how much the extra 2mb of L3 cache is worth in better performance. I suspect not that much, making the 2500K the chip of choice for gamers.