Sandy Bridge-E 8-Core?

[johnb0118]

I am upgrading my current setup and have already purchased an Asus RampageIV mobo and 16GB of Corsair DOminator DDR3 2133 RAM.

I know the the sandy bridge-e die actually has 8 cores and the current lineup has 2 cores disabled. I am anxiously waiting for the i7 3820 (quad)to come out, but does anyone know if there will be an i7 that will have all 8-cores enabled that isn't a Xeon? Or, is there a known way to unlock the locked cores in the current lineup, perhaps the same way AMD's triple cores can be unlocked through the bios? Or will Intel come out with an upgrade card that you can purchase to unlock the additional disabled cores?

Thanks

 

[FinneousPJ]

Unfortunately Intel doesn't want to offer unlock capability and I don't think they will. Since their 6 core SBE reigns supreme it's doubtful they'll release an 8 core for the desktop.

 

[fazers_on_stun]

I am upgrading my current setup and have already purchased an Asus RampageIV mobo and 16GB of Corsair DOminator DDR3 2133 RAM.

I know the the sandy bridge-e die actually has 8 cores and the current lineup has 2 cores disabled. I am anxiously waiting for the i7 3820 (quad)to come out, but does anyone know if there will be an i7 that will have all 8-cores enabled that isn't a Xeon? Or, is there a known way to unlock the locked cores in the current lineup, perhaps the same way AMD's triple cores can be unlocked through the bios? Or will Intel come out with an upgrade card that you can purchase to unlock the additional disabled cores?

Thanks

Dunno for sure but I'd bet against any desktop 8-core SB-E. Even if Intel priced it at $1500 or $2K it would likely undercut potential Xeon sales.

However I think there's a reasonable chance we might see 8-core desktop IB-E's next fall, priced at the traditional $1K.

Unless you're doing some serious multi-threaded stuff, 8 cores/16 threads is probably overkill for desktop, for the moment anyway.

 

[IntelEnthusiast]

The upgrade cards are only for entry level processors in a desktop environment and they may upgrade additional features. I have not sent any plans that would lead me to believe that we will offer upgrade cards on higher end processors like the Intel Core i7-3930K or other processors that use socket 2011.

At this time I also haven't seen any plans for releasing an 8 core processor in the desktop space (this doesnt mean it won't happen just that I havent seen anything on it).

Christian Wood
Intel Enthusiast Team

 

[johnb0118]

Best answer selected by johnb0118.

 

[Mousemonkey]

This topic has been closed by Mousemonkey