Trending

Overclocking Core i7-3770K: Learning To Live With Compromise

By , published

We recently took our first look at Intel's Ivy Bridge architecture. Then, we evaluated its efficiency. Now, we turn to overclocking. Recently, each of Intel's die shrinks has helped increase frequency headroom. This time, however, we ran into some walls.

Overall Efficiency

As the diagram shows, Intel's 4.5 GHz Core i7-3770K beats the two competing platforms in our efficiency test, which consists of almost all the applications used in this article, by using the fewest Wh (watt-hours) of energy.

The Core i7-3770K's elapsed run time is the longest by just a hair, since the Sandy Bridge chip runs at higher clock rates and the Sandy Bridge-E processor boasts more cores. But Ivy Bridge’s clear win in the efficiency department outweighs its small performance disadvantage.

The verdict is in: under load, Ivy Bridge leads in performance per Wh. An overclocked Core i7-3770K is the new enthusiast-oriented efficiency champ.

The efficiency diagram documents our findings in visual form.