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Intel Core i7-3930K Review

Intel Core i7-3930K six-core processor review and testing

general information

Core i7 is a family of x86-64 processors from Intel and today I want to present you with an overview of one of the top models based on the Sandy Bridge-E microarchitecture, namely the Intel Core i7-3930K.

This model is half the price of the "big brother" Intel Core i7-3960X, which can become a significant argument when choosing between these two processors. After all, the only difference between them is only the cache of the third level, cut down to 12 MB. The frequency difference of 100 MHz does not count as both processors have an unlocked multiplier. Accordingly, the difference in turbo modes is also absent, because it can easily be reconfigured depending on your desire.

Intel Core i7-3930K is manufactured using 32nm manufacturing process and is designed to work with the new Socket LGA 2011 processor socket.

First of all, the question arises, how did the productivity increase? To do this, it is worth taking a closer look at the processor crystal structure diagram.

P.S. photo of the Intel Core i7-3960X crystal, since there are no physical differences between them.

First, the integrated graphics processor has disappeared, thereby freeing up space for more processing cores (to be more precise, 2 more processing cores were added). I think no one will worry about this, because there was very little graphics performance for the High-End segment of the market. It is unlikely that anyone buying such a processor will use this solution.

Secondly, the memory controller became a four-channel and received support for the DDR3-1600 memory standard. Thanks to this, the operating speed reaches 51200 Mb / s. I would like to remind you that all the previous solutions worked in a maximum of three-channel mode, while the competitor's processors work in a two-channel mode.

Thirdly, the PCI-Express 2.0 bus controller began to be equipped with forty PCI-Express lanes, and therefore the following technologies are supported: AMD CrossFireX and NVIDIA SLI. At the same time, the working configurations of the distribution of lines can be very different: 2x16 and 1x8, 1x16 and 3x8 or 1x16 plus 2x8 and 2x4. This number of lines will be in demand in servers that use additional RAID controllers. By the way, this processor was expected to support PCI-Express 3.0, but, unfortunately, it was not implemented.

Fourthly, the work of the novelty is supported by the new Intel X79 Express chipset. It consists of only one microcircuit and is connected to the processor using the DMI bus, the bandwidth of which is 20 GB / s. Thanks to this chip, it became possible to support four SATA 2.0 ports and two SATA 3.0 ports, with the possibility of organizing RAID-arrays of levels 0,1,10 and 5. Fourteen USB 2.0 outputs are also supported. Support for USB 3.0 and PCI is missing. Additional ports can be implemented with controllers from other manufacturers.

Intel Core i7-3930К - one of the most productive processors for desktop personal computers.

Packaging appearance:

(appearance of the box with an Intel Core i7-3930K processor)

Just picking up the box, the inscription catches the eye: "Unlocked & Unleashed". It is immediately clear that the product belongs to high-performance solutions.

In terms of design, the processor itself is no different from its "brothers". The lid has the main markings, with which the product is identified. The operating frequency, cache size and power requirements are also reported.

Place of production - Costa Rica.

It immediately seems that everything is usually to the point of disgrace, but then you realize that you never noticed the main difference from other specimens. It's all about size. The processor is just gigantic. The increase in performance could not help but affect the die size.

Even the back side is simply unrecognizable. LGA 2011 and LGA 1155 are two completely different processor sockets.

Left to right: Socket 2011 → 1366 → 1155 → 775

Because the size of the processor is huge, and it requires not one, but two clamps to attach it to the motherboard socket. With this size, it is difficult to achieve uniform contact with the processor socket on the motherboard.

A metal plate on the back of the PCB gives rigidity to the structure and avoids bending of the board. Another feature of the new connector is the screw fastening of the cooler, which many have lacked. On the other hand, it is now impossible to dismantle the cooling system without a screwdriver.

The protective cover is made of nickel-plated copper, the substrate is silicon, and the contacts are made of gold-plated copper.

Storage temperature: -55 ° C and 125 ° C.

Allocation of processor resources

The cache memory is distributed as follows: the first level is 64 KB per core (32 KB for data caching, 32 KB for instructions), the second level is 256 KB per core, and the third level is 12 MB for all cores.

Thanks to the large cache of the third level, we can expect a significant increase in the speed of work in tasks related to archiving and data encoding.

In standard mode, the operating frequency is on average 3.2 GHz at a voltage of 1.152 V.

Testing

The performance will be compared to two other processors: Intel Core i7-2600K and AMD FX-8150. All tests were carried out in nominal mode.

Equipment:

Motherboards: Asus P8Z68-V PRO (Intel Z68 chipset, sLGA1155 socket, DDR3 RAM, ATX form factor), Asus P9X79 PRO (Intel X79 chipset, sLGA2011 socket, DDR3 RAM, ATX form factor);

Cooling: Zalman CNPS12X;

RAM: Kingston HyperX DDR3-2000 1024 MB;

Video card: GeForce 9800 GX2;

HDD: Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 500 GB;

Power Supply: Seasonic SS series, power - 650 watts, 80 PLUS standard.

Results table (winner highlighted in red):

Intel Core i7-3930K

Intel Core i7-2600K

AMD FX-8150

Futuremark PCMark`05 (CPU), the higher the score, the better

13080

12297

9729

Futuremark PCMark`05 (Memory), the higher the score, the better

12530

11552

7461

Futuremark PCMark`05 (Graphics), the higher the score, the better

10413

10444

9402

Futermark PCMark `05 is a computer benchmark designed to test the performance and stability of the processor, RAM and graphics. For testing, various tests are used, both synthetic, loading certain computer blocks, and applied, for example, data archiving, encoding and decoding of audio and video, and much more.

CrystalMark 0.9 (ALU), the higher the score, the better

74002

73982

48251

CrystalMark 0.9 (FPU), the higher the score, the better

73583

70630

44451

CrystalMark 0.9 (Memory), the higher the score, the better

78532

48038

46562

CrystalMark 0.9 is a computer benchmark that allows you to test the operation of the processor, memory, HDD and video subsystem (GDI, Direct Draw, OpenGL).

WinRar 3.80, the higher the score, the better

5137

3898

3287

WinRar 3.80 is a powerful utility for creating and managing archives, has a built-in benchmark for testing.

VirtualDub 1.8.6, mpeg to avi, s (Divx 6.5.1), the lower the score, the better

30

40

37

VirtualDub 1.8.6, mpeg to avi, s (WMV 9), the lower the number, the better

62

69

50

VirtualDub 1.8.6 is a free utility for capturing, editing, editing and encoding a video stream for the Windows platform, licensed under the terms of the GNU General Public License (GPL).

Futeremark 3DMark`06 (Mark Score), the higher the score, the better

6885

6812

6613

Futeremark 3DMark`06 (CPU Score), the higher the score, the better

7830

6643

5591

FuterMark 3DMark `06 is a computer benchmark that measures the performance of a personal computer in games. In addition to the video card, the performance of the central processor is also tested in tasks such as gaming artificial intelligence and a physics engine.

X264 Benchmark HD 2.0, the higher the score, the better

110,97

103,67

81,22

X264 Benchmark HD 2.0 is a benchmark for evaluating processor performance using video encoding.

Cinebench R10 (Rendering, CB-CPU), the higher the better

25317

18279

14850

Cinebench R10 (Shanding, CB-GFX), the higher the better

6822

6843

5220

CINEBENCH R10 is a test suite for evaluating PC performance. Supports multi-core processors

Fritz Chess Benchmark v4.2, the higher the score, the better

16181

13191

11640

Fritz Chess Benchmark v4.2 is a benchmark designed to determine processor performance by processing chess algorithms.

Futuremark 3DMark Vantage (Pmark Score), the higher the better

13124

12001

11531

Futuremark 3DMark Vantage (CPU Score), the higher the score, the better

34872

23220

18905

Futuremark 3DMark Vantage is a powerful benchmark suite for measuring processor and graphics card performance.

Tom Clancy`s H.A.W.X. Demo, High, 1280x1024, AA2x, the higher the value, the better

132

120

149

Tom Clancy`s H.A.W.X. is a computer video game in the genre of arcade flight simulator.

World In Conflict v1.0.0.9, Maximum, 1024x768, the higher the score, the better

76

77

58

World in Conflict v1.0.0.9 is a computer video game in the genre of real-time strategy.

Far Cry 2 v1.00, 1280x1024 (DirectX 9), the higher the score, the better

147,95

146,05

100,46

Far Cry 2 v1.00, 1280x1024 (DirectX 10), the higher the score, the better

109,97

108,9

84,06

Far Cry 2 v1.00 is a cross-platform computer video game in the first person shooter genre.

Race Driver: GRID Demo, 1280x1024, AA4x, the higher the score, the better

103,096

136,775

98,213

Race Driver: GRID is a computer video game in the car simulator genre.

As you can see, with two additional cores and an increased L3 cache, the Intel Core i7-3930K processor confidently outperforms the Intel Core i7-2600K and AMD FX-8150 in terms of performance.

Overclocking: Sandy Bridge-E, thanks to the unlocked processor multiplier, managed to overclock up to 4500 MHz at 1.415 V. A higher result is possible, but it is difficult to cope with overheating. Requires a water cooling system.

By the way, the processor frequency of the Intel Core i7-3930K does not consist of two parameters, as before, but of three. Now, to get the processor frequency, you need to: Multiply the Multiplier by the Reference Frequency (BCLK) and multiply by the Multiplier of the Reference Frequency. In reality, nothing has changed. It's just that now, you can vary the frequency of the processor with greater accuracy and nothing more.

The reference frequency multiplier can be 1, 1.25 and 1.6.

The stability of operation after overclocking was checked by the LinX stress test.

Energy consumption: In the nominal mode, the processor consumes 79 watts of electricity when idle, in overclocked state - 170 watts.

During overclocking, at maximum load, the processor is capable of consuming more than 350 watts. Therefore, if you are going to overclock the processor, you should think in advance about the quality of the power supply and motherboard.

Output: besides home use, the processor is quite suitable for server computing. Thanks to the unlocked multiplier and updated clock mapping, this model is the choice of many enthusiasts. Gamers are also encouraged to buy this processor. Thanks to its high performance, even a pair of the most powerful graphics compute adapters will be able to reach their full potential.

When working with mathematical calculations, multimedia systems, 3D modeling applications, and especially in programs optimized for multithreading, you will get the maximum performance that is available to the average user.

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