Reviews - Intel Core i7-3770K (22nm Ivy Bridge)

[shaithis]

But TIM is far less conductive and is far more likely to leave gaps than solder.

and the solder tends to be a lot thicker then TIM.......

Oh I don't doubt there will be a few, even with a soldered IHS people attempt it: http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/...d.php?t=256092

That was my point. When people remove the solder and IHS, temperatures drop. Is it because of the solder or the IHS?

[shaithis]

Those who are 'Loyal Members' can buy today with delivery tomorrow from Aria.

Shame I am not a loyal customer....they could have stolen an order from scan!

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Out of interest what rig are you putting the new CPU into?? Its not like your current ones seem deficient!!

[shaithis]

Will be going in the main pc. Socket 1366 is way too old for my liking and now with PCI-E 3.0 I can finally get all the lanes I need on a desktop board.

And yeah, it isn't really needed but then neither was the starbucks I had this morning....and the upgrade itch has been getting to me.....can't remember the last time I had a motherboard last this long before replacement!

Just bagged a 600T in white for £90 delivered as well to put it all in and have a Megahalem lying around......so even going air at the same time and ditching the WC......so the biggest changea I have made to my gaming rig in ~4 years!

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Wouldn't the bandwidth be the same, as the Z77 motherboards support PCI-E 3.0 8X which is more or less then same as PCI-E 2.0 16X in multi-card setups??

[watercooled]

and the solder tends to be a lot thicker then TIM.......

It doesn't matter, solder is just metal so it has similar conductivity to the heatsink, but TBH it is very thin, easily within the range of TIM, possibly thinner depending on how it's applied (when melted, solder is very fluid, it's not gloopy like TIM so doesn't need a lot of force to thin it out). OTH, even the best TIM is a rubbish conductor vs solder if it's not spread incredibly thinly. Even best-case it's miles off. Solder is the best interface to use, but because having a heatsink soldered to a CPU would be impractical to say the least, relying on solder to conduct the heat to a much larger surface area is a better solution which has been used for years. We're not talking small differences either: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...conductivities compare lead-free solder to silver-based thermal grease. Look at how many thermal pastes are using metal or ceramic particles to improve conductivity, but the conduction path is still likely to involve the oil the particles are suspended in which is a relatively poor conductor, or if not, conduction through small particles pressed against each other still doesn't match solid metal. And these 'liquid metal' pads/TIM trying to emulate solder by using alloys which are liquid near to room temperature.

That was my point. When people remove the solder and IHS, temperatures drop. Is it because of the solder or the IHS?

Most people don't succeed in removing a soldered IHS, but I've not seen conclusive evidence that de-lidding a CPU actually improves temperatures over lapping the IHS for a soldered die. It doesn't stop people experimenting though.

[shaithis]

Wouldn't the bandwidth be the same, as the Z77 motherboards support PCI-E 3.0 8X which is more or less then same as PCI-E 2.0 16X in multi-card setups??

Finally they are the same, yes.

Until IB + Z77 there was no way I could possibly get enough lanes on a mainstream board......until the very late (and rather expensive) Z68 boards with additional PCI-E chips.

[watercooled]

Even running 2 580s on 2 8x PCIe2.0 lanes didn't seem to make any noticeable difference in most games IIRC, I'll try to find the article which I think was on Tom's...

Edit: This looks like the article but I seem to remember a more recent one, comparing more than the one card, but here's results for the 480 anyway. http://www.tomshardware.co.uk/pcie-g...iew-31964.html There's a small difference for some games but it's mostly negligible, not something you're likely to notice.

[davig019]

I wonder if in a future stepping they will use solder instead of TIM. Or if they are reserving solder for EE parts.

[watercooled]

I was wondering that, considering they've had delays but the desktop line seemed unaffected, maybe they made up time by switching to TIM for a while?

[shaithis]

The problem wasn't 2 GPUs....its adding an 8xpci-e raid controller as well

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Isn't there a total of 16 PCI-E 3.0 lanes??

Wouldn't that mean there would be none left after you use a pair of GTX580 cards??

[watercooled]

Ah fair enough, but don't forget the chipset is much the same as the Z68, providing 8 PCIe 2.0 lanes, anything else is from the CPU's integrated controller and isn't dependant on the chipset, even the older boards will support 3.0 for the sockets fed by the CPU. The cards will also need to support 3.0 if they're to take advantage of the extra bandwidth.

Edit: @CAT: Yeah, but you get another 8 2.0 lanes from the chipset, but they may be shared by on-board features e.g. extra SATA/USB controllers.

[CAT-THE-FIFTH]

Ah,OK so there are an additional 8 PCI-E 2.0 lanes available!

[watercooled]

Yeah but unless there are no extra chips on board the 3rd socket will likely be either 4x or switchable i.e choose between 8x or the SATA/USB controller.

[shaithis]

Some boards have 3 PCI-E 3.0 slots plus some PCI-E 2.0 slots. I'm looking at the gigabyte that runs 8/4/4 @ PCI-E 3.0 (so 16/8/8 @ PCI-E 2.0)....plus some 1xPCI-E slots (ideal for soundcard)....which is exactly the same amount of lanes each card is getting on my x58 currently. You do need the IB chip to get the PCI-E 3.0 compliance and the 3rd slot to work though.

I have noticed that the Z77 boards differ significantly in how PCI-E lanes and 3.0 compliance works.....you really have to read the specs on every board carefully.