Was Sandy Bridge the best Intel CPU?

Hi guys, we all waited for what Haswell could bring to the table, and let's say it bring really not much to the top dogs that we are, of the PC community. though Ivy Bridge didn't change much, it was welcomed(heat issue is the only problem). which all of that make SB looks like a golden chip, no weird heat dissipation technique,excellent OC headroom ,strong stock performance(applies to ivy and haswell too...), mainly the heat issue make SB look golden.

Share your opinions.

 

I think when Conroe was released it took the crown as the performance jump was astronomical. I was lucky enough to go from an AMD Althon 64 4000+ single core CPU @ 2.9GHz to a Intel Core 2 Extreme X6800 @ 2.93GHz it had the unlocked multiplier and I got that beast up to 3.5GHz and never looked back. Until they released the ever popular and amazing Q6600 G0 revision. A quad core CPU clocked at 2.4GHz with a 95W TDP and I clocked that bad boy upto 3.8GHz and it never went over 66*C after 6 HOURS of priming.

I think the crown goes to the Q6600 G0 its was ridiculously popular.

 

yep, to be more specif i meant to Core IX series from the first core gen to the last.

I remember back than i had athlon 64 x2 3600, saw the performance of the Conroe and was amazed... still to this day ye.

 

I think Conroe was definitely the best Intel chip. I remember getting my E6600 and by god did that fly back in the day! Dual core which was fast, coming from the Athlon XP! What a beast. Although I'm so glad I got sandy bridge. Overclocks well. Still not really worth the upgrade to Haswell. So I can spend my money on more important things like a SSD :infinity:c1:

 

When i went from a 2.7GHz opteron 144 to an E8400 that was an amazing jump, i would say core 2 series was the best release. SB follows close.

 

Heh I came here to say almost the same.
Moving from an Athlon64 x2 @ 2.8GHz to an E8400 @ 4GHz was a big performance jump in everything.

The E8400 was in my system for a couple of years and was replaced by a Q9705 @ 4.2GHz which lasted a year until I got a 2500K.
Even though the 2500K is already the CPU I've used in my main system the longest (nearly 2.5 years so far, will probably hit 4 years!), the overall performance jump wasnt as great as moving to the E8400.

E8400 wins by a nose.

 

Well to me many people who have owned both IB and SB CPUs have found out that the SB ran cooler due to the fact that it did not use that stupid glue idea on the processor. My dream CPU before it was discontinued was the i5 2500k because of the huge OC that is capable of. Well my next CPU of choice is from the Haswell CPUs which is the 4670k.

 

Perhaps OP, perhaps, ..sandy was /is 'va va voom!'
Gotta love the 2700k.

 

conroe change things back then, it knocked AMD of the throne..and they never managed to take it back...i`m running on a i7 2600k right know and really love the sandy ivy and hasswell are great to but with sandy in your sytem i dont see a reason to get a 3770 or 4770. off course they are a bit faster but i.m.o. they difference between them is not so big that me want to get one, i stiil manage to do everything with sandy en it still does the job!!

 

My Intel Core i(something) top 3 list, considering my OC experiences with many Core i(something) CPU's from first, second and third generation:

1). i7-2600K, on decent OC capable MB with Z68/Z77 and propper heatpipe cooler almost every sample is capable for 4.5-4.6GHz OC @ 1.35V, some samples @ even lower Vcore, some samples require a little more than 1.35V. Never had any heat problems with them while OC.

2). i5-2500K for those who don't care about HT on i7 2600K, want almost the same performance-per-core like 2600K and same OC possibilities as 2600K and want to spend less money

3). i7-920 D0, on better X58 MB's many samples that had passed through my hands were capable for 100% stabile OC 24/7 @ 4.2GHz with better aftermarket heatpipe coolers and that is almost 1.6x higher than 2.66GHz base frequency! How many CPU's after 920 C0 model are/were capable for 1.6x OC 24/7 with just heatpipe coolers (I don't know any)? That is just amazing, even now highly OC'ed 920 D0/C0 are still strong CPU's.

For earlier generations of Intel CPU's (OC capabilities and value for money are my main target zone) my votes goes to: C2Q Q6600 G0, ancient Celeron 300A...etc.

 

Core 2 Duo E6750, awesome CPU, my first proper rig.
Core i7 950 D0, OCed to 4.4 GHz.
Xeon W3680 (980X) OCs to 4.6 at a push. Sticking with this one for now

 

HAHA nice that u mention the celeron A, i remember getting that beast to 450mhz and would get better performance than the pentium 2 wich was higher priced, if i remember well the benefit was that the lvl2 cache got overclocked as well, so performance was higher.

good memories, now if i remember too, you had to take out pin 21 to unlock it lol. gg's

back in those days the high end was celeron A + 2 Voodo's 2 in sli. i had dat rig, and never had stutter, issues, or anyhing, god i miss 3dfx api, and its hardware.

 

Conroe seems to get most voices, yes i remember that era. at first i though it was a joke, but then it wasn't. AMD went from top to bottom, that was such a swift strike.

But i meant between the Core I generations, sandy bridge seems golden to me, as it don't share any problems of the others, only thing that can make Ivy or haswell a must choice over sb, is PCI Express 3.0 in multi gpu system, aka 3way SLI or 3way Xfire. as i seen huge difference in the benchmarks.

 

I think they are great chips to overclock on air but the pro clockers hate them since if little bobby gets a 57 multi they get beat lol

Why do you think you need ln2 to overclock everything since then?

 

2700K is strong like hairy ape rape banana.

 

I have two of them in my room still, lol.

 

I still have one Celeron 300A Slot 1. I think long time ago it costed me around 300 DEM, maybe little less or little more. It is fully operative paired with Chaintech 6BTM with 64MB SDRAM and Quantim 6.4GB HDD @ Windows 98 (first edition, never reinstalled), clocked to 450MHz (4.5x 100MHz) with few pins taped to get more voltage so it can be stable at 450MHz, 2.1V, 2.2V or 2.3V I don't remember. I'm using it to store logs about service repairs at my company. That rig had never let me down, I will never sell it because that CPU is my first sucessful attempt to clock one CPU @ 50% higher speed. Before him with Intel & AMD CPU's from 486 and first Pentium generation I've managed to get 20% to 30% higher speeds from those CPU's with OC. Backthen Celeron 300A was one mean beast OC'ed @ 450MHz. I'm sure I'll never sell it.

 

I tried to get mine (300A at 450MHz) working a few weeks back but havent got an AGP gfx card worth using.
It gave a POST display but was corrupted.
Still keeping it and a few other early slotted pentiums, just in case I come across a good gfx card.

 

Both of mine work at 450MHz 2v. I have been playing sc1 through on it in win98 for nostalgia, lol.

 

I still have a desktop 386 up in my attic from around 1990 circa.
Theres loads of great Intel cpu's that have been released over the years.

I think the most important cpu ever released was the Motorola 68000.