M17x-R2 - Core i7 CPU Info Thread!

I am interested in following up your project NWGuru. If anything at all, the CPU performance of the core-i7 should be the same or better ... and should be cooler.

CrossFire ... now that will be something to play with ...

cheers ...

Ouch, don't tempt the man

cheers ...

We have some discussion going on here about nVidia "new" Fermi ..

Unless I read it wrong, nVidia is gasping for air at the moment.

cheers ...

oh yes, RGB was high on my list,

DX11 is 2nd

and USB 3.0 is third - but not a deal breaker lol

The news of the next NVIDIA DX11 GPU has me excited lol

It should blow the ATI 58xx series out of the water

but not likely to see a mobile version until late 2010 IMO
unless they been working on the mobile version the same time as the desktop one - not likely lol

But I can see me going for an ATI 5870 crossfired GPU setup for now

I hope that they stick with it. Last I heard, the top guy mentioned that DX11 is "not" so important for nVidia ... Change of heart?

cheers ...

Make a new one NWGuru. We will try to optimize all your threads later on.

cheers ...

Did I hear 5870m mentioned? NW on the question of will the 128bit bottleneck? The bus is simply an ends to a means. What is the bandwidth? That said equal bandwidth 128bit vs 256bit, 128bit wins. Logic? Clocks are clocks, actual, bus is theoretical. Look at system RAM and dual channel? Dual channel doubles theoretical bandwidth not real.

64GB bandwidth! 5870 gonna rock!

I don't want to let the wind out of Dave's sail, but people predicted a year or more ago, that we'd have a mobile version of the 260/280 generation. And while we have products labeled as such we really only have 8800's die shrunk.

Now before you take that as all bad there is some good there. Both Nvidia and ATI really aren't doing anything more on the desktop than upping the power consumption and giving new prowess and performance that results from increased power. Die shrinks have augmented that but it's not something that works well in the notebook form factor or power limits. So if you examine the changes over time you'll find the only thing that really drives up performance in the notebook factor is die shrinks. New designs have very limited improvement effect by comparison. On the desktop, power has gone up and up, along with dies going down, so the net impact is stronger for new designs that also use more power.

Said more simply the real benefit (note that the 5870 is only on average 25% faster than a 280M) being offered by ATI with the 5870 is that the shrink to 40nm is real for ATI. When Nvidia gets there, with whatever design they utilize, you'll see fairly similar numbers. DX11 will mean more to desktops that can just use more power to drive more poly's. Notebooks will have limits as to how much DX11 they can use effectively. It's still not something to do without, but it won't take Fermi to give DX11 I suspect (that's just a suspicion but wait and see).

So I tend to think @ 40nm or 32nm both companies will have good chips. What is awful is ATI's driver program. I'm not a fan of hacked drivers, but I've used them a lot because there is no better choice. ATI needs to get with the decade and bring out a mobile driver program, and one that supports older as well as newer cards. Nvidia has been doing this for over a year and ATI has yet to match. That's key really. The best hardware is often laid low by bad drivers. Failing to update those, failing to keep updates coming for older hardware does not renew my faith in chips that cost 10x what a desktop chip of equivalent power costs. That additional revenue "should" gain me better drivers, not worse. So ATI really has to SHOW me they can do this by doing it right now. DX11 (which I can't use yet) means less to me than a quality driver program that is ongoing for mobile chips and supports older chips. To have a modern driver install from Win 7 on a 4 year old 7950go was really refreshing, and highlighted to me again, the value of drivers.

I really won't buy without USB 3. It may be a here and there standard now, but in a year or two it will be in everything, printers, docking stations, external SSD's and it will be so common that you'll be very sad if you don't have it. An expresscard equivalent is a last choice option and not one I prefer. Remember also that USB 3 will give higher power output which will drive more external hardrives without power modules as well as notebook coolers with better fans.

What I might also like to highlight Dave P is do you want to see 32nm Quads? The dual core I7 mobiles are 32nm and have 2.67 speeds. The current I7 mobile quads are 45nm. I tend to think 32nm would have done quite a bit for their speeds. They aren't slow, so don't take this comment in that way, but 32nm is "working" if we have dual cores in that process, so can quad 32nm be far away?

So here's my wish (and I wish this in 2010) for a M17x:

I7 32nm
5870 CF with an active driver program or a NV DX11 40nm chip (unlikely to be Fermi, honestly but it may not have to be).
16gb maximum memory capacity (920 goes to 8gb only right? -unsure)
RGBLED screen - check
USB 3 at least 2 slots, but preferably all USB slots.
Digital sound output - preferably not HDMI based, either digital optical or digital coax.
Dual displayports - skip all other video ports. Use adapters if you want HDMI or other.

Yes it's a "wishlist" but that's what it is.

yes, I have seen it done before

I worked at one place were we did custom paint jobs

We had a local shop that did the power coat painting, it was always a nice looking job.