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i7 950 1366 on rampage iii... to xeon 5650?

gigeorge

gigeorge

gigeorge

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So i've noticed these aging xeon chips are quite cheap at the moment and what with doing quite a bit of graphics work thought it might be a nice sideways upgrade instead of getting a whole new mobo/ram/cpu thing..

Will i encounter any ram issues when plonking in the xeon 5650 into my rampage iii, i've heard that they wont run on non ecc ram - can you confirm this?

Are there any other considerations ?

Thanks
 
Im also reading mixed reviews on whether the rampage iii extreme will even support the cpu. Anyone on here running this combo?
 
It will work.

And it's not a sideways upgrade. Clock per clock they're not much slower than the Sandy hex cores.

Of course it's highly doubtful you could get 5ghz out of one, but clock it to 4.2 and you basically have 4790k sort of power for £50.

You won't have ECC issues.

http://forums.overclockers.co.uk/showpost.php?p=26934406&postcount=415

The only difference between a Xeon and 980x is..

Well first up the Xeon supports ECC. The 980x does not.

Secondly? the Xeon has both QPI links enabled, the 980x does not.

And that's it. It's just a 980x that runs two QPIs and will work with ECC if you fancy it.

Don't think that it's just a 950 with two more cores. It isn't, the core tech is totally different.

http://ark.intel.com/products/47922/Intel-Xeon-Processor-X5650-12M-Cache-2_66-GHz-6_40-GTs-Intel-QPI

http://ark.intel.com/products/37150/Intel-Core-i7-950-Processor-8M-Cache-3_06-GHz-4_80-GTs-Intel-QPI

Note, 950 is 45nm, Westmere is 32nm. So lower power consumption, plus the obligatory 5-10% IPC gain on the die shrink.

The Xeon will gleefully wee on what you have now. Plus you've about got the best board you could wish for too. They still sell for a song.
 
Is there a way to unlock the 980x to work as an xeon, a mod or something?

If modding the 980x to a xeon is possible, what are the benefits of having two QPIs and ECC and is it really worth it over the standard 980x?
 
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you only need two QPI for a dual socket motherboard and your unlikely to find a dual socket 1366 motherboard which supports overclocking.

One thing the 980x/990x has over a xeon is the unlocked multiplier.
 
Sylver123 said:
Is there a way to unlock the 980x to work as an xeon, a mod or something?

If modding the 980x to a xeon is possible, what are the benefits of having two QPIs and ECC and is it really worth it over the standard 980x?
Click to expand...

Nope. Good old Intel padlock (tm).

Two QPIs mean you can run two. It's how they link.

Xeons are overclockable so there's no point in buying the 980x. Certain Xeons will be super binned too. I mean, they all are to an extent because Xeons are far more fussy about the volts they run on (lower than desktop parts) the power they use (because they're for servers) and the heat output. So they're all binned to a certain degree :)
 
Dave2150 said:
Be aware that your motherboard has to be a decent clocker to get the xeons to 4.2Ghz though.
Click to expand...

From memory 220mhz bus was pretty much a given on the R3.

If you were lucky it would do 230, if you were blessed with golden danglys it would do 240+.

They're definitely in the top 3 IMO for X58. Only the R3E and black were better. Gigabyte's SOC is another corker, but due to loads of them being sold for £90 at the EOL they're easier to get than the R3.

R3s are super rare. They were a top end board back then and so very desirable with these stupid cheap Xeons floating around :)
 
kylew_is_back said:
the IPC is exactly the same between a 950 and x5650
Click to expand...

Hmm not sure on that, but hey if you're right at least performance per watt will be lower.

Ed. Easy way to find out. OP - can you clock your 950 to 3.5ghz and run Cinebench R15. Post your score, then disable two cores on the Xeon, whack it to 3.5 and run the test again.
 
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Yup, certainly.. IF i get the 5650! The slightly faster core Xeons from this generation are looking tempting at not hugely more sums of £. All depends if the OC ability would be a lot greater on the 5680/90's.

Still given standard performance / bang per buck : http://cpuboss.com/cpus/Intel-Xeon-X5650-vs-Intel-Core-i7-950

for £65, you cant really go too wrong can you?!

I guess one of the final questions is, can i use my i7 950 cooler on it (with new paste)?
 
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ALXAndy said:
Hmm not sure on that, but hey if you're right at least performance per watt will be lower.

Ed. Easy way to find out. OP - can you clock your 950 to 3.5ghz and run Cinebench R15. Post your score, then disable two cores on the Xeon, whack it to 3.5 and run the test again.
Click to expand...

While the two additional cores will help, the 5600s are only a process change from 45 to 32nm, so a power/heat reduction which help with the overclocking (my 960 was terrible).

Beyond that they are the same architecture, the big change was the Nehalem 5500s and 900s for desktop. Intel usually do architecture, then process, and back again.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_Tick-Tock for which is which :)
 
ALXAndy said:
Hmm not sure on that, but hey if you're right at least performance per watt will be lower.

Ed. Easy way to find out. OP - can you clock your 950 to 3.5ghz and run Cinebench R15. Post your score, then disable two cores on the Xeon, whack it to 3.5 and run the test again.
Click to expand...
I have done that with my i7 920 and my new x5650, to be honest I was expecting to see at least 2% higher IPC, but sadly it was exactly the same.
btw I only tested Cinebench R15 and wPrime.
 
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