• Competitor rules

    Please remember that any mention of competitors, hinting at competitors or offering to provide details of competitors will result in an account suspension. The full rules can be found under the 'Terms and Rules' link in the bottom right corner of your screen. Just don't mention competitors in any way, shape or form and you'll be OK.

Downsides to buying an ES Cpu

Man of Honour
Joined
13 Nov 2009
Posts
11,668
Location
Northampton
As thread title.

A potential bargain price on a brand new unused Z68 Motherboard and QC46 ES (3570k) has come up, would I be mad to consider it or not?

Will it hinder the overclocking potential at all? Not that any overclock is going to be needing upgrading from a Phenom II 955BE
 
I knew the potentially shady side of things regarding it being an ES.

I was only looking at it from the motherboard as it is being sold very very cheap but new. I enquired further as the Photos showed the socket protector in the box. The board and cpu we're given away at an Isomnia event in Telford.

EDIT: Put it this way, I would be getting a Brand New Z68 board and the cpu for less than an OEM 3570k would set me back.
 
I've seen a lot of mixed opinions about ES chips in my time on OCUK plenty have people have used them with no problems, while others have had issues.

The guy seems genuine and gives me no reason to disbelieve his story about it being part of a give away at an Insomnia gaming event, I can't see them giving away a duff chip at a major even like that, ES or not.
 
They shouldn't be giving them away full stop, iirc they are the property of Intel regardless of who's hands it is in.
 
"Intel ES Processors are not for sale or re-sale
Intel ES Processors may not have passed commercial regulatory requirements
ES Processors are not covered under Intel warranty and are generally not supported by Intel"

^ that alone would be enough to put me off buying it.
 
Seems to be a slightly divided opinion.

It was bought off eBay so should the worst happen and it turn up duff it'll be going back for a refund... Worst case scenario I lose a tenner if it all turns up working perfectly fine then then I've gone from Phenom II to Ivybridge for £100 or less by the time I've sold my old kit.
 
To add a bit of balance, I had an ES C2D before they were released and had no issues with it. Was an excellent clocker too :D Bought mine from XtremeSystems forum.
 
It really depends on your moral standpoint on handling stolen goods, because in the end that's what you're doing.
 
Currently got this so far

aq2tS6c.png


Can't get the Memory any further than 2200mhz yet. 0D1 BSOD trying for 4.7ghz

Voltage under load varies from 1.298-1.344v as the UEFI bios for this board is beta and has no LLC settings as yet.

Max temps I've seen we're spread from 80-86'c across the 4 cores after running CineBench R15 using a Titan Fenrir

EDIT: That should be 4.5ghz, forgot about speed step

EDIT EDIT: Dammed good bang for buck considering the board and CPU cost me £150 and the RAM was £30. My phenom II and motherboard cost more than that.
 
Last edited:
For on ES chips that's not bad at all. Find a sweet spot at 4.5Ghz and see if you can get the voltages lower? regardless if it overclocked or not, this ****s all over your 955 anyway. :D
 
This has been some very quick and dirty overclocking so far.

I literally took a guess at voltage, set 45x multi and 2200mhz for the ram with timings on default.

How do those temps look? I know IvyBridge runs hot but I wasn't expecting to be able to do 4.5ghz with acceptable temps on a cooler as old as a Titan Fenrir
 
are you sure its an engineering sample? it saya es for ever cpu in coretemp,does it say es in cpu-z? if not then its a regular cpu
 
Back
Top Bottom