Will Intel® Core™i7 (Bloomfield/X58) owners be able to afford an upgrade?

[Big.Wayne]

With all this talk about the next gen LGA1366 processors coming out soon (Gulftown) and speculation they may have a huge £500/£900 proce tag I am wondering if Intel® have any plans to release updated chips on the X58 platform that are affordable?

Is it a possibility that they view the Bloomfield i7 920 as their Happy Hour chip sold at a reduced cost so that people buy into the X58/LGA1366 platform who will then be forced to pay top dollar $$$ for any future processor upgrades?

I've watched Intel® releases for many years but I've not seen them release multiple platforms/sockets like this before? . . . sure they have released different chipsets to cater for the high end and mainstream but they both had the same socket and we had the choice of which chipset to plug our chips into?

I just wondered what your thoughts were, I am looking at a new system and although the LGA1366/i7/Bloomfield is a stonking platform I am unclear what the processor upgrade path may look like?

Thanks in advance for any useful feedback!

 

[Big.Wayne]

Off Topic:

Is it possible that these new ATI 5*** cards will saturate a single PCI-E x16 on the new 1156 motherboards?

I doubt it, if it did it would also saturate the PCI-E x16 slot on an X58 chipset also.

 

[Big.Wayne]

He thanks for that setter . . .of course no one mentioned SLI or Crossfire so you (& hardtarget) are in fact pretty much Off Topic!

What are your thoughts about the future cost of LGA1366 chips? you don't seem shy to spend a few hundred quid . . . if 6 months down the line your a bit bored with your 920 would you be prepared to shell out several hundred pounds on a Gulftown? (if it goes that way).

 

[Big.Wayne]

Being honest with yourselves, by the time you NEED to replace an i7 920 overclocked

I think maybe you are seeing things differently to me. It should be obvious there is no NEED for a lot of upgrades we do however we do them anyway for out own good reasons. Just think of Women with their bags and handbags, of course they don't actually NEED several dozen of each but thats what always seems to happen!

I think a large number of forum members just like to play with the hardware, swap bits about etc, I think of it as mechano for grown up kids, the big difference being that these days a lot of the pieces don't fit together, so it could be kinda a drag if your not able to Pop & Swap chips like the old days!

Buying a system for an upgrade path is stupid

I think you could have worded that better!

The opposite end of the spectrum to your last comment would be buying a sealed box, its got hardware in it, you don't really know what it is but its a computer and it does stuff.

Us hardware enthusiasts generally always consider the route ahead when buying stuff, not all but most I would say!

 

[Big.Wayne]

i7 is still the way. All this talk of upgrade is pointless

Is that i7 Bloomfield or i7 Lynnfield your talking about?

And I wouldn't say it's pointless for us to discuss where a platform is heading as some people use this information to make a purchasing decison so it's a topic some may find useful . . .

Long gone are the days of updating a cpu. It simply isn't needed ans pretty pointless

Interesting opinion, you kinda sound like a fan of the Sealed-Box, buy it, use it to do stuff then buy a new one in three years. Nothing wrong with that approach but it's not something I've been able to do myself, new stuff comes out and you get The Itch.

I agree that some people maybe upgrade too much for the slightest of gains but if its cost effective and doesn't involve hours of work I see no harm. I've always enjoyed swapping out chips myself!

 

[Big.Wayne]

I have just gone from a P4 3.2 single core with HT to a 920 @ 4.0

Hehe awesome, I had a Northwood too (2.8GHz @ 3.5GHz) but that was back in 2004 heh!

I admire you for holding off your upgrade for 5 years but It's not something I could do myself, I'm sure the same goes for a large number of Enthusiasts

Technology advances so fast, that I don't think it's worth worrying too much about the years down the line

I think that depends if your paying attention or not, I think Technology evolves quite slowly actually, but thats probably because I keep a sharp on the technology as it evolves.

I wouldn't say I am loosing sleep over Intels socket plans but I'm not a big fan of swapping out motherboards so kinda looking at the facts we know to see which way the wind is gonna blow!

 

[Big.Wayne]

Just a reminder what the thread is about . .

I am asking your opinions on Intel®'s marketing strategy and whether or not they will ramp up the cost of any future LGA1366 processors

It's a question for the Technologists, Market Analysts and Soothsayers out there!

 

[Big.Wayne]

Firstly, you really shouldn't label people that don't worry about the upgrade path when buying as sealed box fans, and inferring that they aren't hardware enthusiasts. It may not be your intention, but it is coming across to me as a bit arrogant and elitest.

I'm not sure I have said anything for you to conclude I am being "arrogant and elitest"

You posted in a thread I made to ask peoples opinions about the future, in your first reply you made a very sweeping statement that basically anyone who likes to upgrade and swap bits about in their computer are all "Stupid"?

Buying a system for an upgrade path is stupid

While I am not the biggest fan of the term *Future-Proof* I think you will find the great majority of the overclockers here and around the world would prefere not buying into a dead platform or if not a dead platform then one that will prove financially very difficult to upgrade.

If you don't care to much about your platform that's fine, I don't think your stupid but you go about your hardware hobby in a different way to me and many others and you sound quite happy to put a mean machine together and get on with using it, again which is fine but what I don't appreciate is your intolerance towards people with a different viewpoint to your own.

I don't want any beef so just please apologize for your rude comments and we can all carry on with the technical discussion . . .

 

[Big.Wayne]

Easy I7/X58 is STILL king and is likely worth it if you can afford it

It isn't though is it

In the hands of an overclocker with a fetish for memory bandwidth and Ultra High-Def Crossfire/SLI gaming your certainly right but for most people the Lynnfield LGA1156/P55 is faster out-the-box and cheaper!



Thanks everyone for your feedback/viewpoints. it's certainly all food for thought. If the LGA1366 does end up being uBer high end chips only (£500+) then I think the Bloomfield 920 would be a much sought after chip after they go EOL

 

[Big.Wayne]

Isnt it already known that the 920 will be replaced with the 930 near the end of february, at the same bin price, with a slightly higher 2.8ghz stock speed

I wasn't aware of that when the thread was started

17th Sep 2009

Intel are expensive, but they are still a fair bit faster clock for clock, and overclock better. Performance is what you pay for with intel, and AMD sell their "slightly" slower chips are a bargain price simply because they cant compete with intel for Tech at the moment

I personally know *exactly* what you mean Corasik but one must be careful with the rhetoric one uses as it's becoming evident that the Intel options are *only* faster used within certain parameters . . .

In general your post is fairly innocuous but there are some who may take it at face value. I hope you don't take this as a criticism in any way but I am merely pointing out how your words *may* be perceived. I'm aware you are a long standing member of the community and your intentions are to help people so just a heads up!