Worth upgrading my i7 930 to an X5680?

[Black Panther]

My cpu is currently oc'd at 4Ghz and I use this pc primarily for gaming.

Will an X5680 show any difference in performance, and will I be able to oc it to over 4Ghz on air cooling?

 

[dgianstefani]

It's worth it, about 20% faster.

 

[dorsetknob]

Base clock is higher and 2 more cores ( its a 6/12 v4/6)
newer architecture 32nm so yes your see some improvement
X56** Xeons (westmere) are monster overclocker's (On the right Motherboard and with luck and some skill 4.8ghz is achievable)

adding a 2nd Fan to push/pull will improve your chances of a higher overclock

 

[dgianstefani]

Not on air

 

[Vario]

X5670 is cheaper and more or less the same thing. The W series has unlocked multiplier, you could do that instead. Gulftown is W3680 or W3690, unlocked multiplier. In contrast, the X series has locked multiplier I think.

 

[Fouquin]

will I be able to oc it to over 4Ghz on air cooling?

Not on air

Absolutely on air. Something like the OG Hyper212 with a push-pull fan config will offer plenty of cooling to push an X5680 up to around 4.3GHz. Your Scythe Yasya should not break a sweat.

 

[droopyRO]

I`m waiting for this to arrive Intel Xeon X5675 3.06GHz 12M Cache Hex 6 SIX Core Processor LGA1366 SLBYL QTY:1-in Processors from Computer & Office on Aliexpress.com | Alibaba Group really curious how it will compare to a 8600k in games.

 

[Vario]

I`m waiting for this to arrive Intel Xeon X5675 3.06GHz 12M Cache Hex 6 SIX Core Processor LGA1366 SLBYL QTY:1-in Processors from Computer & Office on Aliexpress.com | Alibaba Group really curious how it will compare to a 8600k in games.

Nice price. For games where the bottleneck is sheer core count, I would imagine it is close or same to an 8600K. For games where the bottleneck is the thread speed, probably 30% slower.

 

[Black Panther]

Will my motherboard be ok for an X5690? I think that would be the most powerful cpu I might put on it.

Or would you go for the X5675 since it's got a higher multiplier?

 

[kastriot]

Well if you find it for <50$ sure why not it's 32nm and 50% faster at same clock not 20% like some are saying here but X5650 or X5660 will do either

 

[Vario]

Will my motherboard be ok for an X5690? I think that would be the most powerful cpu I might put on it.

Or would you go for the X5675 since it's got a higher multiplier?

Why not do the W3680 or W3690? Should be same as the i7 980x/990x and has unlocked multi compared to the X5690.

 

[las]

Not much. Only worth it if you can get one very cheap.

 

[droopyRO]

Nice price. For games where the bottleneck is sheer core count, I would imagine it is close or same to an 8600K. For games where the bottleneck is the thread speed, probably 30% slower.

Well i might get a Pentium 4 instead, you never know with this Chinese sellers

 

[FireFox]

Well i might get a Pentium 4 instead, you never know with this Chinese sellers

I have bought a few Xeons X5690 from China, i have nothing to complain, fast shipping and good prices.

 

[Tomgang]

Yes you will definitely feel a different going from a I7 930 @ 4 GHz to 6 core Xeon.

Not only will you get more cores/threads but also going from 8 MB L3 cashe to 12 MB L3 cashe will help you in games. Also 32 NM chips runs cooler than there older 45 NM counter parts so al ready there are more headroom to oc just there.

I got from a I7 920 @ 4.1 GHz to a I7 980X @ 4.42 GHz. I can for sure say I got an improvement In games. Not only from the higher clock but also more L3 cashe helps. Al throw 6 core X58 chips still needs a good cooler. I have a Noctua NH-D14 with 3 120 MM 3000 RPM fans on and uses thermal grizzly kryonaut paste + great airflow i my case. And yet with 4.42 GHz at 1.41 volts the cooler still has a hard time keeping CPU below 80 C. With a prime95 test maximum heat test cores can go as high as 85 C. Off cause mamimum heat test is not accurate to normal use heat and will never become this hot in games, but my point is you need some good aircooling or if you are noise sensitive water cooling might be a good idea.

 

[KLMR]

You can go for the W version W5670, 80, 90... same processor for single socket mobos (your case).

I used to have a 920, I use a X5690@4,5GHz. I only miss nvme support and usb3. Those processors were great.

 

[kastriot]

going from 8 MB L3 cashe to 12 MB L3 cashe will help you in games

It's same 2Mb for one core i7 930=4 cores * 2MB=8MB and X56XX=6 cores *2MB=12MB so only thing benefical is 32nm better ocing and 50% more cores especially in multithreaded games

 

[Tomgang]

You can go for the W version W5670, 80, 90... same processor for single socket mobos (your case).

I used to have a 920, I use a X5690@4,5GHz. I only miss nvme support and usb3. Those processors were great.

I dont know what motherboard you have , but there are ways to get USB 3.0. Either you find a Second gen X58 motherboard like the asus p6x58d premium i have. These motherboards has onboard sata 3 all throw sata 3 on X58 is crap caused by the crappy marvell controller and 2 USB 3.0 on them or you can try find this PCIe adaptor from asus called Asus U3S6. I used one of these before i got a second gen X58 motherboard: https://www.amazon.com/Asus-U3S6-True-Support-Motherboard/dp/B002VVQ58M

About m.2 NVMe. There are was to get NVMe SSD to work on X58 like this: https://audiocricket.com/2016/12/31/booting-samsung-sm961-on-asus-p6t-se-mainboard/

Or you can go the easy way and try find a Samsung 950 PRO. Samsung left a little gift in them called legacy mode or a OPT-rom are they also know as. Thanks to that this m.2 SSD can be seen by legacy bios and boot as well as install windows on it with out any third party software, you just need a SSD and a M.2 to PCIe adaptor. I have two running in my system (not raid, but one for boot and one for games. In short words: its awesome to have).

My system as it is know.

The speed i get from my Samsung M.2 SSD. Please note PCIe gen 2 at X4 limits max speed to around 1700 MB/s while my SSD max read speed is 2200 MB/s.

It's same 2Mb for one core i7 930=4 cores * 2MB=8MB and X56XX=6 cores *2MB=12MB so only thing benefical is 32nm better ocing and 50% more cores especially in multithreaded games

No there you are wrong. L3 cashe is shared between all cores so 1 core have access to all 12 MB L3 cashe as well as 4 or 6 cores has. While L1 and L2 cashe is dedicated to each core. Se CPU-z that is also why there at L1 and L2 is 6 x 32 KB and 6 x 256 KB while at L3 there only stands 12 MB and not 6 x 12 MB. all cores can use up to 12 MB L3 cashe either alone or together. While he´s I7 930 only has 8 MB L3 cashe to share between all cores. So on a 6 core xeon or I7 cpu 4 cores can still use all 12 MB l3 cashe if needed.

 

[Vario]

It's same 2Mb for one core i7 930=4 cores * 2MB=8MB and X56XX=6 cores *2MB=12MB so only thing benefical is 32nm better ocing and 50% more cores especially in multithreaded games

I may be wrong but I think you are incorrect. The L2 cache is not shared but L3 cache is. Therefore that 12MB is shared.

 

[kastriot]

i7 920 boost clock 2.93GHz --->cpu passmark=4935 ---->single thread=1165
X5650 boost clock 3.06GHZ---->cpu passmark=7431---->single thread=1231

X5650 cpu passmark difference=+49.42% faster
X5650 cpu passmark single thread=+5.66% faster

X5650 boost clock =+4.43% faster

Now do yourself math and see benefits of 4MB "shared" cache..


P.S.( i have both cpu-s!)

 

[droopyRO]

Got the X58 board cheap with a i7 930 at about 80$. Bought it to play around with it, not to use it daily. I have the PC in profile for that. But i might sell the 8600K and mobo, since i plan to play older games in my Steam inventory.
And here are the results, almost as good as a i5 8600k all for 49$.

 

[Vario]

Got the X58 board cheap with a i7 930 at about 80$. Bought it to play around with it, not to use it daily. I have the PC in profile for that. But i might sell the 8600K and mobo, since i plan to play older games in my Steam inventory.
And here are the results, almost as good as a i5 8600k all for 49$.

View attachment 103048View attachment 103049

Wow that is very good. Your single thread speed is actually fairly competitive given the processor is nearly a decade old!
Running my 8600K and my ram, both stock: not overclocked and not xmp, my single thread score is 491 and multithreaded score is 2808.

 

[droopyRO]

My 8600k at 4.5Ghz has a single thread score of 532 and a multi thread of 3030, with 1093 points in Cinebench R15. For a backup PC the X5675 it is great choice.

 

[Vya Domus]

If you can get it for really cheap sure why not , but don't expect much of an improvement. Remember that this is still first get Nehalem.

 

[droopyRO]

https://www.aliexpress.com/item/Int...3bc8-440c-b91c-3a9e17025fb9&priceBeautifyAB=0 this is where i got it from, it arrived in 20 days, free shipping, if you have a 1366 board.