Core i7 Ivy Bridge Improvements Over Sandy Bridge

[Black4]

If I'm using my Rig primarily for gaming, are there significant performance or future-proofing advantages of the just-introduced Ivy Bridge processors (paired with the Z77 chipset mainboards, of course)?

[HiVizMan]

Based on your system specs there will be a huge gain in the CPU performance stakes and of course in the ram clocking too.

Future proofing - well there is no such thing in PC land sadly.

[Black4]

HiVizMan,
Ivy Bridge over Sandy Bridge is what I meant, sorry. Has the Ivy Bridge over Sandy Bridge premium got good value?

Based on your system specs there will be a huge gain in the CPU performance stakes and of course in the ram clocking too.

Future proofing - well there is no such thing in PC land sadly.

[Lilkka]

Hi,

I'll be honest.. Ivy bridge is only useful if you intend to spend $$$ on the new PCI 3.0 GFX cards, there is very small improvements over the Sandy/Ivy - but if your upgrading for the first time which by the looks of it is then i suggest you highly go with a Ivy as that will give that "Future proof" type of idea.. yes there isn't much in the way of future proof but everyone want's a pc to keep for several years so grab a Ivy and then down the line get yourself a PCI-E 3.0 GFX card, the CPU will run at 2.0 (basically it won't fully use all bandwith until you get the 3.0 card) so it'll have backwards working for your older GFX cards.

[HiVizMan]

Honest reply is SB is better for water and air cooling. The gains are like 4 % on the CPU processing power, however if you are using the IPG then the gains are huge. But still not as good as the on board graphics of AMD. Llano for example rules the desktop market because of the great performance of the IGP.

[Lilkka]

Honest reply is SB is better for water and air cooling. The gains are like 4 % on the CPU processing power, however if you are using the IPG then the gains are huge. But still not as good as the on board graphics of AMD. Llano for example rules the desktop market because of the great performance of the IGP.

Yeah pretty much this, but really since your gaining your first one Ivy bridge will do nicely and allow you to potentially buy a PCI 3.0 card down the line somewhere in the next 1 year but Sandybridges do clock better (that is if you are after 4.8ghz + which most people aren't.)

If the price is close (in the uk it's £17 you might as well pick up the Ivy and have the upgrade room).

[Black4]

Thanks guys.

I just bought my GTX560 Ti 448 Cores DirectCU II last month, so I definitely don't expect to upgrade graphics cards anytime soon. Don't need PCI 3.0 functionality at this time.

Getting a Gene-Z/GEN3 and Core i7 2500K with DDR3 1866MHz memory next, and that will have to do me for a while. In a few years I'll consider upgrading the lot of them again.

Using my Rig for Battlefield 3 for the most part anyway, at this time.

[Lilkka]

Oh i suggest getting the Sabertooth or Gene Z, you'll be far better off than the Gene Z / Gen 3 board, and grab yourself 2000mhz + ram (G.Skill have good ones) This will help you alot with applications - alot say that in real world you cannot notice the differences but i don't see why bandwith wouldn't help. I feel as if it does, certiantly helps with loading and various things like that and with a RAID you might see some nice performance boosts (got to think about what the pc is doing inside you cannot see so why not grab the higher rams? That way you'll be just on the times instead of being slightly outdated )

Anyway, I wish you luck and if you need anymore advice from us just feel free to start a thread or you can PM me if you so wish.

Have a nice day!

[Black4]

Why the Gene-Z over the Gene-Z/GEN3 board, mate?

[Lilkka]

I dunno i just like the idea of a V sign instead of the IV (V rocks better), theres a few settings too that also help performance .. aka i think it was the new DRAM setup that placed to the boards and PCI 3.0 lanes and so on.. few differences so its just a personal preference.