2 disabled cores in new Sandy Bridge-E :(

[stars10250]

Is it just me or did everyone wince when they saw the die shot of the new Sandy Bridge-E cpu with 2 cores and 5 MB cache disabled? I understand that for a consumer processor they want to be able to clock the cores high and keep the temperatures down, but dang. While a consumer processor, it's clearly a processor for people that use a lot of cores and those people would likely prefer the extra 2 cores and whatever heat comes from it. And if they really felt all that bad about it, why not make the core utilization up to us to decide (assuming its possible to throw a software switch and disable cores). I wasn't expecting 8 cores, but still, what a waste.

[KyleAskine]

Originally Posted by stars10250

Is it just me or did everyone wince when they saw the die shot of the new Sandy Bridge-E cpu with 2 cores and 5 MB cache disabled? I understand that for a consumer processor they want to be able to clock the cores high and keep the temperatures down, but dang. While a consumer processor, it's clearly a processor for people that use a lot of cores and those people would likely prefer the extra 2 cores and whatever heat comes from it. And if they really felt all that bad about it, why not make the core utilization up to us to decide (assuming its possible to throw a software switch and disable cores). I wasn't expecting 8 cores, but still, what a waste.

They need to be able to repackage it as an 8 core xeon for $2000!

[retina]

It is all about yield. A percentage of parts emerge from the wafer stage with defects. Rather than throw away every faulty die they determine if there are enough working sub-parts to make a usable whole-part but with less core(s)/cache(s). Die that emerge with everything working perfectly are sold as the top line version, other die have the non-functional core(s)/cache(s) disabled and sold as cheaper versions.

[KyleAskine]

Originally Posted by retina

It is all about yield. A percentage of parts emerge from the wafer stage with defects. Rather than throw away every faulty die they determine if there are enough working sub-parts to make a usable whole-part but with less core(s)/cache(s). Die that emerge with everything working perfectly are sold as the top line version, other die have the non-functional core(s)/cache(s) disabled and sold as cheaper versions.

That is definitely part of it too, but the fact that most old Phenom three core processors could be unlocked to four cores, and most original board 6950s (including both of mine) could be unlocked to 6970s make it seem like it is more than just getting rid of the buggy ones.

[Dubslow]

Originally Posted by stars10250

Is it just me or did everyone wince when they saw the die shot of the new Sandy Bridge-E cpu with 2 cores and 5 MB cache disabled? I understand that for a consumer processor they want to be able to clock the cores high and keep the temperatures down, but dang. While a consumer processor, it's clearly a processor for people that use a lot of cores and those people would likely prefer the extra 2 cores and whatever heat comes from it. And if they really felt all that bad about it, why not make the core utilization up to us to decide (assuming its possible to throw a software switch and disable cores). I wasn't expecting 8 cores, but still, what a waste.

Can you point us to these pics? And are there 8 core SNB Xeons?

[ixfd64]

More info here: http://gizmodo.com/5859447/sandy-bri...formance-crown

[Dubslow]

Thanks, great help. Among the many articles which followed, I saw this:

Noctua sent us its NH-D14 SE2011 for our upcoming holiday gift guide, and we were able to get all six cores stable at 4.6 GHz running Prime95 for an hour with it on the Intel DX79SI board.

Source

[nucleon]

Originally Posted by KyleAskine

<snip>....make it seem like it is more than just getting rid of the buggy ones.

Wouldn't surprise me if Intel's plan-B was that if Bulldozer was any good, they'd release 8core parts for the desktop.

The other downside of poor competition. Not only high prices, but not-as-good-as-it-could-be product.

I also saw a an intel slide with the mention of IVB-E. So I'm hoping for that I guess :)

-- Craig

[KyleAskine]

Originally Posted by Dubslow

Can you point us to these pics? And are there 8 core SNB Xeons?

Quoting tomshardware.com:

Of course, Sandy Bridge-E was never intended to be a desktop processor exclusively. Rather, it’s going to emerge in the first part of next year as Xeon E5 for single- and dual-socket servers/workstations. In that context, the CPU’s size and complexity makes more sense. After all, Westmere-EX (at the heart of Intel’s more enterprise-oriented Xeon E7 family) is a 2.6 billion-transistor die occupying 513 square millimeters of space.

When Sandy Bridge-E surfaces as Xeon, it’ll offer up to eight processing cores and 20 MB of shared L3 cache. As a desktop CPU, however, it’s limited to as many as six cores and up to 15 MB of shared L3. Intel achieves this by disabling two cores and four of the die’s 16 slices of shared L3 cache.