thorgal

Thanks to our sponsor Tones we're able to show you an interesting comparison : the new clarkdale cpus versus the (not so new) bloomfield 860. The 860 is priced at exactly the same level as the 670, so a direct comparison is certainly possible. The 530/540 are a lot cheaper, and arguably the best bang for buck available, so I'm curious about its performance, and especially its overclock potential.


Let's have a look at our test trio first :


I specifically asked for a P55 motherboard that wasn't too expensive. in my humble opinion there's no point in pairing a (medium) budget cpu with a premium price motherboard. As I like Gigabyte a lot lately, with their very accessible bios and (for me at least) great performance, I went for the least expensive of the normal ATX range : the UD3.

This is the test setup :


* Gigabyte P55-UD3
* Intel i3 540 / i5 670 / i7 860
* CPU cooler : TRUE Copper
* 2x 2Gb Mushkin Redline PC12800
* WD Raptor WD740
* Zotac 7300GT
* OCZ EliteXstream 1kW

And this is where 5 minutes of bclk fun landed me :


238 bclk on a €100 motherboard. Not too shabby eh ? Oh, and by the way : the 8x memory multi is working great on Gigabyte motherboards, resulting in a nice memory OC as well.

Stay tuned for more fun to come in the next days and weeks.

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Massman

Pretty good!

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leeghoofd

Go go Torsten

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