Gadgetory

welcome back to harbor unbox today's video is an opinion piece and I guess it's a bit of a wish list from a consumers perspective things we would like to see until do better with that would benefit all of us as the current market leader and longtime dominant force in the CPU space Intel's been out to get away with a lot and really this is because the competition has allowed them to some will rally behind AMD holding them up and saying how brilliant they are increasing core counts with rise and and finally sending us forward after years and years of nothing but quad cores on the mainstream don't get us wrong what AMD is done with Verizon really is impressive and we've said so many times on the channel but they're also a big part of why the past manner almost decade has been very slow on the cpu front but now that things are getting seriously competitive we feel Intel needs to change some stuff and stuff that we've been asking the change for years now last week Tim and myself are over in Taiwan attending the Computex trade show and we found ourselves discussing a few areas where Intel as well as AMD and NVIDIA need to improve to become more consumer friendly and at the end of that discussion we thought it would actually make for a pretty good video so here we are for this first video I'm going to discuss the Intel side of things I'll talk about each point that was raised and please note that none of these are in any particular order they're just things that we thought were worth talking about and some of them will be more important than others again we're looking at this from your perspective the perspective of a buyer so let's get into it first order of business is the Tim no not that one I'm sure many of you aware of this but Intel no longer sold as their desktop CPUs and this in my opinion has been a big issue for years now I've heard all the arguments for why Intel no longer sold as their chips and honestly I just don't buy them the best case put forth is that solder can form micro cracks after a certain amount of thermal cycles over an undetermined period of time a thermal paste on the other hand is claimed to last a lot longer especially for small dice CPUs what we do know for a fact is that Intel's desktop CPUs ran much cooler back when they were soldered in 2011 the Sandy Bridge days for the mainstream desktop CPUs while the higher-end parts they were soldered up to the Broadwell era in 2016 as a quick little example the core i7 3770k running at 4.7 gigahertz using 1.35 volt would peak at just over 90 degrees running at a 260 for stress tests using a large tower style air cooler and then under the exact same conditions but with 1.4 volt so more voltage the 2600 K ran at least 20 degrees cooler and we've seen that time and time again even with the much newer Intel CPUs that deal adding them drops temperatures by at least 20 degrees I've also got quite a few Sandy Bridge CPUs that have been overclocked all their life and had been used on a regular basis over the past seven years and the thermal performance as far as I can tell is exactly the same as the day I first tested them back in 2011 if any of you who are still using a Sandy Bridge processor or an older one and have seen an increase in thermals I would love to hear about it because I haven't actually heard any reports that they have seen thermals go through the roof or even increase a little bit so yeah if you've seen that please do let us know in the comment section below that would be very interesting to hear so although I don't have any real concrete evidence other than the CPUs that I've had for many years now I I'm gonna call BS on the micro cracks being a serious concern at least for the most part I don't doubt that it does happen I just don't think it's a serious concern I don't think it's a legitimate reason for not soldering CPUs I still believe the real reason Intel doesn't solve their chips is because it's an expensive process so this is just a saving exercise pretty plain and simple intel is a big business and this is just a classic big business decision all the evidence does suggest that soldiering is clearly a better method in terms of performance and this is why Intel still solder there's the on server chips I'd say it's easier to get away with shafting the general consumer and with no competition they can probably get away with doing the same to enthusiasts at least they have been anyway I get that per overclockers are happy to deal Eid and they can even profit from the process by providing tools for enthusiasts to do the same I'm not saying there's anything wrong there or dodgy I'm just merely pointing it out but for most I think it just results in hotter processors that are more costly and difficult to cool so I am Pro solder while on the subject of cooling the box cooler that thing could do with a serious upgrade the 73 watt model supplied with the core i7 8700 is a complete joke and we don't really want to see any more of that we definitely don't want to see any more of that again like the thermal paste this is merely a cost-saving exercise we've already seen how the Intel Box cooler provided with the 8700 can't avoid extreme thermal throttling under load even with a well ventilated case with an ambient air temperature of just 21 degrees so this is pretty straightforward and I think everyone can agree Intel needs to seriously up their box cooler game sadly the Hoover Intel they have missed a golden opportunity to release their next generation with their box cooler called the Wraith Ripper they can thank Coolermaster for that one so in summary we want bigger coolers that not just eliminate thermal throttling but reduced thermals to acceptable levels and soldering would play a key role here as well oh and of course we do want coolers that don't sound like a jet about to take off that would be very welcomed all right so this one is pretty straightforward as I said earlier these requests aren't in any kind of order or listed by any kind of importance but what I want here is for Intel to start sending reviewers retail products in retail packages AMD sends retail versions of their CPUs to reviewers and sure they do test them before shipping but I don't have too much of an issue with that one step one would be at least sending retail products to those that are reviewing them and testing them for potential buyers Intel sends reviewers qsr or qualification sample chips and although these are technically identical to the OEM or retail CPUs and still much rather show the full-blown retail chip on launch day with all the details on packaging and possibly even more importantly the retail cooler should the cpu actually come with one for those of you wondering the qsr chips come from just an early production run and they're generally sent out to OEMs and board partners to validate their hardware so anyone that got their hands on the core i7 8,700 or the core i5 8400 ahead of release from someone like a board partner for example that's how we got our 8400 they would have needed to source a standard into a box cooler if they wanted to test out-of-the-box performance getting Intel box cool isn't that difficult because they've been shipping the same cooler now with their retail CPUs for a long time but you would have to assume that Intel was sticking with the seventh gen box color for the new 8th gen parts because that information wasn't really given out we didn't know what the Box cooler would be because we weren't told and we didn't have any retail chips okay so again remember I'm complaining on behalf of the consumer not someone who gets product sent to them for review so someone that actually goes and buys them that being the case we obviously want to pay as little as possible while still getting what we want and Intel wants to charge us as much as possible while giving us I suppose as little as possible and with limited competition prior to last year it really has been advantage Intel recently those things have changed and in a bigger way but while the competition continues to step up Intel really hasn't stepped down on pricing we're getting a little bit more than what we were a few years ago but really that should be the natural progression of things anyway admittedly pricing for the mainstream coffee like desktop parts isn't too bad Intel is still robbing us in a few areas like the Box cooler and other things that I've talked about but it's really their high-end desktop parts that are grossly overpriced at least in my opinion and this is largely because Intel wants to avoid cannibalizing their server parts where they do make the big bucks for example even though Skylar cakes doesn't offer ECC memory support Intel still doesn't want to risk hurting sales of the Xeon series at the workstation equivalent of the core I 979 ATX Eve and that costs a further five hundred and fifty dollars us for example but with AMD's recent thread repre noun sment Intel will surely be finally forced to become more competitive on pricing and Intel users won't be forced to pay a hideous premium for the same kind of performance that aimed it typically offers for much less of course you will also have to stop overpaying for your CPUs if you want Intel to stop overcharging something we are starting to see more and more of is Intel abusing the TDP it got particularly bad with the coffee lake series and I do have to give credit to gia matador TV for first picking up on this it wasn't the case with the 8400 but it was indeed the case for the 8700 so we are going to give credit there and Intel has been only get away with abusing the TDP because of what it means it seems based on the comments that we often read that most people don't realize that the TDP actually refers to the power dissipation when the processor is running at the base clocks the TDP tells us nothing about how the CPU runs at its boost clocks and what sort of cooling is required to run at higher than base frequencies in recent years Intel has been pushing the boundaries of the TDP by continuing to shuffle the base clocks lower and lower while keeping the boost clocks as high as possible this allows them to release a CPU that falls under a certain TDP while still bragging about high clock speeds take the core i7 8700 as an example this CPU comes with a 65 watt TDP which correlates to its 3.2 gigahertz base clock however the chip has a 4.6 gigahertz single core boost frequency it can boost a whole 1.4 gigahertz higher than its base and in the process blows the power consumption well up of 65 watts in fact we monitored it hitting 128 watts in a short stress test in typical workloads where you want to and are running well above the base clocks the TDP rating of the chip is completely meaningless the problem with this is that some OEMs and even in tell themselves packaged CPUs like the core i7 8700 with coolers that are barely capable of dissipating the power specified by the TDP some pre-built even lock the CPUs power draw to the TDP to prevent their terrible cooler from being overwhelmed then when a user wants to hit the boost clocks that they've seen on Intel's website they are unable to do so because the system and the cooler have been designed around the TDP in the modern landscape where CPUs boost more than a gigahertz higher than their base clock and are capable of sustaining that frequency for long periods Intel should be using a TDP or similar metric that is an actual reflection of the typical power consumed during those high-performance workloads buyers would then have a much better idea the cooler they need and Intel would be forced to upgrade their crappy box cool that is something more capable of running the CPU at its full boost clocks we'd end up with better om systems everyone would be better informed about power consumption and would all live happily ever after okay I've got a bit carried away with how great and accurate TDP rating would make everything but still it would be nice okay so the core i3 8350 k is a great idea and all but at $180 us there is more wrong here than just the cpu price I talked about box coolers earlier and how crap they are well in this case with the 8350 k and other unlocked case.you models there's no cooler at all then making matters even worse is the fact that you require a Z series chipset to enable overclocking in this case AZ 370 motherboard granted zeb 370 boards aren't too crazy in terms of pricing and it is possible to snag one for a little over $100 u.s. though for that price you are getting an extremely basic motherboard what would make far more sense is a $65 USB 360 board that can support CPU overclocking and hey why not throw in some memory overclocking support while you're at it personally I am well and truly over this locked chipset nonsense give enthusiasts on a budget the chance to get the most out of their CPU intel's really no longer in a position to get away with this so you guys need to let them know about it again we realized that AMD is the underdog here and they need to be as competitive as they possibly can be in all these areas so I'm not saying they're Saints but the fact that you can overclock any rise and CPU on a be 350 motherboard and affordabl be 350 motherboard at that is really awesome and if Intel want to limit their losses they'll do the same also while on the topic of overclocking we don't just want to see overclocking support extended to more affordable chipsets but also more affordable CPUs you know like old days apart from being unlocked and more expensive there really isn't anything or there really is a single thing special about the K Series models they're just more expensive and unlocked and they still feature the same crappy thermal interface material that we discussed earlier I think it was the first point we touched on and unlike the unlike the locked models they don't come with a cooler at all even a crappy cooler so as a customer I want to see intel drop the k models and just the unlocked parts altogether just get rid of them and make every cpu unlocked and that would just that for me that would make Intel CPUs truly exciting yet would make overclocking exciting again and I really feel like this is a win-win situation for Intel perhaps I'm looking at this wrong perhaps I'm naive but I honestly think this would make Intel CPUs just so much more exciting I also really can't see this cannibalizing that other cpu lines that much well maybe a little bit but not not significantly and I think the gains would outweigh any disadvantages there based on some recent polls that we've done on the channel it seems like your average gamer doesn't really like to overclock anyway so it's yeah it's our opinion this approach would certainly get more budget-conscious enthusiasts talking about Intel CPUs and that's something that I think we'll start to see less and less of over the next few if things continue the way they are okay so this is a big one compatibility Intel really need to stop shifting us when it comes to compatibility and really only limits support when absolutely necessary the current and previous few generations all use the same physically identical LGA 1151 socket so why can't you use an 8th gen core process on a 100 or 200 series motherboard and why I can't use a 6 or seventh gen processor on a 300 series motherboard there's no reason no reason at all apparently last year Intel lied about the reason why compatibility was dumped claiming that the two additional cause of the new core i5 and i7 models require more power and while that is technically true these new processors don't use that much more power and at least to my knowledge there isn't a single Xen 170 or 0 to 70 board that they wouldn't work on until also noted that these EDD 370 motherboards have improved memory routing to support ddr4 2666 a slight increase over cable HDD r4 2400 because said 170 and Xen 270 boards haven't been proven to handle ddr4 4000 without any issues 2666 is really going to trip them up you might think I'm being a bit harsh here and well I have called Intel Liars without providing any evidence so let's just get to that quickly back in October of 2017 Andrew were the seuss ROG product manager went on the record in a bit Tech interview and clearly said there is no reason why coffee like CPUs can't work on 100 and 200 series motherboards he said that it was an Intel decision to remove compatibility the power consumption increase was small and he also said but it makes no real difference so the main takeaway here being that backwards compatibility isn't a problem but Intel would need to allow it it's certainly plausible that overclocking Headroom is greater on the more optimized at 370 boards but there's just no reason why the 8th gen CPUs can't work on older motherboards and why those older CPUs certainly can't work on the newer motherboards and more recently modders deal indeed managed to get coffee like CPU is working on 100 and 200 series boards without any problems I also haven't heard a single reason why the sixth seventh gen CPUs couldn't work on a 300 series board that is assuming that Intel opened up support as an example if you're 100 or 200 series motherboard died in a year from now chances are you would be able to get a new 300 series board cheaper than that of a secondhand board using an older chipset so there's more than half a dozen things we as consumers feel Intel needs to address of course this is merely a wish list if you will and we don't expect that Intel will address any of these concerns but if they did that would be pretty amazing and yeah it'd be great to see them tackle a few of these over the next year with continuing pressure from AMD we'd be surprised if Intel doesn't get serious about a few of these points but so far they've been fairly stubborn on the idea of change that said we are starting to see some serious kinks in Intel's armor as they rush products out run into security problems and fake press demos anyway I hope you enjoyed this video and if you did hang tight because next week we'll tackle what AMD needs to fix followed by what Nvidia needs to fix so let us know in the comments section below if there's anything you think we missed in this video and if you have any suggestions for the upcoming AMD and NVIDIA versions as always thank you for watching I'm your host Steve and I'll see you next time