The Intel Ivy Bridge (Core i7 3770K) Review
by Anand Lal Shimpi & Ryan Smith on April 23, 2012 12:03 PM EST- Posted in
- CPUs
- Intel
- Ivy Bridge
Switching gears for the moment we have Minecraft, our OpenGL title. It's no secret that OpenGL usage on the PC has fallen by the wayside in recent years, and as far major games go Minecraft is one of but a few recently released major titles using OpenGL. Minecraft is incredibly simple—not even utilizing pixel shaders let alone more advanced hardware—but this doesn't mean it's easy to render. Its use of massive amounts of blocks (and the overdraw that creates) means you need solid hardware and an efficient OpenGL implementation if you want to hit playable framerates with a far render distance. Consequently, as the most successful OpenGL game in quite some number of years (at over 5.5mil copies sold), it's a good reminder for GPU manufacturers that OpenGL is not to be ignored.
Our test here is pretty simple: we're looking at lush forest after the world finishes loading. In spite of a lack of any kind of shader workload for Ivy Bridge, it's still struggling here. On the one hand this is the single biggest gain over Sandy Bridge we've seen in any of our tests, with Ivy Bridge improving on its predecessor by an incredible 130%, and at the same time it's still only competitive with the entry-level discrete GPUs. Worse, for all of its gains, Ivy Bridge is still only achieving a mere 30% of the performance of Llano here.
Since this is largely a pixel pushing test, we'd expect Llano and Ivy Bridge to be closer than where they are. Given the gains versus Sandy Bridge Intel may still have some ROP bottlenecks that only come out in unusual workloads like Minecraft, but at the same time it's hard to imagine that OpenGL drivers aren't playing a role here. If that's the case, then Intel clearly has some work to do.
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sld - Wednesday, April 25, 2012 - link
.... and in this multivariate comparison you choose to ignore the superior battery life which makes Llano a serious competitor in the mobile space.midn8t - Thursday, June 28, 2012 - link
this the frames pre secound for CPU, you cant really figure out well when gamming its all mostly based around what ever video card they used, in this artical so I would have to guess that they might have used diffrent GPU video card in each system.obivuously they cant use same motherboard for amd vs intel
Also I find it wired that other reciews have Rated the phenom II x6 lower in preformance then the FX chip makes it wired how these review claims that the phenom II which is lower grade CPU is more powerfull then the top of the line AMD product out.
zeagus - Wednesday, April 25, 2012 - link
A huge chunk of text is spent explaining how while its a step in the right direction, they need to do more on the GPU side of the equation. Take off your strangely coloured glasses.wingless - Monday, April 23, 2012 - link
EDIT: I'M NOT KIDDING. I bought my 2600K the Friday before last for $199 and paired it with an ASUS P8Z77-V PRO. Ivy Bridge is simply too hot and lacks OC performance.I overclock so I WILL be keeping my 2600K for the foreseeable future!
fredisdead - Sunday, April 29, 2012 - link
So HD4000 igp is weaker than last gen Brazos ?? Based on the leaked Trinity benchmarks, Trinity blows any Intel igp into the weeds, never mind the ( already 1.5 yr old ) Brazos, which is 'only' 5% faster.fredisdead - Sunday, April 29, 2012 - link
So HD4000 igp is weaker than last gen Brazos ?? Based on the leaked Trinity benchmarks, Trinity blows any Intel igp into the weeds, never mind the ( already 1.5 yr old ) Brazos, which is 'only' 5% faster.1ceTr0n - Monday, April 23, 2012 - link
I'll keep my 2500k @ 4.6ghzNot kidding
smookyolo - Monday, April 23, 2012 - link
And I'll keep mine at 4.9GHz.But that's just because I'll be waiting for the tock, not the tick.
I will however be getting a Ivy Bridge Laptop soon.
Flunk - Monday, April 23, 2012 - link
Me too, the 2500K is a great chip. Especially with watercooling.Ratman6161 - Monday, April 23, 2012 - link
For anyone like me who already has a Sandy Bridge quad core (mine's a 2600K) it wouldn't make a lot of sense to "upgrade" to an Ivy bridge. But for those with older systems looking to upgrade, these actually seem like pretty good deals. @ $313 the 3770K is cheaper than the 2700K and cheaper than the typical price on a 2600K (unless like me you are lucky enough to live near a Micro Center).As to those complaining about graphics, come on. Will anyone who really cares a lot about graphics, particularly gaming, be using the on board graphics anyway?