> However, it's unknown how much Intel would have to charge for a Sandy Bridge with a > stock cooling solution that could reach the overclocked speeds you have quoted
Right. I don't expect that they could ship much above probably 4.2 GHz with their usual coolers, but that's still a pretty good boost over stock. I'm actually surprised there isn't at least a 4.0 GHz rated version so they can claim the milestone.
> Of course, the Sandy Bridge as an OEM part without a fan would not carry this burden > and could be lots cheaper even if rated to run at higher clock speeds. > > Also there is the power consumption angle; I don't really know how much power a > Sandby Bridge uses when overclocked (did you have to overvoltage to get to 4+ Ghz? If
You need a very minor overvolt (less than 0.1 volt) on most production parts to get past 4.6 GHz. At or below that it runs happily at stock voltage.
> Finally, would you be able to confirm your earlier claim that your overclocked Sandy > Bridge can compile the entire MAME source tree from a clean state in 30 seconds?
Sure. The key is that you have 8 GB of RAM, nothing large running to eat it, and you do make clean ; make ; make clean ; make. Everything runs out of RAM cache then and it's super-fast pretty much regardless of your processor speed.
Also, I should mention that SNB has significantly different power management behavior from previous chips. When the OS is idling or under light loads, it drops all cores to 1.6 GHz. When you crank up MAME or GCC or whatever, it clocks up to whatever your overclock is. That results in a significant noise/heat/power improvement in normal web/email usage compared to overclocking previous CPUs - mine stays within 10 degrees C of room ambient temperature when it's in that state.
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Re: How about a clock for clock comparison.
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