Intel i7 3960X EE / Asus P9X79 Deluxe / 32GB Corsair Vengeance (1600mhz) Review

1. Introduction2. Intel i7 3960x Extreme Edition3. Intel Active Thermal Solution (RTS2011LC)4. Intel i7 3960x & RTS2011LC (Super High Res Gallery)5. Corsair 32GB Vengeance (1600mhz) DDR36. Corsair 32GB Vengeance (Super High Res Gallery)7. Intel DX79SL Extreme Series Motherboard8. Intel DX79SL Extreme Series (Super High Res Gallery)9. Asus P9X79 Deluxe Motherboard10. Asus P9X79 Deluxe (Super High Res Gallery)11. Testing Methodology12. Synthetic: PCMark 713. Synthetic: 3DMark Vantage14. Synthetic: 3DMark 1115. Synthetic: SiSoft Sandra16. Synthetic: Cinebench R11.5 64 bit17. Synthetic: SSD Performance18. Image Quality: HQV Benchmark19. Real World: 3D Rendering20. Real World: Media Encoding21. Technical: Bios & Overclocking22. Overclocking Results: Cinebench23. Overclocking Results: SiSoft Sandra24. Overclocking Results: Media Encoding25. Overclocking Results: PCMark 726. Overclocking Results: 3DMark 1127. Overclocking Results: Gaming Performance28. Technical: Power Consumption29. Closing Thoughts30. View All Pages

Intel launch their X79 platform today and we have several reviews ready for your enjoyment, focusing on various aspects of the technology and associated performance with partnering hardware. In this article we are going to be testing the Intel i7 3960x with the new Asus P9X79 Deluxe motherboard with a fully loaded array of 32GB 1600mhz memory, courtesy of Corsair.

Intel have had it all their own way in 2011 with Sandybridge dominating both the performance and sales charts. When AMD released the FX8150 in October it failed to ignite the hearts and minds of the enthusiast audience, being launched to a mixed, but mainly negative reception. Intel's 2600k still held the performance crown in the sub £300 sector, being quickly superseded by the clock ramped Intel Core i7 2700k. When that happened the gulf just widened even more.

To make matters worse, AMD have had nothing to target Intel's ultra high end Core i7 970, 980x and 990x processors … so it is up to Intel to replace them with a new range of high performing silicon. X58/LGA1366 has now been replaced by X79/LGA2011.

If you have read our other reviews today then you may want to skip over some of the pages in this article, as we have to recap on the new technology for those readers who have landed here first.

Today Intel are launching three new Core i7 processors. The Core i7 3820 @ 3.6ghz, The Core i7 3930k @ 3.2ghz and the Core i7 3960X Extreme Edition @ 3.3ghz. We are looking at the latter model, pairing it up with the high end Asus P9X79 Deluxe motherboard.

	Intel Core i7 3960X Extreme Edition	Core i7 3930k	Core i7 3820
Number of Processor Cores	6	6	4
Number of simultaneous threads with Intel Hyper Threading Technology	12	12	8
Intel Smart Cache Size	15 MB	12 MB	10 MB
Processor Base Frequency	3.3ghz	3.2ghz	3.6ghz
Memory Frequency	1600 mhz	1600 mhz	1600 mhz
Intel Turbo Boost Technology	2.0	2.0	2.0
Number of DDR3 Memory Channels	4	4	4
Overclocking Enabled	YES	YES	YES (partial)
Intel Express Chipset	X79	X79	X79
Socket	LGA2011	LGA2011	LGA2011

As the table above highlights, both 3960X and 3930K are unlocked processors, while the cheaper 3820 allows for ‘partial' overclocking. This means the user can adjust the core multiplier to a preset maximum. UK pricing has yet to be confirmed, but the 3960X should cost around $1,000 in the states and the 3930k at $610. We would make an educated guess that the 3960X will cost around £800 inc vat in the UK, directly replacing the 990X at the same price.

The new processor range features a design with up to 6 execution cores. Each core supports two threads, which we all know as ‘Intel Hyper Threading Technology'. This logical thread basis doubles the physical count, so a 6 core processor will have 6+6 for a total of 12. Each core has a 32kb instruction and a 32kb data first level cache (L1) and a 256kb shared instruction/data mid level (L2) cache. The new processors have between 10mb and 15mb of last level (LLC cache), up to 2.5 MB per core.

The processors support four DDR3 channels with a single unbuffered DIMM per channel. Officially they support memory of 1066mhz, 1333mhz and 1600mhz, although as we will see in another review today, this can only be used as a rough guideline.

The Direct Media Interface Generation 2 (DMI2) serves as the chip to chip interface to the PCH. The DM12 port supports a x4 link width and only operates in x4 mode when in DMI2. It operates at PCIe2 or PCIe1 speeds and is transparent to software. There is support for processor and peer to peer writes and reads with 64 bit address support.

Above, a CPUz overview of the Core i7 3960X processor. The processor has 6 cores and 12 threads, with 15MB of ‘Level 3' cache. The new chip has support for 40 PCI Express lanes.

The latest range of processors are based on Intel's ‘tock' cycle, before the 22nm Ivy Bridge chips hit retail in the near future.

Above, the Core i7 3960X processor Die detail, showing the 6 cores, which share the L3 cache. There are 2.27 billion transistors with this particular design and the chip measures 20.8mm x 20.9 mm.

Above, the 3960X EE engineering sample we were sent for review. These processors are noticeably bigger than the previous series. Intel say that when compared against the 990X that the new processor is 20% faster with video editing, 102% faster with memory performance, and 34% faster with 3D Game Physics. Sounds really good on paper, but the proof is in the testing.

Intel have worked with Asetek on the release of a new ‘All in One' liquid cooler, called the RTS2011LC. This is designed to work with the LGA 2011/1366/1155 and 1156 socket. Our sample arrived in a plain white box but there should be some rather attractive Intel coloured artwork with the final retail version.

Inside, the unit is shipped within a molded cardboard box.

The bundle includes mounting brackets and screws for all Intel platforms, as well as installation instructions and thermal paste. Intel also supply a single fan.

The cooler itself will be familiar to many Kitguru readers as it looks similar to many we have reviewed before from Antec. It uses Propylene Glycol as the cooling liquid. The RTS2011LC weighs 820 grams.

The cooler uses a copper ‘cold plate' design which uses ‘state of the art, ultra efficient heat transferring microchannels'. Intel claim that these new microchannels are able to transfer heat from the CPU to the liquid more efficiently than previous generation designs.

The radiator is 150mm x 118mm x 37 mm and Intel supply a 120mm fan with the product, which screws into one side of the radiator. This is a custom design fan by Asetek specifically for this product, rated at 74 CFM. It spins between 800 rpm and 2,200 rpm with noise emissions rated between 21 dBa and 35 dBa.

There is a single 4 PWM header cable which connects to the motherboard directly.

The RTS2011LC uses soft rubber hoses, which are said to last for 50,000 hours.

We noticed that the mounting system was identical to other ASETEK sourced designs and as such the ANTEC KUHLER units are interchangeable. We tried the Antec Kuhler 920 and found it was a better performer than this Intel branded model, due to a thicker radiator with twin fan configuration.

On this page we present some super high resolution images of the product taken with the 24.5MP Nikon D3X camera and 24-70mm ED lens. These will take much longer to open due to the dimensions, especially on slower connections. If you use these pictures on another site or publication, please credit Kitguru.net as the owner/source. You can right click and ‘save as’ to your computer to view later.

For our coverage today, we are testing various systems with a variety of memory configurations. In this specific review we will be using 32GB of Corsair Vengeance memory, rated 1600mhz @ 9-9-9-24 timings.

Four kits of 8GB Vengeance DDR3 with stunning blue heat spreaders.

We could almost imagine that Corsair made this memory specifically for the Asus P9X79 Deluxe Motherboard, as shown above.

On this page we present some super high resolution images of the product taken with the 24.5MP Nikon D3X camera and 24-70mm ED lens. These will take much longer to open due to the dimensions, especially on slower connections. If you use these pictures on another site or publication, please credit Kitguru.net as the owner/source. You can right click and ‘save as’ to your computer to view later.

Even though we aren't using it for the review today, Intel supplied us with the DX79SI motherboard which is shipped in a very ominous looking box. More than a passing resemblance to the Skulltrail products of yesteryear.

Intel include a backplate, a 2 way and 3 way SLI bridge and a mousemat. Our reviewers sample didn't have any literature, but you can expect this with a retail sample.

The motherboard is an attractive design built around a black PCB with blue slots and accented heatsinks. The board is populated with Solid State Capacitors and a ‘power supervisor' for enhanced stability. It has six SATA ports, 2 x 6.0 GB/s (blue) and 4 x 3.0 GB/s (black). Board dimensions are 29.46 cm x 24.38 cm.

The motherboard has three PCI Express x 16 slots for triple card CrossfireX and SLI configurations. If used in tri mode they run in x16/x8/x8 mode. There are also two PCI express 2.0 slots and one PCI slot.

Along the bottom of the board is an infrared receiver and transmitter which supports receiving, learning and emitting capabilities. It can control up to two additional CE devices and eliminates the need for a USB based CIR dongle. Intel have included diagnostic LED's with this board to help with troubleshooting. and there are tweaking switches for overclocking, power on and reset functionality. There are the usual plethora of USB 2.0 and USB 3.0 header ports.

The DX79SI supports Quad Channel memory across eight slots. It can accept a total of 64GB of non ECC system memory with speeds up to 2400mhz O.C.

The rear I/O panel has several GB lan connectors, two USB 3.0 ports and six USB 2.0 ports with a Firewire connector positioned in the middle. Eight channel audio is supported from this panel along with an optical cable.

On this page we present some super high resolution images of the product taken with the 24.5MP Nikon D3X camera and 24-70mm ED lens. These will take much longer to open due to the dimensions, especially on slower connections. If you use these pictures on another site or publication, please credit Kitguru.net as the owner/source. You can right click and ‘save as’ to your computer to view later.

The Asus P9X79 Deluxe is one of five boards that ASUS are releasing today and it is the second most expensive board in their lineup, behind the Rampage IV Extreme. The P9X79 Deluxe will retail in the United Kingdom for £279.99 and is targeted at the higher end audience.

The box is a lovely gatefold design, listing specifications along the top, while exposing the board underneath behind a protective plastic sheet.

The bundle includes four 6GB/s SATA cables, and four 3GB/s SATA cables, a 2 in 1 Q connector, 1x 3 way SLI bridge, 1x SLI bridge, 1 Bluetooth V3.0 & HS module, 1 x Wi-Fi Ring Moving Antenna, an I/O backplate, software/driver disc and user manual.

The motherboard is attractive and a similar colour scheme to the Intel DX79SI which we looked at earlier in this review. It measures 30.5 cm x 24.4 cm, fitting the ATX standard.

The board is populated with attractively designed heatsinks to improve stability under load and when overclocked. This board is a fan-less, passively cooled product.

The P9X79 Deluxe has 8 memory slots with support for up to 64GB of memory. Memory at 1066mhz/1333mhz/1600mhz/1866mhz/2133mhz (O.C.)/2400mhz (OC) can be used. As with all X79 boards the P9X79 Deluxe supports a Quad Channel memory architecture.

The P9X79 Deluxe has 3x PCI Express Slots which can run in dual x16/x16 mode or x16/x8/x8 in a tri configuration. It supports SLI in x3 way, and Crossfire in Quad mode. There are also two PCI Express 2.0 x1 slots.

This Deluxe board has 8 SATA ports. The two grey ports on the left (above) are controlled by the Marvell 9128 controller and are SATA 3 rated (6 GB/s). The four blue ports in the middle are controlled by the Intel X79 Express Chipset which are SATA 2 rated (3 GB/s). The remaining two on the far right (grey) are also controlled by the Intel X79 Express Chipset and are SATA 3 rated (6 GB/s).

Along the bottom is a diagnostic LED readout for troubleshooting potential problems. Next to this is a power and reset button and then a series of USB 2.0 headers. At the far right is a TPU and EPU switch and a system panel connector.

The back I/O panel features a raft of connectivity featuring 6 x USB 3.0/2.0 ports (blue), 4 x USB 2.0/1.1 ports, 1 x USB BIOS Flashback button, 1 x Bluetooth V3.0 + HS module (Bluetooth V2.1 module & WiFi antenna port). There are also 2 x LAN (RJ-45) ports (1x Intel LAN), 1 Optical S/PDIF out and 2 power eSATA 6GB/s ports (green). Finally, at the far right is full 8 Channel audio support.

On this page we present some super high resolution images of the product taken with the 24.5MP Nikon D3X camera and 24-70mm ED lens. These will take much longer to open due to the dimensions, especially on slower connections. If you use these pictures on another site or publication, please credit Kitguru.net as the owner/source. You can right click and ‘save as’ to your computer to view later.

Test System:

Processor: Intel i7 3960X EE
Motherboard: Asus P9X79 Deluxe
Cooler: Antec H20 920
Memory: 32GB Corsair Vengeance 1600mhz
Graphics Card: AMD HD6990 – 880mhz core (synthetic tests) // XFX HD6870 Black Edition in Crossfire (gaming)
Power Supply: Enermax Platimax 1200W
Optical Drive: Asus BluRay Drive
Chassis: Lian Li X2000F
Monitors: Dell U3011, 3x Ilyama ProLite E2472HDD
Boot Drive: Patriot WildFire 120GB
Secondary Drive: 1TB Samsung

Software:
Windows 7 Enterprise (64-bit).
FRAPS Professional.
SiSoft Sandra.
Windows Media Player/VLC Player.
CPUz.
GPUz.
CPUID Hardware Monitor.
Cinebench R11.5 (64-bit).
Cyberlink PowerDVD 11 Ultra.
Cyberlink MediaEspresso.
CrystalDiskMark.
3D Mark Vantage.
3DMark 11.
PCMark 7.
Catalyst 11.10 driver.

Games:
Total War: Shogun 2
Call Of Pripyat
F1 2011.

Comparison Systems:

AMD FX 8150 Black Edition
Processor: AMD FX 8150 Black Edition
Motherboard: Gigabyte 990FXA-UD7
Cooler: Noctua NH D14
Memory: G-SKill Ripjaws 1600mhz 8GB (2x 4GB)
Power Supply: ADATA 1200W
Chassis: SilverStone Raven 3
Boot Drive: Intel 40GB SSD
Secondary Drive: Patriot 120GB WildFire

Intel Core i7 990X
Processor: Intel Core i7 990x
Cooler: Corsair H100
Motherboard: Gigabyte G1 Assassin
Memory: Kingston HyperX 6GB
Drives: Crucial RealSSD C300 256GB
Power Supply: Corsair AX1200
Chassis: Antec Twelve Hundred

Intel Core i7 2700k
Processor: Intel Core i7 2700k
Cooling: ThermalTake Frio OCK
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-Z68AP-D3 Z68 Motherboard
Chassis: Silverstone Raven 3.
Power Supply: Corsair 850W.
Memory: Corsair 1600mhz memory
Storage: Intel 80GB SSD (boot) / Patriot Wildfire 120GB SSD.

Intel Core i7 2600k
Processor: Intel Core i7 2600k
Motherboard: ASRock Fatal1ty Z68 Professional Gen 3
Cooler: Intel XTS-100H
Memory: ADATA 1600mhz DDR3 8GB (2x4GB)
Graphics Card: HIS HD6970 IceQ Mix
Power Supply: Thermaltake Toughpower 850W
Boot Drive: Intel 510 SSD 250GB

Intel Core i5 2500k
Processor: Intel Core i7 2500k
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-Z68AP-D3 Z68 Motherboard
Cooler: Arctic Cooling Freezer Xtreme Rev.2 CPU Cooler
Memory: Corsair 1600mhz memory 8GB (2x4GB)
Graphics Card: HIS HD6970 IceQ Mix
Power Supply: Corsair 850W.
Boot Drive: Patriot Pyro 120GB SSD.

AMD Phenom II X6 1100T
Processor: AMD Phenom II X6 1100T
Motherboard: Gigabyte 990FXA-UD7
Cooler: Noctua NH D14
Memory: G-SKill Ripjaws 1600mhz 8GB (2x 4GB)
Graphics Card: HIS HD6970 IceQ Mix
Power Supply: ADATA 1200W
Chassis: SilverStone Raven 3
Boot Drive: Intel 40GB SSD
Secondary Drive: Patriot 120GB WildFire

PCMark 7 includes 7 PC tests for Windows 7, combining more than 25 individual workloads covering storage, computation, image and video manipulation, web browsing and gaming. Specifically designed to cover the full range of PC hardware from netbooks and tablets to notebooks and desktops, PCMark 7 offers complete PC performance testing for Windows 7 for home and business use.

Of to a very promising start, scoring 5,368 points with Futuremark's latest system benchmark test.

Futuremark released 3DMark Vantage on April 28, 2008. It is a benchmark based upon DirectX 10, and therefore will only run under Windows Vista (Service Pack 1 is stated as a requirement) and Windows 7.

With the AMD HD6990, this i7 3960X EE system scores 37,471 points, and almost 40,000 from the CPU alone.

3DMark 11 is designed for testing DirectX 11 hardware running on Windows 7 and Windows Vista the benchmark includes six all new benchmark tests that make extensive use of all the new features in DirectX 11 including tessellation, compute shaders and multi-threading.

After running the tests 3DMark gives your system a score with larger numbers indicating better performance. Trusted by gamers worldwide to give accurate and unbiased results, 3DMark 11 is the best way to test DirectX 11 under game-like loads.

If you want to learn more about this benchmark, or to buy it yourself, head over to this page.

AMD's HD6990 is a powerful card, as shown in the results above. When paired up with the Core i7 3960X EE it breaks the 10k barrier, scoring 10,408 points at reference clocks. The CPU based physics score is very strong, scoring 12,696 points.

SiSoftware Sandra (the System ANalyser, Diagnostic and Reporting Assistant) is an information & diagnostic utility. It should provide most of the information (including undocumented) you need to know about your hardware, software and other devices whether hardware or software.

Sandra is a (girl’s) name of Greek origin that means “defender”, “helper of mankind”. We think that’s quite fitting.

It works along the lines of other Windows utilities, however it tries to go beyond them and show you more of what’s really going on. Giving the user the ability to draw comparisons at both a high and low-level. You can get information about the CPU, chipset, video adapter, ports, printers, sound card, memory, network, Windows internals, AGP, PCI, PCI-X, PCIe (PCI Express), database, USB, USB2, 1394/Firewire, etc.

Native ports for all major operating systems are available:

• Windows XP, 2003/R2, Vista, 7, 2008/R2 (x86)
• Windows XP, 2003/R2, Vista, 7, 2008/R2 (x64)
• Windows 2003/R2, 2008/R2* (IA64)
• Windows Mobile 5.x (ARM CE 5.01)
• Windows Mobile 6.x (ARM CE 5.02)

All major technologies are supported and taken advantage of:

• SMP – Multi-Processor
• MC – Multi-Core
• SMT/HT – Hyper-Threading
• MMX, SSE, SSE2, SSE3, SSSE3, SSE 4.1, SSE 4.2, AVX, FMA – Multi-Media instructions
• GPGPU, DirectX, OpenGL – Graphics
• NUMA – Non-Uniform Memory Access
• AMD64/EM64T/x64 – 64-bit extensions to x86
• IA64 – Intel* Itanium 64-bit

We can immediately see the benefits of the new Quad Channel Memory architecture, scoring just under 40 GB/s of memory bandwidth. This really is an incredible benchmark result.

CINEBENCH R11.5 64 Bit is a real-world cross platform test suite that evaluates your computer’s performance capabilities. CINEBENCH is based on MAXON’s award-winning animation software CINEMA 4D, which is used extensively by studios and production houses worldwide for 3D content creation. MAXON software has been used in blockbuster movies such as Spider-Man, Star Wars, The Chronicles of Narnia and many more.

CINEBENCH is the perfect tool to compare CPU and graphics performance across various systems and platforms (Windows and Mac OS X). And best of all: It’s completely free.

Intel's Core i7 990X is a rendering powerhouse, but it looks positively pedestrian when compared with the new Core i7 3960X EE, scoring 9.28 points compared against 11.39 points. This is a huge difference with this benchmark. By comparison the latest AMD FX8150 scores just under 6 points at reference clocks.

Crystalmark is a useful benchmark to measure theoretical performance levels of hard drives and SSD’s. We are using V3.0 x64.

There are no SATA 3 performance concerns with the Asus P9X79 Deluxe motherboard, averaging around 500 MB/s sequential read and around 483 MB/s sequential write from the Patriot WildFire 120GB SSD. As we have seen in previous tests, this particular SSD is a very impressive performer, especially with 4k and 4k QD32 performance.

The ATTO Disk Benchmark performance measurement tool is compatible with Microsoft Windows. Measure your storage systems performance with various transfer sizes and test lengths for reads and writes. Several options are available to customize your performance measurement including queue depth, overlapped I/O and even a comparison mode with the option to run continuously. Use ATTO Disk Benchmark to test any manufacturers RAID controllers, storage controllers, host adapters, hard drives and SSD drives and notice that ATTO products will consistently provide the highest level of performance to your storage.

ATTO highlights class leading drive performance, with read scores peaking at over 550MB/s and write scores peaking over 500 MB/s.

HQV Benchmark 2.0 is an updated version of the original tool and it consists of various video clips and test patterns which are designed to evalute motion correction, de-interlacing, decoding, noise reduction, detail enhancement and film cadence detection.

There are two versions of the program, standard definition on DVD and high definition on Bluray. As our audience will be concentrating on HD content so will we.

This has a total of 39 video tests which is increased from 23 in the original and the scoring is also up from a total of 130 to 210. As hardware and software gets more complicated, the software has been tuned to make sure we can thoroughly maximise our analysis.

Read our initial analysis over here.

	AMD HD6990
Dial	4
Dial with static pattern	5
Gray Bars	5
Violin	5
Stadium 2:2	5
Stadium 3:2	5
Horizontal Text Scroll	5
Vertical Text Scroll	5
Transition to 3:2 Lock	5
Transition to 2:2 Lock	0
2:2:2:4 24 FPS DVCAM Video	5
2:3:3:2 24 FPS DVCam Video	5
3:2:3:2:2 24 FOS Vari-Speed	5
5:5 FPS Animation	5
6:4 12 FPS Animation	5
8:7 8 FPS Animation	5
Interlace Chroma Problem (ICP)	5
Chroma Upsampling Error (CUE)	5
Random Noise: Sailboat	5
Random Noise: Flower	5
Random Noise: Sunrise	5
Random Noise: Harbour Night	5
Scrolling Text	5
Roller Coaster	5
Ferris Wheel	5
Bridge Traffic	5
Text Pattern/ Scrolling Text	5
Roller Coaster	5
Ferris Wheel	5
Bridge Traffic	5
Luminance Frequency Bands	5
Chrominance Frequency Bands	5
Vanishing Text	5
Resolution Enhancement	15
Theme Park	5
Driftwood	5
Ferris Wheel	5
Skin Tones	7
Total	196

Class leading performance, although perhaps this system is a little overkill for general high definition media duties.

V2011 is the first release of 3DStudio Max to fully support the Windows 7 operating system. This is a professional level tool that many people use for work purposes and our test will show any possible differences between board design today.

Autodesk 3ds Max Design 2011 software offers compelling new techniques to help bring designs to life by aggregating data, iterating ideas, and presenting the results.

Streamlined, more intelligent data exchange workflows and innovative new modeling and visualization tools help significantly increase designers’ creativity and productivity, enabling them to better explore, validate, and communicate the stories behind their designs.

Major new features:

• Slate: A node based material editor.
• Quicksilver: Hardware renderer with multithreaded rendering engine that utilizes both CPU and GPU.
• Extended Graphite Modeling Toolset
• 3ds Max Composite: A HDRI-capable compositor based on Autodesk Toxik.
• Viewport Canvas toolset for 3D and 2D texture painting directly in the viewport
• Object Painting: use 3D geometry as ‘brushes’ on other geometry
• Character Animation Toolkit (CAT): now integrated as part of the base package
• Autodesk Material Library: Over 1200 new photometrically accurate shaders
• Additional file format support: includes native support for Sketchup, Inventor
• FBX file linking
• Save to Previous Release (2010)

We created a new 8200×3200 scene and recorded the time for the hardware to finalise the render.

We are beginning to see how much power is on tap from the new architecture, reducing the overall time by 42 seconds when compared to the 990x.

CyberLink MediaEspresso 6 is the successor to CyberLink MediaShow Espresso 5.5. With its further optimized CPU/GPU-acceleration, MediaEspresso is an even faster way to convert not only your video but also your music and image files between a wide range of popular formats.

Now you can easily playback and display your favourite movies, songs and photos not just on your mobile phone, iPad, PSP, Xbox, or Youtube and Facebook channels but also on the newly launched iPhone 4. Compile, convert and enjoy images and songs on any of your computing devices and enhance your videos with CyberLink’s built-in TrueTheater Technology.

New and Improved Features

• Ultra Fast Media Conversion – With support from the Intel Core i-Series processor family, ATI Stream & NVIDIA CUDA, MediaEspresso’s Batch-Conversion function enables multiple files to be transcoded simultaneously.
• Smart Detect Technology – MediaEspresso 6 automatically detects the type of portable device connected to the PC and selects the best multimedia profile to begin the conversion without the need for user’s intervention.
• Direct Sync to Portable Devices – Video, audio and image files can be transferred in a few easy steps to mobile phones including those from Acer, BlackBerry, HTC, Samsung, LG, Nokia, Motorola, Sony Ericsson, and Palm, as well as Sony Walkman and PSP devices.
• Enhanced Video Quality – CyberLink TrueTheater Denoise and Lighting enables the enhancement of video quality through optical noise filters and automatic brightness adjustment.
• Video, Music and Image File Conversion – Convert not only videos to popular formats such as AVI, MPEG, MKV, H.264/AVC, and FLV at the click of a button, but also images such as JPEG and PNG and music files like WMA, MP3 and M4A.
• Online Sharing – Conversion to video formats used by popular social networking websites and a direct upload feature means posting videos to Facebook and YouTube has never been easier.

For our testing today we are converting a 3.3GB 720p MKV file (2h:12mins) to Apple Mp4 format for playback on a portable device. This is a common procedure for many people and will give a good indication of system power. We are using the newest version which has been optimised for Sandybridge processors.

Graphics acceleration is disabled to measure pure processor performance.

This benchmark doesn't completely use all processing power, but it scales in relation to core efficiency as can be seen above.

The Asus UEFI bios is very intuitive. We expected a comfortable, stable user experience and were not disappointed.

Overclocking the i7 3960X EE with the P9X79 Deluxe proved straightforward enough and we managed to post at 4.9ghz then 5.0ghz with the Antec H20 920 cooler installed.

To get stability at 4,900mhz and 5,000mhz our particular sample needed over 1.5 volts, which meant that the thermal footprint would run hot under load, around 90c.

We didn't want to kill the processor chasing benchmark figures over the last couple of weeks so backed down to 4.8ghz, which required around 1.475 volts for complete stability. This caused CPU temperatures to drop by around 10c to 80c under load, indicating that our CPU cooler had reached the limit.

Getting the system prime stable wasn't quite as easy as simply changing a few settings, as it required some fine tweaking within the Digi+ Power Control panel. The P9X79 Deluxe certainly doesn't disappoint in this regard, although many of these settings would be rather complicated and confusing for an inexperienced user.

Interestingly, our Core i7 3960X EE sample was stable at 4.7ghz with only 1.41 volts and many of the settings on automatic. We only had one sample at hand so are unable to compare against others. We are sure that 5.0ghz and higher is possible 24/7, with better, more expensive cooling.

Validation at 4.8ghz is available here.

Validation at 4.9ghz is available here.

On this page we overclock some of the processors at 4.6ghz, 4.8ghz and 5.0ghz … measuring and comparing relative performance with Cinebench R11.5 64 bit.

Intel's 6 core processor designs absolutely dominate this benchmark and there are some interesting results to take from the graph above. When the Core i7 2700k is overclocked to 5ghz it manages to outperform the reference clocked 990X, at one third of the price. However when we compare the Core i7 2700k @ 5ghz to the reference clocked Core i7 3960X EE @ 3.3ghz it falls short, scoring 9.73 points, compared against 11.39 points. The new architecture is showing considerable performance related improvements when powering the Cinema4D engine.

When the Core i7 990X EE is overclocked to 5ghz it manages to outperform the reference clocked Core i7 3960X EE producing a score of 12.13 points compared against 11.39 points. When we overclock the Core i7 3960X EE however, the performance is literally in a class of its own, with nothing even in the same zone. 14 points at 4.8ghz is an incredible result.

On this page we overclock some of the processors at 4.6ghz, 4.8ghz and 5.0ghz … measuring and comparing relative performance with SiSoft Sandra 2011.

Not really much to say, as the results speak for themselves. The Core i7 3960X EE dominates the charts, yet again.

CyberLink MediaEspresso 6 is the successor to CyberLink MediaShow Espresso 5.5. With its further optimized CPU/GPU-acceleration, MediaEspresso is an even faster way to convert not only your video but also your music and image files between a wide range of popular formats.

Now you can easily playback and display your favourite movies, songs and photos not just on your mobile phone, iPad, PSP, Xbox, or Youtube and Facebook channels but also on the newly launched iPhone 4. Compile, convert and enjoy images and songs on any of your computing devices and enhance your videos with CyberLink’s built-in TrueTheater Technology.

New and Improved Features

• Ultra Fast Media Conversion – With support from the Intel Core i-Series processor family, ATI Stream & NVIDIA CUDA, MediaEspresso’s Batch-Conversion function enables multiple files to be transcoded simultaneously.
• Smart Detect Technology – MediaEspresso 6 automatically detects the type of portable device connected to the PC and selects the best multimedia profile to begin the conversion without the need for user’s intervention.
• Direct Sync to Portable Devices – Video, audio and image files can be transferred in a few easy steps to mobile phones including those from Acer, BlackBerry, HTC, Samsung, LG, Nokia, Motorola, Sony Ericsson, and Palm, as well as Sony Walkman and PSP devices.
• Enhanced Video Quality – CyberLink TrueTheater Denoise and Lighting enables the enhancement of video quality through optical noise filters and automatic brightness adjustment.
• Video, Music and Image File Conversion – Convert not only videos to popular formats such as AVI, MPEG, MKV, H.264/AVC, and FLV at the click of a button, but also images such as JPEG and PNG and music files like WMA, MP3 and M4A.
• Online Sharing – Conversion to video formats used by popular social networking websites and a direct upload feature means posting videos to Facebook and YouTube has never been easier.

For our testing today we are converting a 3.3GB 720p MKV file (2h:12mins) to Apple Mp4 format for playback on a portable device. This is a common procedure for many people and will give a good indication of system power. We are using the newest version which has been optimised for Sandybridge processors.

Graphics acceleration is disabled to measure pure processor performance.

As noted earlier in the review, this particular benchmark doesn't stress all cores to 100%, however core efficiency and clock speed do matter. The Core i7 2700k @ 5ghz, manages to outperform the Core i7 3960X EE @ 3.3ghz, but when we overclock the 3960X EE to 4.8ghz it is over one minute faster than the overclocked 2700k.

PCMark 7 includes 7 PC tests for Windows 7, combining more than 25 individual workloads covering storage, computation, image and video manipulation, web browsing and gaming. Specifically designed to cover the full range of PC hardware from netbooks and tablets to notebooks and desktops, PCMark 7 offers complete PC performance testing for Windows 7 for home and business use.

When overclocked to 4.8ghz, performance increases significantly. If we analyse the Video playback and transcoding/ Video transcoding – downscaling score, it increases from 8088kb/s to 12101kb/s. Direct X 9 graphics performance also increase by 10 fps while web browsing and decrypting/data decrypting increases from 133.80MB/s to 164.10 MB/s. These are significant gains all round.

3DMark 11 is designed for testing DirectX 11 hardware running on Windows 7 and Windows Vista the benchmark includes six all new benchmark tests that make extensive use of all the new features in DirectX 11 including tessellation, compute shaders and multi-threading.

After running the tests 3DMark gives your system a score with larger numbers indicating better performance. Trusted by gamers worldwide to give accurate and unbiased results, 3DMark 11 is the best way to test DirectX 11 under game-like loads.

If you want to learn more about this benchmark, or to buy it yourself, head over to this page.

When we overclock the Core i7 3960X EE to 4.8ghz the physics score increases from 12696 points to 14960 points, which is a noticeable improvement. It only affects the overall score by around 200 points however.

On this page we will test a few of our comparison systems against the Core i7 3960X EE and Asus P9X79 System with two XFX HD6870 Black Editions running in Crossfire. We will be using a couple of game engines at various settings.

The Core i7 3960X EE System scores a couple more frames per second when compared against the Core i7 990X at the same clock speeds.

Noticeable frame rate increases when comparing the systems, side by side at lower quality settings.

At these low settings, the Core i7 3960X system manages to pull out ahead by around 16 fps average, generating around 300 fps.

Power consumption is a hot topic of conversation in recent months as people are paying more attention to their electricity bills and overall energy footprint.

We used a calibrated meter to measure the power at the wall.

Firstly we analysed the power drain when all systems were at reference clock speeds (Core i7 3960X EE @ 3.3ghz, Core i5 2500k @ 3.3ghz, Core i7 2600k @ 3.4ghz, Core i7 2700k @ 3.5ghz and FX 8150 @ 3.6ghz).

All systems were loaded with Cinebench R11.5 64 bit.

Next we overclocked the processors, increasing voltage settings.

Considering the performance, the overclocked load results are surprisingly good, only consuming 36 watts more than the AMD FX 8150, even though its running 200mhz faster.

Above, we recorded power at the socket when running the last test in 3DMark 11 – stressing both CPU (3960X EE @ 4.8ghz) and GPU (HD6990 – 880 mhz).

We used an Enermax Platimax 1200W for all our reviews today, we highly recommend it.

Asus P9X79 Deluxe Motherboard

Asus have a fantastic reputation for creating some of the finest motherboards available to the enthusiast audience. I have been very impressed with their latest P9X79 Deluxe motherboard since I started testing some time ago. The UEFI bios is fully featured, intuitive and capable of achieving some fantastic, stable, overclocked speeds.

Particularly impressive is the Digi Power section of the bios, which can often help to enhance system stability in high overclocked situations, when all else fails. If we used a hardcore watercooling solution we are positive that 5ghz+ would have been possible from the 3960X EE. As it is, the compact and affordable ‘all in one liquid cooler' was able to hit a stable clock of 4.9ghz, although with the voltage required it wouldn't be feasible long term.

Memory support is also flawless and we achieved almost 40GB/s of memory bandwidth with 32GB of 1600mhz Corsair DDR3 installed. We later checked and found that it posted perfectly fine with 2133mhz memory, if you want even more performance from the system. We will focus on 2,400mhz DDR3 testing with another ASUS motherboard in a separate X79 launch review today.

In regards to connectivity, we have no complaints regarding the P9X79 Deluxe motherboard – it is fully loaded and SATA 3 performance was as good as we have experienced with other high end systems.

ASUS have informed us that pricing for the P9X79 Deluxe will be around £279.99 in the UK, so the price tag clearly reflects the luxury ‘deluxe' status. That said, we feel it offers good value, especially when factoring in the feature list, overclocking capabilities and exceptionally powerful bios configuration.

Pros:

• UEFI bios is fully featured.
• Stable when pushed very hard.
• Great memory support and bandwidth results.
• Solid board layout.

Cons:

• It isn't cheap.

Kitguru says: A fantastic partner motherboard for the Core i7 3960X Extreme Edition and works well with a wide variety of memory modules, even in a 32GB configuration.

Intel Core i7 3960X Extreme Edition Processor

I use the X58 platform on a regular basis, between multi monitor work based environments and for bursts of gaming …. on the rare occasion that I manage to get some downtime that is. Intel's 970, 980X and 990X have been personal favourites of mine now for some time, but X58 was long overdue a refresh. We can safely say that the Core i7 3960X Extreme Edition has rewritten the performance charts, even before we get to overclocking.

Intel are promoting the new X79 platform as a ‘master of all trades', and we fail to find a valid argument against this. It can not only outperform any system on the market when it comes to gaming prowess, but for more serious duties such as 3D rendering and video encoding it is without question, in a class of its own.

While the Core architecture is both efficient and brutally powerful on a clock per core basis, the quad channel memory architecture is responsible for further enhancing the overall system performance. SiSoft Sandra gives an indication of almost 40 GB/s of bandwidth available from this 1600mhz Quad channel configuration, which is roughly double the performance of the previous generation at the same clock speed.

Overclocking the Core i7 3960X EE is relatively easy, with our sample needing a little more ‘Digi Power' bios tuning after pushing past 4.7ghz. Intel supplied a reference sheet with their DX79SI motherboard which said it should only need around 1.44 volts to achieve 4.8ghz, but all chips will vary, even from within the same batch.

Achieving 4.7ghz with our sample only required 1.41 volts and we would probably run this CPU at that speed 24/7. It really will depend on your cooling solution, but there is definitely plenty of headroom in the right hands, even with a mainstream ‘all in one' liquid cooler. In the hands of the hardcore overclockers we are sure that some crazy, yet stable 5.2ghz+ speeds will be possible.

AMD have unfortunately not released a solution to target this ultra high end enthusiast sector and we are left with the latest FX 8150 Black Edition, which in reality fails to even outclass Intel's ‘mainstream high end' Core i7 2600k or 2700k. That said, we were surprised to see that the FX 8150 could actually demand more watts at the socket than this i7 3960X EE, depending on the settings.

UK pricing has not yet been confirmed for the i7 3960X Extreme Edition, but as we said earlier in the review, we would make an educated guess around £800 inc vat. Sure its expensive, but like the last generation 970, 980X and 990X this new chip redefines the ultra high end enthusiast market. A selection of the enthusiast audience will be willing to pay for this.

Pros:

• Sets a new performance level.
• Great overclocking capabilities, only limited by the cooling solution.
• Quad Channel memory architecture is a significant new technology.
• Ideal for 3D Rendering and video encoding.
• Power consumption demands are relatively modest at reference settings.

Cons:

• It is a significant financial investment.

Kitguru says: If performance is your primary concern then the Core i7 3960X EE should be right at the top of your shortlist.

32GB Corsair Vengeance Memory

If you are building a new Core i7 3960X EE system and want a very high memory count, then it doesn't have to cost a fortune. An 8GB kit of Corsair Vengeance 1600mhz CL9 memory is currently on offer for less than half price at Amazon, retailing for only £41 including VAT. To fully populate the Asus P9X79 Deluxe motherboard with 32GB of memory will cost only £164 inc vat (free delivery). It really is hard to believe because I can remember a time when 4GB of memory cost more than this.

Four of the 8GB Corsair Vengeance memory bundles works flawlessly with the Asus P9X79 Deluxe motherboard and delivers almost 40 GB/s of memory bandwith in a Quad channel configuration … more than enough for even the most demanding 3D rendering and video encoding tasks.

Pros:

• Inexpensive.
• good heatspreader design.
• work great with this Asus P9X79 Deluxe motherboard.
• Stable.

Cons:

• There are faster options if you spend more money.

Kitguru says: A really inexpensive option if you need a high memory count for serious duties.

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