Better bang for buck: 1156 vs 1366

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I want to make a new gaming rig. I do plan on spending quite a bit, but not waste money. I believe ars technica would categorize it as hot rod..

I want to get a $300 (+/- $100) Intel Core i7.

Whats are the practical differences between the 1156 and 1366 sockets and associated chipsets? More importantly, what should i get?

wag2639

Posted 2010-08-16T06:19:15.313

Reputation: 5 568

Question was closed 2010-08-16T09:32:24.310

Question as it is now is off topic, since shopping recommendations are. Voting to close... "Whats are the practical differences between the 1156 and 1366 sockets and associated chipsets?" could be a valid question though... ;) wink wink – BloodPhilia – 2010-08-16T09:27:16.540

I agree with @BloodpHilia. Also SU is not a shopping suggestion site. – BinaryMisfit – 2010-08-16T09:34:08.830

I don't know... I mean, if he had just said, "What are the practical differences between the 1156 and 1366 sockets and associated chipsets?", would it have been ok?

Just because he framed it in the form of a shopping recommendation doesn't take away the fact that at the heart of the inquiry is a legitimate question. – Ryan – 2010-08-16T19:08:14.443

All of them basically seem down to cost, which makes it shopping. i guess I could ask for relative performance, but then I'd just used that to compare to relative price. – wag2639 – 2010-08-18T05:12:10.690

Answers

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practical differences between the 1156 and 1366 sockets

1366 supports triple channel memory (i.e. 3 DIMMS in parallel), and the highest specification CPUs (i7 9xx).

So to gain advantage of spending extra to get the larger socket you need to spend more on the CPU and memory as well.

Note, some comparisons of 1366 based systems running with two and three memory channels operating found very little difference; apparently Intel have said the real benefit comes with six-core CPUs.

Richard

Posted 2010-08-16T06:19:15.313

Reputation: 8 152

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Overclockers has a breakdown comparison between the two.

Their conclusion:

Everyone will need to reach their own conclusions on this one. The results might make it easier or more difficult for someone to decide between P55/Lynnfield (1156) and X58/Bloomfield (1366) as their next upgrade. When clocked identically, they are close in performance as one might expect. The tough decision will be how much extra will you be willing to shell out for the added performance?

Overall, P55/Lynnfield is cheaper (even now), performs very similar and uses less power to do it. It will likely become even more of a bargain the further we move away from the recent launch and prices decline.

On the other hand, X58/Bloomfield is still king if you need every last drop of performance and every single point on benchmarks.

Ryan

Posted 2010-08-16T06:19:15.313

Reputation: 1 488