Zombie Mods - The I9 Steambox

[ALXAndy]

 

Hi guys and girls. With The Dark Carnival coming to a close (one more modding session will complete it) I was going to be at a loose end. Then a conversation began on another forum I frequent about Westmere Xeons and which ones work with X58 boards. 

 

A few weeks back whilst at my brother's house I found a box that I had stashed there a couple of years back. It was a EVGA shipping carton. Inside I found this -

 

 

It's the board out of my old Alienware Aurora. It's manufactured by MSI (look at the code number's font).

 

Any way, the conversation continued and I decided to start looking to see what a hex cored Xeon (Westmere) might cost. I'm rather strapped for cash so I set myself a budget of £45 which to be honest was completely unrealistic. A few days passed and I continued to hawk Ebay and then I found this.

 

 

For exactly £48. It said it was a hex cored Xeon so I put the serial number into Google, as the date on the CPU didn't quite add up. It turns out (after finding a website in China and then translating it into English) that the chip was actually a prototype I9. Looking at the date and doing a bit of research it would seem Intel had hex cored CPUs planned in 2008. However, for some reason or another they never made the light of day. Maybe it was that AMD had nothing to make it worth it, or poor support from software, who knows? either way one of them is on its way to me.

 

So now I needed a case. I did not want to spend any more money just yet in case it won't post (though I do have confirmation from Dell that the X58 express chipset will work with any Westmere so long as you have the 980x bios on) but I decided to spend some time digging on Amazon as I was rather excited. I found this.

 

 

For £18 delivered (half price !) so I just could not resist.

 

Other hardware will be a GTX 670 Jetstream and numerous left over parts from Dark Carnival. I'll probably hack the living daylights out of it to be honest.

 

The build will be themed in blue and black..

 

More soon

[SAV1OUR]

Hi guys and girls. With The Dark Carnival coming to a close (one more modding session will complete it) I was going to be at a loose end. Then a conversation began on another forum I frequent about Westmere Xeons and which ones work with X58 boards. 

 

A few weeks back whilst at my brother's house I found a box that I had stashed there a couple of years back. It was a EVGA shipping carton. Inside I found this -

 

 

It's the board out of my old Alienware Aurora. It's manufactured by MSI (look at the code number's font).

 

Any way, the conversation continued and I decided to start looking to see what a hex cored Xeon (Westmere) might cost. I'm rather strapped for cash so I set myself a budget of £45 which to be honest was completely unrealistic. A few days passed and I continued to hawk Ebay and then I found this.

 

 

For exactly £48. It said it was a hex cored Xeon so I put the serial number into Google, as the date on the CPU didn't quite add up. It turns out (after finding a website in China and then translating it into English) that the chip was actually a prototype I9. Looking at the date and doing a bit of research it would seem Intel had hex cored CPUs planned in 2008. However, for some reason or another they never made the light of day. Maybe it was that AMD had nothing to make it worth it, or poor support from software, who knows? either way one of them is on its way to me.

 

So now I needed a case. I did not want to spend any more money just yet in case it won't post (though I do have confirmation from Dell that the X58 express chipset will work with any Westmere so long as you have the 980x bios on) but I decided to spend some time digging on Amazon as I was rather excited. I found this.

 

 

For £18 delivered (half price !) so I just could not resist.

 

Other hardware will be a GTX 670 Jetstream and numerous left over parts from Dark Carnival. I'll probably hack the living daylights out of it to be honest.

 

The build will be themed in blue and black..

 

More soon

holyshit thats wack 

prototype i9 thats sweet  

[wng_kingsley7]

Lol Holy balls

[Havoc]

The dates on the top of the CPU never match up with the release date of the product... Look at the top of a i7 4770k it will say '11 on it.

 

And with regards to BIOS - it's unlikely that you will find one which works with that CPU. BIOS compatibility on a particular platform is usually related to the processor Stepping. Due to the fact it is an Intel Confidential QSpec product, you will have no idea what stepping it actually is, and it is unlikely that there will be a BIOS publicly available that is compatible.

 

When Dell say "any Westmere" they mean publicly available Westmere. 

 

Sorry to be a buzz kill.  :unsure:

[needmorewood]

dude thats amazing!

[ALXAndy]

The dates on the top of the CPU never match up with the release date of the product... Look at the top of a i7 4770k it will say '11 on it.

 

And with regards to BIOS - it's unlikely that you will find one which works with that CPU. BIOS compatibility on a particular platform is usually related to the processor Stepping. Due to the fact it is an Intel Confidential QSpec product, you will have no idea what stepping it actually is, and it is unlikely that there will be a BIOS publicly available that is compatible.

 

When Dell say "any Westmere" they mean publicly available Westmere. 

 

Sorry to be a buzz kill.  :unsure:

 

Do you think I would be that naive?

 

 

 

For a board to support Westmere it simply needs to support the core structure. IE - the amount of cores. The only reason, for example, you needed to update your bios on X58 was to basically increase the core support count. You could run the 980x without it, but you would only see four cores.

 

When Dell say that their boards support any Westmere product they mean the X58 Express chipset.

 

http://forums.bf2s.com/viewtopic.php?pid=2823778

 

Clock speed, multi and FSB are completely irrelevant. If the board supports a 980x then it will support any Westmere hex core because they're all identical.

 

Edit. As for the date? the Xeon hex core was not released until 2010. This means Intel were playing with it two years prior. If you run the sample ID through Google you will find information about an I9.

[Havoc]

 

Do you think I would be that naive?

 

 

For a board to support Westmere it simply needs to support the core structure. IE - the amount of cores. The only reason, for example, you needed to update your bios on X58 was to basically increase the core support count. You could run the 980x without it, but you would only see four cores.

 

When Dell say that their boards support any Westmere product they mean the X58 Express chipset.

 

http://forums.bf2s.com/viewtopic.php?pid=2823778

 

Clock speed, multi and FSB are completely irrelevant. If the board supports a 980x then it will support any Westmere hex core because they're all identical.

 

Edit. As for the date? the Xeon hex core was not released until 2010. This means Intel were playing with it two years prior. If you run the sample ID through Google you will find information about an I9.

 

 

Fair play... Surprised it even turns on an LED... A0 stepping.

 

Good find.

[KrutoyEegrok]

Whats with the alienware logo on the motherboard?

[ErwinS]

Whats with the alienware logo on the motherboard?

Did you even bother reading? "It's the board out of my old Alienware Aurora. It's manufactured by MSI (look at the code number's font)"

[fuse]

Nice, I've actually though about doing a Project build for my friend using X58. He's more into looks than performance, but the X58 chips are still contenders for the top excluding any sort of iGPU. 

[ALXAndy]

More parts sourced thanks to some amazing forumites

 

Some one has donated 4gb of 1333 ram (two 2gb sticks*) to save me being raped with the latest ram prices, and some one has donated me one of these.

 

 

The Intel Extreme cooler that comes with the 980x. I can only use a small air cooler any way, due to the enormous NB on the Alienware board (it's because the board was only designed to take AIO). This will be perfect, given the CPU is 32nm and 60w. I reakon it'll only draw 100w even when OCed as far as I can take it, so this cooler is more than sufficient.

 

* Steam OS should be fine on 4gb. I'm not really bothered about triple channel really.

[ilikemacandpc]

This is awesome. 

 

Dat case though...

 

When you get a new one, upgrade it first. 

 

Also, if you ever get time & money, you could mod an aluminum cover on the motherboard to hide that blue pcb. Sorta like the asus tuf armor. 

 

I think it was done in the Project Zoe Build log. 

[ALXAndy]

This is awesome. 

 

Dat case though...

 

When you get a new one, upgrade it first. 

 

Also, if you ever get time & money, you could mod an aluminum cover on the motherboard to hide that blue pcb. Sorta like the asus tuf armor. 

 

I think it was done in the Project Zoe Build log. 

 

haha don't worry about the case, man. There won't be much left of it by the time I'm done. The entire front panel is coming off and going in the bin. I already have the acrylic sheets to make a front panel for it

 

And the blue motherboard? the build is going to be themed blue and black. Did you see my Dark Carnival mod? well that was the red and black build, this is the blue one

[ALXAndy]

Just pottering around on Ebay and came across this, so I ordered one.

 

 

And then I found these.

 

 

Which will transform the ugly bare ram into colour coded stuff.

[MrFluffyPants]

This looks pretty awesome. Definitely hoping to see more of this soon!  

[atomicmonkey101]

Good idea for an improvised build man!

[Father Fuzzy]

good find on the cpu

 

cool project x58 still has some power behind it..excellent

[ALXAndy]

Thanks guys !

 

I just made a trip to my mother's to pick up the motherboard which was under my old bed lol. I even managed to find the IO shield, which I had here with me (which is really odd because it's been through three house moves and I never lost it, but should have been with the board !).

 

I also picked up my old tiny little glass desk which will become my braiding and soldering station now to save me continually messing up my desk. I made sure to go up into mum's loft and robbed some old cases of their wiring so I have plenty to fit my custom buttons and so on.

[ALXAndy]

Update. So the cooler has fallen through sadly if any one in the UK has one get in touch !

 

I've decided on the colours, and just ordered this.

 

 

I also saw this and thought it was really nice, so I got it too.

 

[alpenwasser]

I totally read that sign as "Intel insicle" at first. :lol:

Does look nice though.

[ALXAndy]

LOL thanks for pointing that out I'll forever read it like that now

 

It's a lot smaller than it looks so it should be OK lol.

[MalcolmSex]

This is so cool. I like your style

[cl_l-CaKe]

this is gonna be interesting *followed*

[ALXAndy]

OK quick update. The CPU has arrived with my friend out in Maryland, he's going to forward it to me in a couple of days. He's also sending me some ram.

The case has been dispatched by Amazon, should be here in a couple of days.

The modding parts are all dispatched, so again, couple of days tops.

 

I've been doing some reading and apparently board manus can actually lock out the Xeons. However, I've also read that Alienware do support them (from the horse's mouth) so it's still unknown as to whether it'll work. I have done as much research as I can though. Either way I can always pick up a I7 and plonk that in if all else fails.

 

My main rig is out of action (need to buy a PS2 keyboard to fix a driver issue) which is a shame because I wanted to start rendering in Sketchup with some general ideas. I may resort to photoshop and do some 2D work.

 

More to come soon and thanks for your kind words.

 

Also - god damn you Alpenwasser !!! Intel INSICLE grrrr :D

 

Edit. So some one has very, very kindly donated a Titan Fenrir cooler to the cause. For this I have ordered a plain black fan as it doesn't have one. I also just ordered these, X10

 

 

As well as 15ft of this.

 

 

This is not the paracord for the PSU, that will be ordered later (100 ft). This is for everything else (fans, button wires and so on).

 

At least then I can make up mod parts without the CPU here and cheaply.

 

Edit 2. And a teaser pic of my actual CPU

 

[alpenwasser]

Also - god damn you Alpenwasser !!! Intel INSICLE grrrr :D

Terribly sorry about that mate.

Zombie Mods - The I9 Intel Insicle Steambox... :lol: