Intel X299 CPU's NOT soldered!

[asim1999]

 

Quote

he world renowned overclocker der8auer has confirmed that Intel's upcoming Skylake-X and Kaby Lake-X CPUs will not be using a soldered IHS, a first for an Intel High-end desktop (HEDT)  platform. 

 

This presents a number of issues, the largest of which being the thermal performance of these new CPUs, especially when overclocked. It is already well known that non-soldered Intel CPUs can have huge thermal benefits when running with an aftermarket thermal interface material, creating the modern craze known as delidding for Intel CPUs. 

 

With Skylake-X and Kaby Lake-X, Intel has decided to use a thermal compound/thermal interface material (TIM) to transfer heat from the CPU to the CPU's integrated heat spreader (IHS), allowing Intel to save time and money when manufacturing these new CPUs. 

The problems that arise from using non-soldered CPUs occur because the TIM used by Intel will not have the same thermal conductivity as a directly soldered CPU, which will cause Intel's CPUs to run hotter, especially when overclocked.  

Quote

This is the first time that Intel has not soldered their high-end desktop CPUs, a move which will no doubt force overclockers to delid their "premium" CPU in order to achieve the same thermal efficiency as Intel's last generation hardware. This move will no doubt be seen negatively by PC enthusiasts, especially after they learn how expensive a proper delidding tool can be.  

 

Is this some kind of joke? high prices for these CPUs and they are still using crappy TIM? Glad my 5820K is soldered tho

Source: https://www.overclock3d.net/news/cpu_mainboard/intel_s_skylake-x_and_kaby_lake-x_cpus_will_not_be_soldered/1

[captain cactus]

1 minute ago, asim1999 said:

Is this some kind of joke?

Nope, this is Intel's way of keeping product margins high while gimping on pretty much the tiniest of stuff like TIM, no matter how important it is.

[zMeul]

oh noes! what will you do 

[ARikozuM]

There's no point to soldering, IMO. The risks don't outweigh the benefits.

 

Hopefully they add enough TIM this time though.

 

Edit: Apparently X299 CPU's are large enough to warrant soldered heatspreaders. 

[Kinda Bottlenecked]

NO WORRIES! Just get der8auer's new Delid Die Mate X!! 

[Morgan MLGman]

I guess the point of the post is not about soldering itself, but Intel having a history with poor thermal performance of their non-soldered CPUs (Haswell, Kaby Lake for example), whether due to poor TIM or IHS contact with the die itself. This might indicate issues for people who want to overclock.

 

It's a good-to-know info but doesn't mean anything until real-world testing is conducted.

[Dabombinable]

3 minutes ago, ARikozuM said:

There's no point to soldering, IMO. The risks don't outweigh the benefits.

 

Hopefully they add enough TIM this time though.

The temperatures of CPU with soldered on IHS are far better as metal is a far better thermal conductor than any TIM currently available. Just look at the clock speeds+temps managed by Sandybridge with its soldered on IHS+32nm node compared to its successors.

[HKZeroFive]

Aren't Xeons soldered? If I'm dropping $2000 on a CPU, I'd want it soldered.

 

Looking forward to see the temps on that 18-core.

[Valentyn]

@asim1999 video of Der8bauer delidding Skylake X and Kabylake X.
 

 

[tom_w141]

Lol oh no. They just don't care at all. 2 months from now there will be an Intel statement saying "to prevent higher temps don't overclock your X299 CPUs".

 

Unfortunately it is because of the tolerance of us the consumer that they get away with this. If people had a shred of a backbone and made enough noise they'd soon be improved.

[The Owl]

Maybe their TIM is a special compound made out of hopes and dreams.

[Jahramika]

Come on all you Intel lovers got nothing bad to say about this crap from Intel? Shit if this was AMD you would all be spitting blood in your comments.

[JuztBe]

People justified standard i7s not being soldered because die was too small and could crack. What will it be now?

[ARikozuM]

1 minute ago, JuztBe said:

People justified standard i7s not being soldered because die was too small and could crack. What will it be now?

Rule #1 Choose your battles.

Rule #2 You will never satisfy all parties involved. 

Rule #3...

Spoiler

 

[Guest]

14 minutes ago, Jahramika said:

Come on all you Intel lovers got nothing bad to say about this crap from Intel? Shit if this was AMD you would all be spitting blood in your comments.

Nah, their fanboys... 

[Gibbons]

Those temps are going to be crazy. The 7700k gets pretty hot when overclocking (without de-lid). Now imagine increasing the TDP by 50%, doubling/tripling the cores and trying to keep that cool. De-lidding is likely going to be mandatory for overclocking these things and that means losing your warranty.

 

I wonder what has changed since Broadwell-E and Haswell-E etc. were all soldered in the past.

[ARikozuM]

1 minute ago, Gibbons said:

I wonder what has changed since Broadwell-E and Haswell-E etc. were all soldered in the past.

Expansion and contraction of solder was found to possibly cause breakage of the core as micro-fissures formed.

[Gibbons]

6 minutes ago, ARikozuM said:

Expansion and contraction of solder was found to possibly cause breakage of the core as micro-fissures formed.

That issue is a risk for Broadwell-E as well. It was deemed an acceptable risk then but not now for Skylake-X.

 

edit - I wonder if the package is thinner and that is what could cause higher failures.

[juri-han]

hmm void warranty on $2000 cpu or have my house burn down ... thanks intel, delidding has been shown to lower temps by 30c i cant wait to see what it does for the 18 core 

[ARikozuM]

Just now, Gibbons said:

That issue is a risk for Broadwell-E as well. It was deemed an acceptable risk then but not now for Skylake-X.

As the dies get smaller, the issue increases.

 

I believe that @Enderman and @DocSwag know more.

[DocSwag]

5 minutes ago, ARikozuM said:

As the dies get smaller, the issue increases.

 

I believe that @Enderman and @DocSwag know more.

Honestly though I'm surprised that they didn't at least solder the higher end SKUs. The dies should be large enough to make it feasible. Intel has soldered dies around 200 mm^2 in the past. 

 

If you want people that know more on the subject than me, @MageTank, @done12many2, and @Lays are probably better people to ask. Most of what I know is from the thing der8auer wrote on overclocked.net  

[MageTank]

People, calm down a little. We do not have any confirmations on the larger Skylake-X CPU's being unsoldered as well. For all we know, this could be something that is exclusive to the 8c and below SKU's. 

 

41 minutes ago, JuztBe said:

People justified standard i7s not being soldered because die was too small and could crack. What will it be now?

That "justification" was real. Physics doesn't lie. This on the other hand, seems to be Intel being blatantly cheap. I refuse to believe that the bigger X299 SKU's are not soldered, as AVX512 would kill those things if they were not. We already see throttling under AVX2 loads on stock TIM on normal consumer-grade SKU's. Multiply that core count by 4.5 and you are bound to see extreme thermals, especially if it's a single monolithic die. Yields on these things have to be low.

[Humbug]

5 hours ago, ARikozuM said:

There's no point to soldering, IMO. The risks don't outweigh the benefits.

Isn't Ryzen soldered?

Seems to work fine. What's the risk?

[Dylanc1500]

14 minutes ago, DocSwag said:

Honestly though I'm surprised that they didn't at least solder the higher end SKUs. The dies should be large enough to make it feasible. Intel has soldered dies around 200 mm^2 in the past. 

 

If you want people that know more on the subject than me, @MageTank, @done12many2, and @Lays are probably better people to ask. Most of what I know is from the thing der8auer wrote on overclocked.net  

I could see issues if someone was to start pushing these things hard with AVX-512. It would explain the TDP jump as well.

 

Edit: dang @MageTank beat me to it.

[Valentyn]

4 minutes ago, Humbug said:

Isn't Ryzen soldered?

Seems to work fine. What's the risk?

Yes it is, also runs cooler than Kabylake which isn't.

The 7700K can drop temps as much as 23-30 degrees if you delid it and replace the TIM on it.

The fear is that because of the increase TDP on Skylake X + number of cores + possibly bad TIM = very hot temps.