Ghetto Intel Core i7 from CHINA for $100!!

[X_X]

6 hours ago, Bitter said:

I'll keep my fingers crossed!

Thanks, you must have magic fingers

 

 

After taking some pics before the delid there seemed like there was a crack or maybe it was just an illusion.

 

 

Thumb nail between the heat spreader and BGA substrate in that corner and it came off in my hand chief! A little surprised how easy it was as it seemed to be stuck on solid. Now have to go out and get some cleaning stuff. Haven't decided how to brace for the socket, might even reuse the spreader as the idea seems good, although would mean double TIM. They say indecision is the key to flexibility and at the moment I'm trying to be very flexible.  

[Bitter]

So that looks like that awful grey goo stuff that costs 50 cents a tube, the old gritty silicone compound. If that IHS isn't aluminum I vote for liquid metal treatment! You can insulate the components on the sides of the dies with E6000 craft glue, I use that to protect circuit boards and wiring that are exposed to the elements, good stuff. Does it look like a standard copper IHS would fit on there, that one looks kind of weird shaped?

[X_X]

Not sure what was used but many TIM's look that color. After some trial and error looks like my H100i is causing thermals to be bad. Whether air in there or possibly fouling on the close caps to the socket idk. Short story I swapped to my trusty old Raystorm WB with CPU socket clamp removed from the mainboard and using bare die with a little duct tape to hold it in. Now with 4.344GHz @ 1.25V CBR15 runs up to 140W and temperature increases about 30C from idle so not too bad (IGD and L4 disabled).

 

Don't know what the tolerance is with 2 dies present and wether it would be a problem with LM. I doubt the standard IHS would fit but there seems to be more than one type on the market. See here and delided here. Quite a few people saying they are running hot and that also seems to show in the CPU-Z top 15, except for the guy at the top IIRC.

[Bitter]

Interesting, so these are maybe not the best for overclocking but 140W for 4.3Ghz across 4 cores and 8 threads isn't too bad. I assume that's all 4 cores at 4.3?

 

That other style IHS with the delid doesn't look like high quality compound either. The dies do look large enough that doing bare should still have satisfactory contact across the cooler though you won't get it even across multiple heat pipes if using air, less of an issue with water cooling though. I can't fathom the two dies being at different heights, they must be on the same horizontal plane so that liquid metal and a good copper IHS would be fine.

[X_X]

All cores at 26x 167MHz. Found this blog in Russian Google Translate English that contains a lot of useful info. The mention of corner glue is something I was previously wondering about, it should help with ball stress and it's not used on these adapters.

 

I've not used LM ever so maybe just being a little over concerned at pump out. Using Gelid Extreme here.

[Bitter]

That is some great information, I don't feel so bad about the crappy looking IHS now knowing it can be fixed. Also really good knowing that the giant L4 cache really does make a noticeable difference in performance.

 

If you warm the liquid metal some and warm the application tip with a hair dryer or similar before applying it's supposed to come out easier, or just put some on something else then apply it to the CPU/IHS by hand. Would those graphite pads work?

[X_X]

I've not used graphite pads either but from what I've read if everything isn't in just the right position results can be really poor IOW might be a bit fiddly.

 

FWIW a comparison of WinRaR bench @ 4GHz with L4 and with L4 disabled.

 

L4 enabled

 

L4 Disabled

 

@AntonyL I've done a 12 minute plus run @4.4GHz with C-States disabled to keep the power draw above 60W. You can see there isn't any power throttling so hopefully this proves the 47W TDP rating which can be exceeded by over 4 times BTW, isn't limited to 47W but dependent on what is set through BIOS or other means.

[Bitter]

Am I reading that result correctly, that the L4 enabled nearly doubled that Winrar performance?

 

I've ordered mine, same style you have, and once I'm sure it works properly I'm planning to delid, hone the IHS like the russians did, then liquid metal it. Or if I can find a better lid that's nickel plated, I'd prefer that. I wonder, again, if a heat spreader from something like 8th gen stuff would work? The shape and thickness looks pretty good in photos. Maybe I'll email Silicon Lottery to see if they have a few heat spreaders they can sell me.

 

Ok so there's something called Low-phosphorus electroless nickel plating, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electroless_nickel_plating

I wonder if that would do the do for protecting an IHS from gallium and if it would be do-able at home in small mason jar scale?

 

Edit: Been googling metal plating at home. I can totally do that and in GOLD over the copper IHS, I have a CC/CV buck/boost driver I use for keeping a LiFePO4 battery in my Celica topped up when not driving, I have a spare circuit board for that setup. I don't have a hot plate but I could wing it or just it would take a lot longer at lower temps. It's like $20-40 for some 24k gold plate solution on eBay. I also know a jeweler who can probably send it out to be plated professionally and polished up probably too! I could end up with a Core i7 GOLD edition hahahaha

[X_X]

That particular bench (winrar) shows a huge gain but for something like CBR15 there's not a great difference.

 

With eDRAM enabled.

 

With eDRAM disabled

 

For my chip frequency/voltage scaling up to 4.4GHz is okay but starts getting ugly after that. Hope yours works out great.

[Bitter]

I'm on air and it's for the htpc so 4 to 4.2 is plenty for me for now. I may do a water loop in the future and push it more.

 

As for the gold plate IHS it sounds like fun so I'll see how that pans out if I need to lap the included IHS.

[f4llacy]

I am currently using an i5 4690k on a MSI z97 motherboard.  Thinking about buying one of these CPUs since BFV is very cpu dependent and apparently can benefit from a hyperthreaded CPU. 

 

I see this seller on ebay has a variety of these types of cpus for sale. 

https://www.ebay.com/str/hugohk/CPU/_i.html?_storecat=32448194018

The highest model they have is a i7 5950HQ.  Checking the CPU specs and it does seem like its worth paying the premium for it though.  Sweet spot for price/performance looks to be the i7 4960HQ especially since I plan on overclocking it anyway.  

 

What does everyone else think?

[X_X]

IMO

1. Prices seem a little high

2. Many reports of high temperatures so some work may be required with the attached heat spreader.

3. No corner glue which may or may not effect lifetime of the CPU due to ball stress, perhaps something can be added.

4. Broadwell (5950HQ) maybe limited to maximum ratio of 44x for one core active and 43x for all cores and cache ratio lower than that but considering Broadwell generally doesn't overclock that well then may not be an issue. Might not support BCLK straps either but may support changing of eDRAM (L4 cache) ratio.

5. Read the Russian blog linked earlier, lots of useful info there.

6. Resale might be difficult.

 

Might be better sticking with the 4690k but if you do decide to go ahead then please post some 4690k vs ???? results.

[MattPaul]

Hi everybody, did anyone of you tried out the Intel GPU output? Does it work? Would be a nice cheap beast combined with the P106-6G - GTX 1060 mining card.

 

Thanks

[Bitter]

My CPU is delayed for 'a while' due to some festival, even though they marked it as shipped it had yet to be shipped (or even made possibly).

[Herman Mcpootis]

9 hours ago, Bitter said:

My CPU is delayed for 'a while' due to some festival, even though they marked it as shipped it had yet to be shipped (or even made possibly).

Good luck, Chinese new year is a full 2 weeks break for China.

[X_X]

15 hours ago, MattPaul said:

Hi everybody, did anyone of you tried out the Intel GPU output? Does it work? Would be a nice cheap beast combined with the P106-6G - GTX 1060 mining card.

 

Thanks

Seems to work for MSI Z97 G5 but haven't run it for long, normally have it disabled.

[Bitter]

12 hours ago, Herman Mcpootis said:

Good luck, Chinese new year is a full 2 weeks break for China.

Yeah, it was marked as shipped about a week after I ordered it on 12-20-18, then after 3 weeks the tracking never updated so in mid January they said it was cause of the festival for New years except Chinese New year festival wasn't during that time. Whatever, I said I'd wait so I'll wait. It's not killing me not having it.

[X_X]

@Bitter that sucks, should have got it by now I would have thought. Check that it doesn't run past your dispute date.

 

@MattPaul running the 1050Ti through the 4980HQ frame buffer seems to work although a couple of times at W7 loading to desktop it would report a TDR reset (display adapter not responding). Probably a driver issue but a heads up just in case. Just a case of me forgetting I was using 125MHz BCLK and hadn't increased the Graphics core voltage.

[Bitter]

[derail]They extended the processing time so I should be ok but I'll ask for an estimated date this weekend. As you can see in my other thread I've gotten a stop gap low power i5 4460S which I am just smitten with! I'm loving that low TDP processing power, I'll be swapping it into the current HTPC while I'm waiting for the i7 to arrive for the new HTPC build. The i3 4130 can go in something else, it's always been kind of "meh" but for the most part worked fine just runs warm on the stock heat sink. I have a copper core stock cooler which runs quieter supposedly, so that'll go in at the same time. It's showing 20W less TDP at full load than the i3 so a stock heatsink should be just fine if it keeps the 60ishW i3 just under thermal throttle. [/derail]

[Bitter]

Well now they're saying the factory can't make it and they want to refund me via paypal. Why is everything I do a debacle lately? Anyone know where someone is still selling a 4980HQ for 1150? I found one on eBay for $250 with DHL shipping but that's just too much.

[Herman Mcpootis]

1 hour ago, Bitter said:

Well now they're saying the factory can't make it and they want to refund me via paypal. Why is everything I do a debacle lately? Anyone know where someone is still selling a 4980HQ for 1150? I found one on eBay for $250 with DHL shipping but that's just too much.

https://item.taobao.com/item.htm?spm=a230r.1.14.13.450c7dbavgEBV3&id=585301244211&ns=1&abbucket=9#detail

you can try finding a 3rd party agent to ship it to you.

[Bitter]

eBay seller says they're going to update the listing, it's got a nicer looking IHS more like the Intel one without chrome finish and laser marking but with LM already applied, or so they claim. As soon as they do that I'll just buy that one, hopefully.  Not too keen on a re-shipper. If this doesn't work out I think I'll just give up and wait a decade or so for the 4790K to become reasonably priced! No I'll just build something else and use my low power i5 4590S which will do just fine, I got caught up in having something weird and unique so... pfffft we see how that goes.

Some sellers are now listing some Broadwell mobile CPU's for 1150, but I have only 87 stuff and Broadwell lacks the 128MB cache I'm curious about.

One point of concern I've noticed but is likely moot, Intel specs this for DDR3L. Will it do fine with standard DDR3 or will that stress the memory controller?

[X_X]

@Bitter Maybe it's a sign that you don't need one

 

The thing with the DDR3/L is laptop manufacturers possibly cheaped out on the VR for memory with a fixed 1.35V and didn't seem too keen to say that was the reason why DDR3 might have problems. I'm running 1.5V with the Z97 and if I had some decent stuff I might run 1.65V. I also have a mini ITX board that has a switchable 1.3V/1.5V for the memory and takes mobile Haswell PGA CPU's, I ran that at 1.5V with DDR3L SO-DIMM.

 

 

Might want a read what famous overclocker has to say on voltages.

https://www.pcgamer.com/pro-overclocker-der8auer-on-why-the-race-to-add-cpu-cores-doesnt-make-any-sense-and-why-you-should-still-overclock/

[Bitter]

Kind of what I figured, thank you. My 1.65V 1866 will be fine

My Z87 board maxes at 1.8V for the memory, I was playing around with that some last night seeing how far I could push some OCZ 1333 CL7 I found but I went to bed before I finished and was seeing diminishing gains anyway. At 1.8V they were obviously running hot and with CL12 they'd hit almost 1900 but I wasn't comfortable with that voltage long term, despite OCZ guaranteeing them to 1.95V. I don't have a good way to cool them because of CPU cooler overhang, I could fab something goofy like some L shaped aluminum to adhere to both sides of the stick but I'm not going to go that far. I could probably relax timings more and get them running OK with something around 1.75V, at 1.725 they weren't stable and neither was I at that point.

 

Curious, what board do you have that takes mobile CPU's? An Asrock probably?

[X_X]

Asrock IMB180, spec's here.

 

Note that part of those spec's is for support for both DDR3 and DDR3L with mobile Haswell.

 

Quote

 

Memory

• Technology
  - Dual Channel DDR3/DDR3L 1066 / 1333 / 1600 MHz SDRAM
• Max.
  - 16GB
• Socket
  - 2 x SO-DIMM