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Intel Hardware

Sandy Bridge-E CPUs Too Hot For Intel? 244

Posted by CmdrTaco from the the-creams-do-nothing dept.
MrSeb writes "Intel's next consumer CPUs — the Sandy Bridge-E — will ship without a heatsink and fan. These new chips, which will feature up to 15MB of L3 cache and integrated four-channel DDR3 and 32x PCI 3.0 controllers will run very hot — potentially up to 180W TDP. Is Intel unable to cool these extreme chips, or is there another reason for the shift? Curiously, Intel will still offer 'sold separately' own-brand cooling solutions for the new chips — so is this merely Intel trying to cut costs for enthusiasts who don't need a stock cooler — or is this the beginnings of Intel branching out into the cooling business?"
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Sandy Bridge-E CPUs Too Hot For Intel? More

Sandy Bridge-E CPUs Too Hot For Intel?

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  • Warranty (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Anonymous Coward on Monday August 15, 2011 @09:21AM (#37093454)

    It is so they can blame customers if the chip dies of overheating.
    If they offer OEM solutions, and the chip overheats, they need to replace it under warranty, guess these chips may have a high chance of dying due to heat

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by mwvdlee ( 775178 )

      And how is that "blame" issue negated by selling the chips and coolers separately?
      If Intel sells a cooler claiming to be sufficient to cool their CPU and it destroys the CPU in the process, are they not to blame?

      • Re:Warranty (Score:5, Insightful)

        by Alex Zepeda ( 10955 ) on Monday August 15, 2011 @09:33AM (#37093606)

        Two words: installation error.

        • Two words: installation error.

          Oh, you better fucking believe it. Let's see how many defective chips get replaced now...better keep your lawyer in the loop next time you build a machine.

          • Re:Warranty (Score:4, Informative)

            by Lehk228 ( 705449 ) on Monday August 15, 2011 @10:17AM (#37094122) Journal
            or just buy an AMD, you can still buy them with pretty nice OEM coolers and i have never in my live had an AMD CPU go tits up on me, even when i did fuck up the fan install and had heat alarm events and shutdowns, never damaged anything.
            • Or just buy Intel, ignoring these people who inventing these warranty issues out of thin air and their own paranoia.

            • Plus Ive had AMD ship me a replacement CPU after I had overclocked and over volted it, shipped it around with a too-heavy cooler (400g, I think), and installed an unsupported CPU shim (I believe the CPU die was cracked). I called them and gave a mea culpa confession to their tech and he basically said "thats OK, an upgraded model is in the mail." I had had an Athalon 2400, and they sent me a 3200; not half bad for a free upgrade of a processor I nuked.

              Contrast that with Intel, where I had a core2 duo just

              • Re:Warranty (Score:4, Insightful)

                by Moryath ( 553296 ) on Monday August 15, 2011 @01:43PM (#37096646)

                AMD's gotten my money every time because their midrange chips beat the pants off Intel's performance, dollar for dollar, every time. If I spend $2-300 on my chip, I get more performance from the AMD.

                As for why they'd do this, though, I'd think it's simple. Why sell the customer a $200 chip with a fan included, when you can ship a lot more chips in smaller packaging, still sell for $200, and get the customer to pay $30 for the formerly "stock" heatsink on top of it?

            • As much as I like AMD, the stock cooler that came with my Phenom II X6 was garbage. It was incredibly loud and while CPU temps were acceptable they were borderline high/critical. Contrast with the Zyman I replaced it with, which ran silently and dropped temps by 12 degrees on average. Having gone through that, I'd definitely take a discount on a high-end CPU without a heatsink and provide my own aftermarket cooling solution--I don't think I'll plan on using stock coolers anymore...

              • Re: (Score:3)

                by Mal-2 ( 675116 )

                As much as I like AMD, the stock cooler that came with my Phenom II X6 was garbage. It was incredibly loud and while CPU temps were acceptable they were borderline high/critical. Contrast with the Zyman I replaced it with, which ran silently and dropped temps by 12 degrees on average. Having gone through that, I'd definitely take a discount on a high-end CPU without a heatsink and provide my own aftermarket cooling solution--I don't think I'll plan on using stock coolers anymore...

                I used the stock cooler that came with my 1090T Black Edition (3.2 GHz) for a while. As you pointed out, it was loud and only marginally acceptable, but it DID do the job at stock speed and voltage. Surprisingly, it almost did the job at 3.6 GHz (the "turbo core" speed, although only with three or fewer cores in use), and was sufficient to show 3.8 was stable. I have since replaced it with a Cooler Master Hyper212 [newegg.com] and added the second fan.

                Even with both fans going 100% at all times (which makes very little

        • Yep. Since Intel is no longer installing the heat sink, you'll have to prove proper installation to get your warranty replacement.

          • Re:Warranty (Score:5, Insightful)

            by NoNonAlphaCharsHere ( 2201864 ) on Monday August 15, 2011 @09:55AM (#37093886)
            Intel heatsinks NEVER DID come attached to the CPU. It was ALWAYS on the system builder to install the heatsink, even on Intel motherboards. The real issue is that 1) Intel makes really crappy heatsinks, and 2) including a decent (copper and/or heatpipe) cooler would move them out of the performance price-point they've been occupying for many years now.

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by mossr ( 72445 )

              Not meaning to be ignorant here, but what performance price-point do they occupy? It's my understanding that AMD offers better bang-for-buck at the budget end of the scale, and Intel trumps their mid-to-high range offerings. So how would this affect customers who've chosen to buy Intel, since they're already committing themselves to the mid-range or higher?

              • Re: (Score:2)

                by Lifyre ( 960576 )

                The difference between a $250 chip and a $270 or $280 chip is not insignificant, it would also be easy to argue that these chips would need a $50 heatsink/fan making that $250 chip a $300 chip. They aren't trying to stay at a price point to compete with AMD they're trying to stay at a price point to not compete with themselves.

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by Hatta ( 162192 )

              1) Intel makes really crappy heatsinks

              Intel heat sinks have always been sufficient to run the CPU at stock speeds. What more do you want from a stock cooler?

              • If I had said "Intel makes all-aluminum, barely adequate for stock-only speed heat sinks, with low-quality fans that have zero tolerance for dust" would that have made you happier?

            • Re: (Score:2)

              by TheLink ( 130905 )

              Intel makes really crappy heatsinks,

              So far I've never had them fail on the machines I've built. Heck I don't recall having an Intel CPU fail on me (or people I know) in the past decade or so.

              At one place they had a crappy OEM 1-U server where the Intel CPUs were thermal throttling whenever they had stuff to do. But the server still kept running. I certainly don't blame Intel for the insufficient cooling in that case - it's most certainly the OEM's fault.

              The fans might not be that quiet. But they're not that noisy either - in an "average" PC,

        • Re:Warranty (Score:5, Informative)

          by moonbender ( 547943 ) <moonbenderNO@SPAMgmail.com> on Monday August 15, 2011 @09:44AM (#37093754)

          Huh? Installation error also applies to the "boxed" coolers. It's not like they sold them already mounted on the mainboard. However, damaging a CPU when installing the HSF has been fairly rare for a while now, since the advent of improved mounting mechanisms, integrated heat spreaders and CPUs with thermal throttles.

      • Re:Warranty (Score:4, Insightful)

        by discord5 ( 798235 ) on Monday August 15, 2011 @10:03AM (#37093978)

        And how is that "blame" issue negated by selling the chips and coolers separately?

        First and foremost : the distributor/consumer now has to install the cooling device, which shifts the problem to "Did you install the cooler correctly? Because we don't cover improper assembly". That give enough leverage for them to claim that the problem lies with the installer in most cases. While this is less of an issue for the average consumer who will buy a computer from retail, it is for the retailers and distributors (think : Dell). If chips start overheating, clearly Dell isn't correctly installing the cooling fans and heatsinks.

        Second : hobbyists still assemble their own gear and will most likely buy different cooling gear than Intel has to offer. There's been a wide variety in products for years now, going from Ultra-cool-but-noisy, to Cool-but-silent, to Ultra-Cool-And-Silent-But-Expensive. Again, these are most likely not the kind of people who will improperly their CPU, but accidents do happen and it's nice to be able to not have to refund that (relatively) rather expensive part.

        A measure like this has two purposes :

        • Reduce costs in warranty claims
        • Increase revenue by selling a separate cooling part which most distributors will buy from Intel anyway. You don't think the chips will be cheaper without the cooler now, do you?

        If Intel sells a cooler claiming to be sufficient to cool their CPU and it destroys the CPU in the process, are they not to blame?

        You see, the cooler is quite up to spec. Are you sure you are installing it properly? Have you left enough ventilation area in your design? Did you apply the cooling paste properly? Did you actually read the instructions that came with the cooler? How about the disclaimer that came with the cooler?

        I'm sure they've done the math and tests and have minimized the failure rate to a number that won't generate too much of a fuss. But a few thousand failing chips here and there all soon add up to real money, even in a pool millions. Finding a way to save on that saves on costs.

        Anyway, that's the angle I see... I've been known to be wrong on economics before. I've always found it wise to steer clear of the latest and greatest models of CPUs until there's enough complaints on the internet to know what you're getting into.

        On a sidenote, I've been having this feeling for a while now that the CPU arms race has slowed down quite considerably. Oh yes, there's new features every now and then and the number of cores goes up, but for the home consumer the upgrade pressure is far less than a decade ago. Even for modern videogames the CPU demands have stayed pretty much the same in the last couple of years, but I guess the GPU race makes up for that in that respect.

        • On a sidenote, I've been having this feeling for a while now that the CPU arms race has slowed down quite considerably.

          For what it's worth I've felt that way for a while too. I recently got a new Core i7 system and *wow*.
          I've been working on a 1080p video project (was on a Core2 Quad Extreem) and the wait time for render operations is waaaay lower on the core i7.

          As to the heatsink issue, I think this CPU is being targeted at high end desktop users and such who usually just toss the OEM cooler in the bin. Since at 180W the OEM cooler would be rather expensive, I think this is mostly a way for Intel to keep the price about

          • On a sidenote, I've been having this feeling for a while now that the CPU arms race has slowed down quite considerably.

            For what it's worth I've felt that way for a while too. I recently got a new Core i7 system and *wow*. I've been working on a 1080p video project (was on a Core2 Quad Extreem) and the wait time for render operations is waaaay lower on the core i7.

            I am not surprised but of course what you're doing is not exactly what the vast majority of people are doing. Most people want to surf the net, and do some e-mail and type a letter. Some of them may want to edit some photos, or maybe even edit a video. For both applications modern gear is pretty much overkill already.

            Only the handful of people that are real power-users, like you actually rendering your own video and then doing it on HD (which in itself again makes sense nowadays), and are still looking to

    • Re:Warranty (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Lord Byron II ( 671689 ) on Monday August 15, 2011 @09:46AM (#37093784)

      Is this really such a big deal? I've used third-party high end cooling solutions for over a decade now and I always buy tray-only CPUs. I buy AMD and I can usually find the processor I want without the heatsink and fan. Are things that different from Intel?

      I say it's a great change. How many stock fans and heatsinks will be saved from gathering dust because of this? How much waste will this reduce? Plus it will put $10-15 in someone's pocket (probably Intel's).

    • Given that Intel chips have had thermal throttling protections since the P4(the effect makes for a cool demo: spin up something CPU intensive, pop the cooler off, and watch the slideshow start, pop the cooler back on, watch the FPS shoot back up...) chip death from pure overheating should be pretty rare(OEMs selling expensive chips with coolers that never actually allow them to run at full speed, on the other hand...)

      The best way to cook a chip is found when you start fucking around with the supply volta
    • I'd expect the CPU would start throttling and then shutdown if it reached the edge of its acceptable operating range. My 2600K runs 'hot' with the stock cooler (not overclocked but running boinc clients). It seems to hover between 64 and 70c but I think it would start throttling at 78 and shutdown completely if it got to 90-something.

    • No, the article is just written by morons... Current high end Xeons ship without coolers, as have Xeons for many generations, this is because Intel have no clue where the chip is going –it could be into a 1U system, or it could be into something enormous. Basically... Move along, nothing to see here.

    • Ya, let's ruin a company that largely sells because of it's reputation so we can weasel on some warranties. Make perfect sense!

    • Intel chips overheat? I don't think so

      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BSGcnRanYMM [youtube.com]

      So many of these comments are outright lies. Intel sells OEM chips without a heatsink and retail kits with a pretty decent stock heatsink. Here is a stock intel heatsink for a P3 cpu.

      http://cgi.ebay.com/Intel-1U-Socket-370-P3-Heatsink-Fan-Sanyo-Denki-/310132647048 [ebay.com]

    • Yes, that worked out super well when nVidia shipped "too hot" chips and got nailed with a class action lawsuit [nvidiasettlement.com]. They ended up having to give people replacement laptops.

  • P4 again? (Score:2, Funny)

    by Alex Belits ( 437 ) *

    Prescott 2: Electric Boogaloo.

  • It is just so they can sell you the cooling update software patch [slashdot.org].

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by ifrag ( 984323 )
      Could actually be a real problem with selling "software" frequency unlocks. Perhaps the OEM packages it with enough cooling for the stock frequency, but unless it has the extra headroom on cooling the software unlock is going to make things worse.

  • no (Score:5, Funny)

    by circletimessquare ( 444983 ) <circletimessquar ... m minus language> on Monday August 15, 2011 @09:29AM (#37093550) Homepage Journal

    this is the beginnings of Intel branching out into the HEATING business

  • Just to save a few bucks.. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Ross R. Smith ( 2225686 ) on Monday August 15, 2011 @09:30AM (#37093560)
    This is just Intel trying to increase their profit margins even more.
    Most custom builders/modders don't even contemplate using the Intel stock cooler so it just sits there doing nothing.

    If most, if not all, of the intended market will use an aftermarket air cooler/watercooling loop is there really any reason to include the stock heatsink/fan?

    The 'Extreme' chips are very high end and generally not intended for Joe Public to just pick up - more of an enthusiast chip, Intel is just cashing in on this by not shipping with the stock cooling but keeping the price the same. It's also been said on the grapevine that Intel intend on releasing some of their own cooling solutions in the not so distant future.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by ifrag ( 984323 )

      If most, if not all, of the intended market will use an aftermarket air cooler/watercooling loop is there really any reason to include the stock heatsink/fan

      I'm on water now, but setting such a system up requires getting a lot of different parts, probably even from different vendors. I certainly didn't have all that stuff set to go when the CPU was ready to be plugged in. Having a respectable stock heat-sink while sorting out other various hardware is not necessarily useless. And on the extreme chips Intel actually provided a fairly decent product, at least enough to up the clocks some.

      And even if all the hardware orders had arrived, there was still time spe

      • Re: (Score:2)

        by Xtravar ( 725372 )

        Nice pun. Sorry, bud, you're in the minority and I will be glad not to have a bunch of stock heatsinks sitting around - both for me and the environment.

  • Cost Cutting? (Score:4, Insightful)

    by BlakLanner ( 743891 ) on Monday August 15, 2011 @09:33AM (#37093604)

    It is possible that this is a cost cutting measure. I think that a lot of people who buy standalone CPUs use third party cooling solutions. It would save Intel a lot of money in materials and packaging if they don't ship the heatsinks and fans that people just throw away anyways.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by jonwil ( 467024 )

      I have owned a Pentium 166 MMX, a Pentium 3 800, a Pentium 4 1.4, a Pentium 4 2.4 and now a Core 2 Duo. All were bought as individual parts and in all 5 cases I used the stock Intel cooling solution on the CPU.

      • Everything you list there is a mid-range part. That's fine, but that isn't what we are talking about here. The E series chips are Intel's high end enthusiast chips. They require different, more expensive, motherboards and support things that most consumers don't care about. Their consumer Sandy Bridge chips are already out, have been out for quite some time, and come with stock coolers.

        That you tend to buy mid to lower-mid solutions and don't upgrade all that often says that price is important to you. That'

  • Tasty (Score:2)

    by symes ( 835608 )

    Intel should get into the restaurant business - they do high end computng and cook food at the same time.

  • Stock coolers are a waste anyway (Score:5, Insightful)

    by algorimancer ( 2266264 ) on Monday August 15, 2011 @09:35AM (#37093640)
    Stock coolers are a waste -- there are much nicer (quieter) alternatives available, and at minimal expense. I never use the stock coolers. It's long seemed a bit silly to me that you couldn't buy the CPU without getting the cooler along with it, so I'm pleased that they're leaving the choice to those building the systems.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by eddy ( 18759 )

      I thought you'd always been able to buy 'tray [intel.com]' (aka OEM) variants (without the cooler), it's just that lately the tray has cost the same or even less than the retail (aka "boxed") package, so there haven't really been a point to it.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by 6ULDV8 ( 226100 )

      I'd be fine with them not shipping the fan. All the CPUs I've bought in the last 10 years or so go into rack mount cases that don't have room for the stock heatsink anyway. We end up with shelves full of unused parts that we have to inventory and dispose of.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by jedidiah ( 1196 )

      No. The expense is not minimal. This is especially true for the cheaper CPUs.

      In fact, this will add a significant cost to any CPU packaged without one and put it at that much more of a disadvantage when compared with rivals.

      The expense is only "minimal" is when you are talking some bleeding edge part that costs several times more than it's marginal performance improvement warrants.

      • This IS a "bleeding edge part that costs several times more than it's marginal performance improvement warrants"
        It's about a freaking EUR 1K CPU! A large part of the users will water cool anyway, so why include a fan?

      • Which, incedentally is what these parts are :)

    • This isn't because "Intel can't cool them." Please, there are hotter chips out there. Have a look at the heat sinks on an IBM POWER chip sometime. For that matter just look at video cards. The nVidia GTX 580 is spec'd at 244 watts TDP.

      Also it is easy to find current socket 1155/1156/1136 coolers that can handle more than that. Arctic Cooling, my preferred brand of aftermarket coolers, makes one rated to 300 watts. They've made ones rated to 200 watts for years now.

      The reason Intel is doing this is because e

      • Also it is easy to find current socket 1155/1156/1136 coolers that can handle more than that. Arctic Cooling, my preferred brand of aftermarket coolers, makes one rated to 300 watts. They've made ones rated to 200 watts for years now.

        Up to 300W... before melting? Before critical mass? Before the PC lifts off?

        WTF are you cooling? There are ovens that use less power than that...

  • So it seams Intel will make sure they retain top benchmark spots even when Bulldozer hits. Meanwhile AMD is stressing performance per watt and that might be their weak spot, they need similar E-extreme performance model badly, otherwise Intel will grab all performance premiums again and outchart them in the benchmarks.

    • Re: (Score:2)

      by eddy ( 18759 )

      I'm not saying you're wrong, but most sensible people will compare CPUs at a similar price, and the Intel 'extreme' CPUs typically slot in at $999 and beyond. Hopefully Bulldozer isn't trying to compete in that segment.

      Granted, sensible people don't buy these sorts of CPUs at all and are waiting for Ivy Bridge....

      • The top-of-range extreme gear, as you say, is just enthusiast candy of minimal relevance to the rest of the market.

        With one exception: This particular "Extreme" part, with its comparatively huge cache and ample supply of PCIe lanes, certainly sounds like it could be a viable close relative of a fairly mean 1-2 socket Xeon(it wouldn't be unprecedented, a number of "Extreme" enthusiast Intels have been Xeons without dual-socket capability, and some single-socket Xeons have been, basically, high end desktop

  • Seems logical enough to me... (Score:3)

    by fuzzyfuzzyfungus ( 1223518 ) on Monday August 15, 2011 @09:45AM (#37093768) Journal
    This seems reasonable enough to me...

    Particularly for high end or "extreme" CPUs, homebuilders virtually never stick with the stock cooler anyway. If they buy the retail box at all, rather than the OEM one, the cooler just goes in the trash/on ebay/cooling something else. Big OEM builders, on the other hand, frequently want a custom cooler that integrates with their toolless or minimal-tool easy maintenance cases, to cut repair costs. For everybody else, Intel is still offering a badged "official" cooler.

    This really just seems like a sensible recognition that there really isn't much point investing in chasing the high-end cooler market(which isn't an enormous R&D burden or anything; by Intel standards; but churns pretty fast and is at least partially driven by aesthetics, which aren't Intel's strong suit.) and there also isn't much point in shoving a chunk of finned aluminum in every box if it is just going to get tossed out(also, with the increasingly large number of enthusiast CPUs that are probably being purchased online, or from locked cases at retail, making the packaging a lot smaller will make everybody happier. CPUs are tiny, CPU+Cooler+retaining plastic tray is a decent size box.

    The only place where the Intel stock cooler ever made much sense was for lower-end homebuilders or OEMs too cheap to do their own case designs. Those segments can still buy the Intel-blessed coolers if they want, and everybody else can go with what they were already using anyway.

    • The problem is that many motherboards are not designed to take anything BUT the stock cooler. In too many motherboards other components end up being mounted too close to the CPU socket to allow installing an over sized cooler. Sometimes it's one of the heat sinked 'bridge' chips, power supply parts, or even memory sockets. It sucks if an otherwise suitable motherboard won't allow installing a suitable CPU cooler (though in some cases if the cooler were made so the main cooling fins were just a bit higher

      • That sounds like a problem in the design of the third-party coolers, that do not fit in the space allowed by standard motherboards.

  • "It's what our customers asked for"

    This is what an oem or manufacturer says when it's to their benefit and almost nobody else's. Who can prove them wrong? All they need is one or two feedbacks suggesting it and technically, they're not lying. Most people don't want to have to engineer their own cooling solution and wonder if it will be adequate or overkill.

    • Exactly those same customers can prove them wrong. By not accepting the new offer, and going to the competitor who still has the old offer.

  • Why do you have to high end to get more 16 pcie 3.0 lanes? With all the talk about useing the gpu as a CPU some day it may be better to get a low to mid range cpu and get a good GPU or 2. Also the four PCIe 2.0 lanes linking the cpu to the chip set will get used up fast by USB 3.0, SATA ports and thunderbolt.

    You may be able to put thunderbolt on a switch linked to the x16 pci-e lanes but then to get full speed on the video card you need a pci-e 3.0 card or the switch to out put x16 pcie 2.0.

  • According to this article [xbitlabs.com] they are looking to include a water cooled solution instead.

  • Intel is moving into cooling business, I thought we knew this already? Go check their site.

  • I know we love slagging off intel, but... (Score:4, Insightful)

    by itsdapead ( 734413 ) on Monday August 15, 2011 @10:15AM (#37094098)

    Is Intel unable to cool these extreme chips?

    Er... let me think...

    Curiously, Intel will still offer 'sold separately' own-brand cooling solutions for the new chips

    So, I'm guessing "yes".

    Seriously. Maybe, just maybe they did some checking and found that a large proportion of their bundled coolers were ending up in the spare parts bin. Its not exactly surprising that the same people who buy the "extreme" chips would also go in for high bling-to-noise ratio heatsinks and water cooling systems. Not everything is a money-grabbing conspiracy.

  • Not needed (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Sniper98G ( 1078397 ) on Monday August 15, 2011 @10:19AM (#37094148)

    The sandy bridge "Extreme" is aimed at the ultra high end enthusiast market. If you are building one of these rigs you are not going to use the stock cooler. I think this is a good move, it will keep Intel's useless stock coolers from sitting in my closet for a couple of years.

  • It has been my experience that if there is a "to make more money" option, that is the correct options to choose.

  • So Whatcher Wanna Do... (Score:4, Informative)

    by Greyfox ( 87712 ) on Monday August 15, 2011 @10:58AM (#37094550) Homepage Journal
    Is get yerself a big potroast see? Now yew wanna make yereslf a dry rub with some cumin and... Ok... 'ere's my secret ingredient, don't tell anyone... dark cocoa powder. Salt that potroast and rub it with yer dry rub! Now yew wanna wrap that fucker up with some tinfoil, an' go ahead and chuck some raisins and a bit o' tomato sauce in there! Wrap it good now, don't wanna leak that all over the place! Now park that fucker in yew computer and fire up counterstrike fer about 6 hours! Shoot some goddamn hippies yeehaw! After 6 hours yer roast she oughta' be fork tender and just fallin' apart! Nothing better than shooting hippies and computer-cooked potroast nosireee!

  • There's no need to run to conspiracy theories when standard business practices explain the observed behavior: Intel is looking to increase its profits. Instead of selling you two things together for one price, they can sell them separately for slightly more, increasing profit rate.

    If, at the same time, they've realized that they are losing the CPU cooler business at the high-end, and that most of the manufacturing cost that goes into a heat sink is not being used by the end consumer, they save money by not

  • Intel just found a way to increase profits. It's along the same lines as their offering software CPU upgrades.
  • In the early 90s, all CPUs were sold without coolers. They could get pretty hot, but that was considered normal. This was followed by a period in which you could buy CPU coolers separately, which made sense, because in those days overheating CPUs would crash and burn instead of shutting themselves down to avoid damage. Those early coolers were small and simple, but as the megahertz race between Intel and AMD began heating things up (in this case literally), the coolers got bigger and more expensive. This cr

  • If I'm building a computer that powerful I never use the stock cooler. The first thing I usually do with a CPU is remove the factory heatsink and throw it at the nearest person.

    Liquid cooling is so simple and ubiquitous these days there's very little reason not to use it when you have something this powerful to cool.

  • For the first time in as long as long as anyone at ExtremeTech can remember, Intel’s next consumer CPUs — the Sandy Bridge-E range — will ship without a heatsink and fan.

    ^$@& kids.... 386s shipped (and ran) bare. Most 486s shipped with either nothing or a really small heatsinks and fans were optional for all. It was big news when Pentiums shipped with heatsinks AND fans because OMG the things are so hot and powerful!

  • Comment removed based on user account deletion

  • Pricing lies (Score:5, Insightful)

    by BitZtream ( 692029 ) on Monday August 15, 2011 @01:54PM (#37096728)

    This just allows them to make more profit when they sell you the chip.

    The price you pay for a CPU isn't going down, its going up, and you're just being too ignorant to notice.

    You'll still pay the same price for a the CPU as you did when it came with a fan, except now you'll also have to buy the fan seperately.

    This is exactly like the whole 'new CPUs must use this slotted connection due to some mystical magical BS we're making up about interference that is clearly a lie for multiple reasons'.

    Intel is once again bending you over and not using lube, but you're too busy looking for a technical reason that you're missing the obvious and real reason. Money. This isn't the first or even second time they've done something like this.

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