Comment by jansommer
5 hours ago
The E5-2620 v4 is great. Have been using it for 10 years now. Wanted to upgrade until I saw current prices. I have 64 GB ddr4. Paired it with rx 9060 xt 16 GB and games run as fast as ever. Perhaps the cpu is a slight bottleneck in DOOM The Dark Ages, but i'm at 60 fps, so no problem. Light llm on the gpu is a nobrainer, and it's cool to see that things can be tuned to run ok on the cpu. I bought 2667 v4 a month ago for 30$. I'd expect it to give a decent performance boost but I just haven't had the need for it yet, but pushing into llm like in the article I'd probably upgrade because 2667 can handle slightly faster ram.
10 years? Damn, that is a long time. I always assumed that heat-induced damage will kill a CPU after a certain amount of time (5-7 years). Am I wrong here? I assume yes. Or are CPUs must stronger/tougher than the bad old days?
Intel sacrificing lifetime for short-term gigahertz is a relatively recent phenomenon.
This is among the "real" differences between workstation/server CPUs and commodity chips for laptops/desktops/handhelds.
Even then, if a commodity chip isn't pushed full tilt at all times, and assuming that the venting and dissipation are adequate, a commodity chip can last a long time.
A quick search on Xeon production yields that it goes through a rather rigorous testing. I wouldn't be surprised that server cpu's in a desktop pc works longer. I can't overclock it either, and that probably helps with its lifespan as well. But yeah, the fact that it actually powers on when i click the button and isn't a limiting factor after 10 years is quite something.
You raise two very good points that I didn't think about: (1) better binning/testing, (2) no overclocking. Keep rockin' that elderly Xeon!
Back from my old overclocking days - its heat that kills life. And if you keep that under control (what ages is the heatpaste, replace it ever so often) i very much doubt you'll have any life issues from the cpu itself.
Bearings in fans, caps etc. are also stuff that you need to keep an eye on.
I just replaced a i5-660 thats been powered on since 2010 24/7, heatpaste was fucked so it crashed during heavy loads :)
Not my experience.