Intel Core i7 920

hi there geekies… so, what’s up? well, now, finally, i have the best next-gen processor today… it’s the Core i7!!!
oh, so what’s the story? ok… here it is (in timeline LoL)

+ October 2007 – mom arrived from saipan (from work) and told her we should buy Vista Home Premium for her Lappie, and buy either a new dual-core or quad-core desktop pc. that time is the rose od the Intel Core 2 processors, so, dual-core processor are still doing the best… and the only quad-core out is only the Q6600 (which is now phased out)… -failure-

+ June 2008 – 2nd year 1st trimester, summer days just finished (we’ve gone to lucban and tayabas). this is the time when i’m having insomnias, got addicted to skateboarding (and asked mom for money to buy dustin dollin’s no skool shoe), played cabal online for hours (force blader, up to level 18 i guess), dled a lot od movies (twins effect, forbidden kingdom, etc) throuhg torrent, and most specially, became acertified SONE (gir’s generation fan) and addicted to K-Pop. that time, i became a netizen, and since i still download episodes of You Are My Destiny, i noticed, my harddrives getting full…answer? Burner! burned a lot of DVDs and CDs… few weeks later, my Sony DVD-RW became a crap…so, tried to just save the episodes through my brother’s ipod (working like a harddisk, right?). since i became a netizen, well, of course, i shouldn’t forget the geeky me… asked mom to buy me pc parts through newegg.com… i remember, i was choosing between the Intel Core 2 Quad Q9550 or the AMD Phenom X4 9950 Black Edtion… that time also, i started to like the Sapphire ATI Radeon HD4850 Toxic coz’ it’s cool!… but still, i failed… my mom told me we should just buy here in PH not outside the country, i also realized that since the warranties of those things…

+ Late October – November 2008 – this is the worst time of year 2008 for me. early October, my mom bought me my Samsung F480 Tocco (replacement of Anycall Haptic), as my Birthday Gift… later on… arrgghhh! our house! it got renovated… so, no money for all… dammit! so… i just focused on my studies, coz’ it just pisses me off everytime i think about it… -failure, really!-

+ February 2009 – Happy New Year!!! LoL… no, i was busy this time. SNSD cameback, and i had to finish my thesis… and the worst thing is, my old P$ pc got wrecked… like it wont run anymore… so i ended up doing my thesis in some computer shop out there… poor kid LoL

+ Mach 2009 – Graduation! joke… i finished my thesis, school is finished too, and i’m excited to be a 3rd year student! well, this is the time my mom bout me Black Honey! -success!-

So, what’s new in Intel Core i7???

- LGA 1366 or Socket B (so i need to buy that type of mobo)
- On-die memory controller: the memory is directly connected to the processor
- Three channel memory, DDR3 support only
- No ECC support
- Intel QuickPath Interconnect interface replaced the Front Side Bus
- 32 KB L1 instruction and 32 KB L1 data cache per core
- 256 KB L2 cache (combined instruction and data) per core
- 8 MB L3 (combined instruction and data) “inclusive”, shared by all cores
- Single-die device: all four cores, the memory controller, and all cache are on a single die
- “Turbo Boost” technology
- the return of Hyper-threading – this means that there is 4 cores physically, but 8 cores logically (that’s why it’s cool!)
- 45nm
- 731M transistors
- 263 mm2 Die size
- Support for SSE4.2 & SSE4.1 instruction sets

Intel Core i7 920 Specifications:

- Released on 2008-11-17 (i bought it April 2009 in PCHub)
- Thermal Design Power of 130 W
- 2.66GHz ~ 2.67GHz x 4
- Core Multiplier is 20
- 1x 4.8 GT/s
- 1.2 Voltage
- Codenamed Bloomfield

the Pros:

- so fast, that you can’t even determine the so-far ahead of the core i7 920 to my old pentium 4 2.4GHz Northwood LoL
- excellent in multi-tasking
- good-looking!
- i can play, so many games at the same time (GTA4, RA3, GH3, Burnout Paradise, NFS UC all at the same time)
- 8-core logically makes me sick!
- the super mini sized 45nm amazed me
- the included fan works so well, don’t need to buy the V8 for now (but i’m planning to)
- i think this cpu will last for 5 years or more
- silent.. and stable
- the boxing is quite cool too

the Cons:

- as of now, nothing… i just heard that intel is releasing a 6-core physically and 12-core logically in the near future.
- i have no right to compare this processor to AMD Phenom II X4, since, in my life, i havent tried an AMD processor for my pc (unless in comp shops). but still, i prefer Intel Core i7 more, i heard the Phenom II X4 is just game and media centric, and that i need fast and stable pc since i am a programmer.

Pics:

Vista: 8-Cores

Desktop + CPU-Z

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

CPU-Z

 

 

 

  

Core i7 920 Box

Performance: 10/10 [stable, quiet, fast and cool]
Value: 9.5/10 [it's not pricey... i bought it @ PHP 13,990 @ PCHub, same price with Core 2 Quad Q9950]Overall Rating: 9.75/10
Comment: i really recommend everyone who’s building a new rig to choose this processor series, whether the 920 like mine, or faster ones like the 940, 950, 965, 975… it’s good for gaming, programming and all of what you do in your desktops… and good for over-clocking too!

References: Wikipedia.org

VANS | Whip

A year ago, I bought my very first Vans shoes. The Vans Whip. It’s not the ordinary skate or BMX shoe that you guys knew. This one is a signature footwear by Australian BMX Pro Rider, Ryan Guettler. I picked this shoe up not because it’s signatured or something like that, but my sister is actually the one who grabbed it for me simply because she said it’s cool enough, better than the other.

Outer appearance might be a bit owner choosy. This one features a black and white zombie printed in both of the canvas of the shoe. Most materials aside from the canvas are black suede, while an extremely little lining of black leather in each shoe.

Also, the tongue of this shoe is extremely padded making it very thick but comfortable specially when you’re wearing it and you’re riding your BMX. In front of it includes the Vans logo together with Ryan Guettler logo while behind it shows the printed phrase “Endorsed by Ryan Guettler” plus the play cards symbols.

The insides of this shoe is definitely one of the key feature of it. It is as comfortable as how you’re lying in your bed along with your pillows. Both sides are thick enough and you would expect great comfort.

The last thing is the lower part of the shoe. Just like every Vans shoes out there, this one also inherited the cone-shaped-like soles. Aside from how the thickness of the soles are total greatness, it is also equipped with a technology known as the ImpactSorb which eliminates heel bruises and offers amazing comfort everytime you skate or ride your bike.

The looks of this shoe is good enough to distinguish it away from other typical shoes, enough to differentiate it away from the Old School.

Great choice for Ryan Guettler, good match for his Colony Pro BMX model!

Before I conclude this article-slash-review, here’s a Youtube video I made featuring my Hands-On for this shoe. Hope you guys enjoy it. You can also watch it directly in Youtube by clicking here.

Overall, this shoe is a must-have. Everything in this shoe is thick enough to have an extremely good comfort, thus making it last for more years. I do not regret buying it and buy the other ones. I love the whole look of it. Especially since it lasted a year already. I wish it will last in the upcoming years.

My Rating: 9.5/10

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