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P55 Extreme Overclockers: Check your sockets!by Rajinder Gill on 10/15/2009 12:01 AM EST
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275 Comments
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u48802109 - Monday, November 16, 2009 - linkHi all:
I'd bought a Gigabyte P55A-UD5, which use the LOTES 1156 socket on it. However, it disappointed me very much. When I got the board, the metal load plate was mark "LOTES", after lefting it, you'll see that the protective socket cover was FOXCONN!! It meant that the 1156 socket was made by Foxconn, it just use the LOTES back panel and upper metal load plate. So, you should not say that the whole socket was made by LOTES. Reply
DOSwasnice - Saturday, December 05, 2009 - linkthe metal back & upper plates are the most important as they are responsible for not bending the PCB upon the pressure from mounted CPU. i saw some pictures on the web showing this problem (it was most probably one of the reasons of weak contact).
protective plastic cover has nothing to do with the problem for sure :-) i would not bother about this for sure
they just changed the most critical elements of the socket
blacksun1234 - Monday, December 07, 2009 - linkThe root cause is not PCB bending. It's socket itself. And this kind of combination is not certified by Intel. If there is any issue for CPU damage, Intel will not take any responsibility for it. Reply
blacksun1234 - Wednesday, November 18, 2009 - linkGigabyte is trying to cheating!!!!! Reply
michael19 - Wednesday, November 11, 2009 - linkLOTES Sockets explode as well, not only foxconn
http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?t=624489">http://www.ocforums.com/showthread.php?t=624489 Reply
safaan - Friday, October 30, 2009 - linkHello everyone,
I just got my new Asus P7P55D and i5 so please tell me what do you think:
The red area does not have a contact in my opinion. Reply
michael19 - Friday, October 30, 2009 - linkDon't look at the pin prick marks, look for the scuff marks.
^ is a good pic of some scuff marks Reply
LeadSled - Tuesday, October 27, 2009 - linkI have been overclocking ever since I first found that "TURBO" button on my mommy's new HP Computer it even had the $300 optional MB of ram kick ass 2 MB total. Testdrive played awsomely fast, 5.5 in floppy drive loaded...........like lightning. I have turned what I thought was a computer, and discoverd microwave ovens. I have baked larger pan pakes on the bottom of cpu's then grangma on sunday morning, but to destroy a cpu/motherbourd maybe ran is more then enough for me to change brands. If you look at IMG55 that looks to be the CPU and not just the pad. I shutter to imagine what they might have under engineered to save $0.00003 per cpu. The scariest thing is the thought of totally locked cpu's. Reply
neilmarzman - Monday, October 26, 2009 - link
I don't know what this sites policy is about censorship. So I am assume it is a free speech FORUM.
I had posted two separate comments yesterday. One of which was a reply to "Clagmaster"; and it duly present on the site.
The other was in reply to Raj, this post was about this Site's continued refusal to at least agree in principle that missing contacts in data pins are not a trivial issue. In this second comment, I had mentioned that suddenly on of my old students from Intel showed up in town, and when I could not make time for him on Friday, he lingered on until I juggled my calendar to meet him for lunch today. It was just an interesting tidbit.
However I do not see this second post on the site? What is going on? Are we censoring perfectly unobjectionable material now?
I also noticed that my postings are slowly creeping up up from their original page number to lower numbered pages. Is someone deleting older posts to make room for the newer ones? I think it is perfectly reasonable to assume that newer material will occupy newer pages. It is strange to see this compression.
I would like to know where my comment, about the importance of data pins, went? Was it selectively compressed?
If so, why is the site selectively playing with comments. I do not recall that there was any slander, libel, or foul language in my censored post...unlike the posts of some of your more--let's just say--more inexperienced but enthusiastic posters.
If it was deleted, I would like to know why? If it was erroneously deleted, I would like it to be put back on.
Thank you for your attention,
Neil Reply
Porksmuggler - Monday, October 26, 2009 - linkYour level of paranoia is profound, but it's good to see you're still here trolling the comment section.
I noticed you put the blame on Intel a few pages back, and were sure the Lotes sockets would suffer the same issue, which is baseless. The rest of your analysis, while lengthy, is mostly nonsense mixed in with some common knowledge that does not lend to your conclusion.
I think I have to agree with dia, your collective posts do form a canard of epic proportion. Reply
1stguess - Monday, October 26, 2009 - linkThat right? Too bad. I would have liked to have read that. somebody's gotta keep Clagmasters overoptimistic view on the state of the p55 platform in check. You'd think he was gonna issue warranty for failures himself. Reply
gary2112 - Tuesday, November 10, 2009 - linki have a asus maximus iii .and this happend to me last week same as the pics but my chip was a 860 with a a overclcok of 3200 Reply
HDValium - Saturday, October 24, 2009 - linkEveryone needs to take a step back. The playing field is changing by the minute. Tweaktown.com just released a Gigabyte review, new 1156 board on the market next month.
USB3, SATA3, and a switch to the Lotes socket!!!
I think Gigabyte got the message. Unfortunately, ASUS doesn't have a clue! Reply
RJ777 - Friday, October 30, 2009 - linkThanks for the heads up on this but CHECK THIS OUT, I have started looking on the Gigabyte site and found this in their P55A boards spec sheets: * When set Turbo SATA3 / USB3.0 (Marvell 9128 /NEC USB 3.0 Controller) to enable in BIOS setup, 1st PCIex16 slot will run at x8 bandwidth and 2nd PCIex16 slot will be disabled.
So while bringing a revision out and having the LOTES socket what about this? WHF? I am not that technically knowledgeable but know enough that this doesn't make sense. Why would you lose x16 AND the second 16 socket just enabling SATA 3 and USB 3? And this is to get the new socket? Also I can see them releasing a 'new' board to sidestep the liability of the seemingly defective Foxconn socket but this? Back to square one. I don't need x58 or a 920 (soon a 930) but if this keeps up well...
Zink - Sunday, October 25, 2009 - linkhttp://www.tweaktown.com/news/13357/video_preview_...">http://www.tweaktown.com/news/13357/vid...sata3_us...
Thanks a lot for that Tweak Town arcticle. I have a Gigabyte P55M-UD2 that I bought this week localy that I can still return it. My i5 750 is in the mail but I think I will return my motherboard and wait for the "P55AM-UD2" or another matx board with USB3. I had thought USB3 wouldn't be available until early 2010 but if its out in a month then I'd feal riped of without USB3 (at least 300MB/s!!!) Reply
raydenwins - Sunday, October 25, 2009 - linkSeems like Gigabyte reacts faster than ASUS..
What about mild overclocking on affected boards? I would like to raise my i7 870 to 3.39 GHz which was limit for overclocking without changing voltage. Can I set the CPU to 3.39 GHz and use DDR3 @ 2000 MHz or do I have to overclock the CPU higher in order to use my DDR3 at 2000 MHz (XMP modules)?
The thing is that I am going to use my ASUS P5P55D Premium with core i7 24 hours a day for the next 3 years and want to use 2000 MHz DDR3 but don't want to overclock CPU as much. Reply
ClagMaster - Sunday, October 25, 2009 - linkThis is certainly welcome news. If nothing more than to restore confidence. I certainly would not mind a LOTES socket on my own Gigabyte motherboard I will be buying next year. If ASUS experiences failures, especially for stock and mild overclocks, then they will probably follow suit.
If I got anything from this article and the blog discussions about LGA1156, its the suspicion this socket, because of the way compressive force is applied to the CPU, may be susceptable to tilting. Contact points for the latch of the CPU occur at the centerline of the west and east sides forming a fulcrum about tilting could occur at the north and south sides.
I would direct you attention to the photos where these land/pin failures occur at the north and south edges of the CPU where seperation from tilting is the greatest. I think the latching mechanism for LGA1156 stinks and does not apply the same even compression of the successful LGA775 and LGA1366 latch mechanisms.
The lesson is when I install my CPU on a LGA 1156 socket, what I am going to do is carefully place the CPU squarely in the socket with no contacts on the sides, then press down on it with my thumb when I engage the latch. The contact points of the latch slide southward and should not cause the CPU to tilt if I have uniform compressive force applied and the CPU is restrained by the lands at the bottom of the socket.
A year from now, if people can remember, I would be interested to see if people with LGA1156 Foxconn sockets that operated at stock speeds actually have arced pins and lands.
Good Day Reply
RJ777 - Friday, October 23, 2009 - linkHi new here and have been following this thread closely. First I would like to thank Raji (hope I have your name right) for all your work on this, I know it must be really time communing.
Well has it yet to be determined if this is a PLATFORM issue or is it indeed a socket issue and that Foxconn sockets are the problem?
Not a gamer or a extreme OC'r but need to build a new updated rig as mine is getting a bit old (how about Athlon XP Barton) and the P55 860 seems to fit my needs. Would possibly like to do some mild OC just to do it but don't really need it.
I have no need for the X58 platform and frankly the Giga UD3R has all that I need. Would consider the 4P if it meant a better quality board (need for the long haul and do not need the extra features).
Also I really don't want to go to a $200 EVGA board just to get a Lotes socket and at the same time actually lose some features that I would like.
Would appreciate any comments thoughts.
Thanks to all who have contributed to this ongoing issue. Reply
ClagMaster - Friday, October 23, 2009 - linkHi.
I like the Gigabyte GA-P55-UD3R too because it is reasonably priced, well featured, well made, enjoys a very good reputation with the NewEgg reviews, and has wonderful provisions for supporting legacy devices (LPT,COM,Floppy) which you and I appreciate. A very good motherboard which a sensible choice.
The i7 860 is a sensible choice too. I would have preferred the i5 750 because the extra $90 for the i5 860 buys you an extra 133MHz clock and hyperthreading which I feel is not worth the money. Hyperthreading results in about 10% boost in performance for certain multithreaded applications and doubles memory requirements. With Turbo Boost, the advantage of hyperthreading is reduced. I would take this $90 savings and invest in a better heatsink replace that inadequate Intel stock heatsink/fan, invest in a Blue-ray Combo Drive, or upgrade from Windows 7 Home Premium to Windows 7 Professional (with XP provided in a virutal machine).
The Gigabyte GA-P55-UD3R/i5 750 is the combination I am seriously considering for my summer 2010 upgrade of my E6600/G965 rig.
You are right about it being ridiculous to pay $200 for a motherboard with a LOTES socket which the UD3R costs $140 and has the features you wanted.
This business with LGA1156 socket failure occurs during extreme overclocking. There are no failures at stock speeds or mild overclocks (see Gary Key's Post). This is not a platform issue, though the LGA 1156 may well be sensitive to the placement the CPU within the socket prior to clamping to avoid tilting of the CPU within the socket that could be the cause of these issues during high overclocking (typically 230% of design specification for the socket).
Some people have panicked (Lions and Tigers and Bears! Oh my!) at the notion their might be a problem with their motherboards with Foxconn LGA1156 sockets running stock. This has never been proven.
If you bought this board today with the existing Foxconn socket, took care in placing the CPU squarely within the socket prior to clamping, and operated at stock speeds, and used a better CPU Heatsink/fan to replace that inadequate Intel stock heatsink/fan, you should have years of service ahead of you.
If you waited long enough, say after the New Year, the GA-P55-UD3R will likely be available (as a revision) with a LOTES socket or revised Foxconn socket. This motherboard will probably be offered with a rebate or discount in February/March 2010 ;) if you are patient.
Good luck with your decision. Reply
RJ777 - Saturday, October 24, 2009 - linkThank you for your reply and helpful comments/insights. It is appreciated.
Well you now have me thinking about the 750. Had figured the 860 to extend my capabilities a bit (future proof?)but the 750 should be fine in light of what you said. Was planning to go Win 7 Pro and a better heatsink (one that doesn't block any RAM slots).
I imagine with this socket issue the motherboard manufactures will have to address it sometime and revisions will likely be made at which point I would feel better in buying something. As I said in my original post I was concerned if it was a platform issue or socket but considering there doesn't seem to be a problem with the LOTES socket it may not be platform related.
As you stated the problems seem to be with extreme overclocking but to be honest I am a bit skeptical by all this right now. I can wait a bit and see what transpires. Again thank you for your reply. Reply
ClagMaster - Saturday, October 24, 2009 - linkYou're welcome.
I like the Scythe SCSK-1100 100mm Shuriken Rev B. For $30 it's a very good CPU heatsink that blows air down on the power electronics. Although it is listed as a LGA775 heatsink, it will also fit LGA1156 too. See the NewEgg and FrostyTech reviews.
That's what I am going to buy next summer for my i5 750/ GA-P55-UD3R.
If you are upgrading from an Athlon XP Barton, an i5 will most definitely not disappoint. This is about 3-4x faster than the Barton in benchmarks. Reply
moronsworld - Friday, October 23, 2009 - link"Some people have panicked (Lions and Tigers and Bears! Oh my!) at the notion their might be a problem with their motherboards with Foxconn LGA1156 sockets running stock. This has never been proven."
Yeah it has never been proven but it has never been unproven either. All I wanna say is, in the cases of non-overclocked stock speeds, only time can tell but I think what most ppl are saying is they don't wanna take that chance. Six months, a year, a year and a half down the road when at stock speeds if the board burns out the cpus thats money and time gone down the hole. I mean sure some motherboard manufacturers might RMA the boards for you but what about the cost of the cpu? they wont cover that. And even with the RMAing of boards some companies will give you hell before they will do it for you. Basically what ppl want are security in what they buy and foxconn doesn't seem to give that. I wouldn't take my chances with foxconn maybe some ppl will but not me, even if i had to pay a little extra to get a non-foxconn socket. With that all said....
From what I read of all your posts you seem like you want to backup foxconn, what's up with that? I mean WTH... Don't tell ppl it will be ok to buy foxconn sockets when you yourself haven't tested over a long period of time and even so testing one motherboard over a long period of time doesn't prove or disprove anything. It can only be proven with many tests with many different foxconn based motherboards. I doubt you have done that. And then you try to say this is not a foxconn issue but an intel issue. So how is it an intel issue when the other sockets aren't having this problem? Seems to me you're a foxconn employee. Reply
moronsworld - Friday, October 23, 2009 - linkOh yeah and you try to say you know better because you're an Electrical Engineer or whatever but it doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure it out. With basic logic of deduction and common sense anyone can see that foxconn is the problem here. Reply
ClagMaster - Saturday, October 24, 2009 - linkI am disinterested in Foxconn. They make decent hardware but I recognize they can slip up.
And I am serious about my intentions to purchase an i5 750/GA-P55-UD3R combination next year. Whether it has a Foxconn socket or not I do not care because I will be running stock speeds with a single graphics card. Unless its proven there is a defect in this socket where the CPU cannot contact all of the pins (for reasons stated above) then I see no reason why I should not purchase this combination with a Foxconn socket.
I have been a design engineer for 30 years either designing equipment or solving emergent issues with existing equipment. You need to get your facts straight first before making broad accusations about a peice of hardware or a manufacturer. That is because these have legal ramifications for a variety of reasons. Its clear to me you are immature and ignorant.
One excellent attitude to have while investigating hardware issues is to adopt the principle that hardware is assumed innocent before proven guilty. You need to be critical, of course, but not hypercritical because of fear or a rebellious spirit.
I have found people, including you, to be far more faulty, unreliable and culpable than hardware. People have expectations (oftentimes unreasonable, not grounded in reality, more grounded in popular politics) and these expectations often causes self-deception about responsability, or the severity of the problem.
Because of this, I reject the consumerist supposition that the consumer is aways right. Often consumer is not. Especially when they do stupid things like abuse hardware beyond their capabilities. And when they get hurt because their opportunistic stupidity, they deny their resposability and hire professional manipulators and liars to get the courts to rule the manufacturer responsable (liable) instead.
What I do not like to see is people condemning a peice of hardware (or its manufacturer) for failure that occured during conditions it was not designed to operate at. And they did not release the hardware until it has been tested and found to comply with design specifications.
As for security, its an illusion. Allow me to share with you a truth about personal responsability I learned in the Navy many years ago -- The stupid shall die. They really do, despite the best efforts of government to prevent this from happening at the expense of everyone else.
Rajinder Gill - Saturday, October 24, 2009 - linkThe more concerning VCC burnouts are those that have taken place under a single thread load of Super Pi 32M. This benchmark draws very little power to VCC. I measured only 7.5 amps of draw to EPS 12V (with a clamp meter) with a CPU clocked to 5GHz during this benchmark. Around 20w of that power draw will be to VTT and any other assoicated sub-rails. This leaves VCC pulling around 50-60w which is not high at all. Begs the question why you'd getVCC socket pins melting under these types of loads.
The 4.7Ghz burnout will have likely been pulling less than this to VCC (on air cooling).Another reported VCC burnout was at 5GHz (under sub-zero cooling) and as the person who had that issue is very well known to me, I know that the benchmark he was running when this occured was once again 32m Super Pi.
The only claimed stock burnout I know of was running PRime95 (8 thread) at stock frequency using a stock Intel cooler (the thread was linked a few pages back). If this claim is truthful, one does wonder if something is slipping thru the net at random that should not be.
neilmarzman - Sunday, October 25, 2009 - linkWhy do you keep talking only about the power pins and burnouts? It seems like you are intentionally trying to misdirect you readers.
I want to know why do you think it is acceptable that a fairly large number of data pins are not making contact? I had written a lengthy response to someone about why LGA1156 and P55 combo makes it more easy to notice the design flaws. LGA1366 has a similar percentage of pins not making contact. However, it is less prone to exposure, since many people do not use all three memory channels, and the GPUs are allowed more freedom from the CPU.
Another factor which I missed to point out last time, is the fact that these are Quad processors (mostly), and I am not aware of any consumer software which is designed to run in parallel. (for a parallel code, you have to know how many processors you have and then program accordingly to make use of as much parallelism as possible).
When you have sockets like LGA 1366 and LGA 1156, you can rest assured that no single application is tasked to all the processors at the same time. Simply because you are allowed to plug in a single, a dual, or a triple core CPUs. An application written for four parallel processors will not work on 2 processors, without recompilation.
Unlike truly parallel machines, the PC platform using commercial (non-scientific) applications generally assigns one single application to one core. This is another reason why this pin issue has not been found out earlier. When there is redundancy of cores, the task can be assigned to any core, which is available: of course only working cores are available so those which are more prone to fault are unlikely to be tapped, or are partially tapped.
As we notice the removal of the third channel from X58 to P55 and forcing the GPUs to rely more on the processor, has exposed some of these weakness. If I were you, I would stick a dual-core (unless they have a single core variant, or there is a way to completely disable all others cores)processor into both 1156 and 1366 sockets and then try to run a code which is designed to run in parallel. You can find many programs which can do that, for example you can solve some special matrix equations with multiple RHSs in parallel. This will be a good way to find out if the pin contacts matter or not, because both CPUs (or hopefully a processor with only one enabled core) will be put through their paces.
I have not looked at the the pin assignments of these processors, however, I am sure we can still force selected blocks of pins to go live and check them out either directly (by using logic analysers) or indirectly by making these processors duplicate known solutions for a variety of matrices.
I hope someone is thinking along these lines. Let's try to keep emotions out of it. You are, after all, supposed to be helping your readers.
In the spirit of full disclosure, I have never taken any research grants from any chip manufacturers. In mid 80s I did have one research grant from TRW (that dates me pretty well)to figure out the effect of imperfectly etched optical waveguides in optical chips. I do have many of my students employed at various manufacturers. In fact, one of the two I had mentioned in one of my earlier post, actually called me up, completely out of blue, on Friday. He wanted to see if he can visit me for lunch; since he happened to be in town for some business (we do not have any businesses like that in town, it is a university town). He wanted to fill me in on all the wonderful things they are doing at Intel and how my new graduates will find a welcome environment at companies like Intel. Of course, I was all booked up for Friday. He was quite persistent, he went on to inform me that his schedule was quite open and he will hang out here over the weekend, if I can meet with him on Monday. I make it my practice that I do my best to accommodate my students, so I juggled my schedule to meet him for lunch on Monday (in faculty cafeteria), where he would like to "run some ideas" by me and would like to "pick my brains".
Here I thought that no one read these comments hidden on page 24 of a boring topic ;-) on a pretty obscure site.
Anyway, if I learn something I will share it. I do not sign NDAs ;-)
Neil Reply
Rajinder Gill - Sunday, October 25, 2009 - linkWhere are there reports of non contacting data pins? Can you show me evidence of this please? Reply
dia - Sunday, October 25, 2009 - linkNeilmarzman, why don't you pull your finger out of your behind and provide us all with the pictures or REAL evidence of 231 or so non contacting pins on your CPU? How does your CPU even work with all those non-contacting data pins? Its plain to see you have no idea what you are talking about man.
xanagu - Thursday, October 22, 2009 - linkFollowing your recommendations, i was looking for a free problem mobo, and according with my budget, ended with this :
Before placing the order i wanna ask you if this mobo is compatible with ati radeon cards (performance and compatibility issues), cuz I just see nvidia logos in all the website and i want to paired this with a radeon 5850.
Thanks for your advice.
Ananke - Thursday, October 22, 2009 - linkYour EVGA board will work with Radeon, don't worry. You can do Crossfire also.
However, there is something fishy with this socket 1156. It seems the low voltage/high current causes the socket to bottleneck. So, maybe 1366 is better choice? Or maybe just going to AMD? Reply
xanagu - Friday, October 23, 2009 - linkSorry man , i could not find info about the voltage problem u talk, can you put a link pls? Reply
Ananke - Friday, October 23, 2009 - linkI don't have a link, I am just thinking...
When you decrease the voltage, you increase the current, because you need to power ever increasing number of transistors. It seems like the processor power requirements were not changed for the last several generations, and maybe after resolving internal silicon issues like leakage and interferences now we may face a problem with the chip package format. The i5/i7 is the lowest voltage Intel desktop platform, maybe that's why we start seeing this issue now. It seems this socket have very thin voltage tolerance, compared to previus processor generations. Reply
Ananke - Friday, October 23, 2009 - linkI don't have a link, I am just thinking...
When you decrease the voltage, you increase the current, because you need to power ever increasing number of transistors. It seems like the processor power requirements were not changed for the last several generations, and maybe after resolving internal silicon issues like leakage and interferences now we may face a problem with the chip package format. The i5/i7 is the lowest voltage Intel desktop platform, maybe that's why we start seeing this issue now. It seems this socket have very thin voltage tolerance, compared to previus processor generations. Reply
DOSwasnice - Friday, October 23, 2009 - linkseems like foxconn replied, just found it here:
Gary Key - Friday, October 23, 2009 - linkThat is the standard reply memo we received yesterday. We have additional internal memo's that Foxconn supposedly sent to the board suppliers now. We are trying to get those verified before we update the article. In the meantime, I purchased 8 retail boards based on the models we have left to review and those are being compared to the ones we received. Foxconn definitely made a socket revision in August based on early results. Reply
PMPopic - Wednesday, October 21, 2009 - linkWhen I enlarge the photo of the MSI Micro ATX P55 board sold at new egg it clearly shows a Lotes socket. Is this a reliable predictor that should I purchase this board it will actually have that brand? Could there be a new production run that uses the foxcon socket?
How concerned are you that one of the MSI boards tested at Tom's guide having power phase damage? Reply
diuurhai - Thursday, October 22, 2009 - linkyou bought up a good point...... it does have that cheap power issue over at toms..... Reply
diuurhai - Wednesday, October 21, 2009 - linkWhat's going on here? Just report what you have tested for the past 6 months......
Back to my search for LOTES socketed boards... burn out @ stock speed + high load is pretty serious flaw. Reply
Gary Key - Friday, October 23, 2009 - linkHere is our report.
1. No burnouts at stock or oc speeds up to 4.3GHz on any of our boards.
2. 100% burnout on phase and LN2 cooling with the Foxconn socket.
3. Bought another grouping of retail boards and processors to test before the next MB roundup is published to verify and test Foxconn's new socket (an improved clamping design) revision.
4. I find it very interesting that we published the problems we discovered in testing, have been the driving force behind changes to the sockets at the motherboard suppliers, and have spent an enormous amount of resources and money for the follow up article. 5. Yet we are catching flak for not being "honest" or "forthcoming" about our results from a couple of people who obviously have ulterior motives based on the personal attacks about our integrity and even mentioning our revenue stream as a basis for determining articles. If that were truly the case, does anyone in their right mind think we would have posted this article. ;) Reply
ClagMaster - Friday, October 23, 2009 - link@Keys and Raji:
I think Anandtech has been honest and responsable in its reporting of P55/Lynnfield. Yes, there has been articles of Lynnwood and P55 prior to release and pre-release photos of P55 motherboards. But I would hardly call what was published hype under Intel's pay. How can any rational person accuse Anandtech of misinformation over P55/Lynnfield when you could not release any information at all under the NDA? :)
That's not to say Anandtech is infallible, I remember mistakes and misinterpretations of problems and results that occasionally occurred. Despite this, reading your articles for over the past 5 years and reflecting on there veracity, you have proven trustworthy and earned my respect for your opinions.
Some of the posts accusing Raji of disingeneous reporting of this issue is disrespectful and regrettable. Reply
ClagMaster - Friday, October 23, 2009 - linkI agree with some of Neil's arguement, but respectfully reserve judgement about the technology linking the CPU to the socket (upward facing pins). I am not a technology purist as Neil where everything has to be just so. That's for academia. I am an engineer who understands "design compromises/tradeoffs" and the concept of "well enough" and "meets design specification". LGA 775 and LGA 1366 sockets worked well enough at stock and normal air cooled overclocking. And I am not aware of any problems with these sockets with Liquid N2 extreme overclocking.
Both 775 and 1366 have the same latching and compression mechanisms while the LGA 1156 does not. All have the same pin upward facing pins designed to engage lands on the CPU. LGA 775 and 1366 works fine and LGA 1156 does not. What is different with LGA 775 and 1366 is the clamp engages the entire circumferential surface of the CPU resulting in a uniform distibution of compressive force. While the LGA 1156 clamps the CPU along the centerline of the CPU.
I did a KT problem analysis and came up with the following possiblities.
If Neil's assertion that 20% of the lands are not being engaged is true, then the Foxconn socket problem boils down to two possiblities:
1) The plastic ridge on the socket on which the CPU base rests and is restrained is too high by 1-2 mills and does not provide sufficient depression to engage pins that are lower than socket average. A telling indication of this is a random disperson of non-contact lands on the CPU.
2) The plastic ridge on the socket on which the CPU base rests is tilted, resulting in one side of the processor being higher than the other. This can also be from the clamping mechanism too since it engages the CPU at the centerline and provides a fulcrum for tilting. A clamping surface which is much longer will provide a more advantageous distribution of compressive force to correct tilting. A telling indication of this is one side of the processor will have more non-contact lands than the other. This is the problem I would place my money on if I were a betting man.
Neil, base on your observations, which is the telling indication? You are in a position give us THE DEFINITIVE ANSWER to this question. Is the non-contact lands you observed random or tilted in distribution? Which is it?
There is one way to prove this hypothesis.
Take a new motherboard (of a model which previously failed) with a FOXCONN socket and with a small tool such as a screwdriver and glue some emory paper of medium grit on the blade. Or use a small cuticle stone. Then lightly rub the plastic ridge down for 5-10 passes on each side (north, south, east, west) with the abrasive, being very careful not to touch the pins. This will take down about 1-2 mills of plastic ridge.
With canned air, blow away the loose plastic particles and mount the CPU. Remove the CPU and observe whether all of the pins are engaged. If you are satisfied all of them are engaged, completely assemble the computer and overclock it at the same extreme conditions the prior motherboard/CPU had failed. If it does not fail, then the problem is solved.
Not to mention this will answer the question about the Foxconn sockets. Reply
neilmarzman - Sunday, October 25, 2009 - linkThis is a well written response. I am glad the we have a smattering of mature people on the site. Your reasoning is well thought out, and I liked your open-minded yet skeptical attitude.
The missing pin impressions on the lands were actually fairly grouped on the socket LGA1156. This might lend credence to the theory of poorly distributed clamping force, resulting in uneven contacts in groups. However, I can count at least 6 pads which are randomly located and are outside the area where there is grouping.
The trouble is that LGA1366 has similar distribution of pins. About 20% missing contacts, with about 12 pins which are randomly distributed.
Personally, I am really busy with my work to really investigate this problem. However, if there is genuine interest in the issue, I will have some of my colleagues in the Semiconductor lab, take a look at it and investigate it for you. You know in academia, the money is in short supply and we like to publish our work. So if they take it on, or if I in my lab do an investigation of the adverse EMI consequences of sharply bent pins. We will publish the results at the least. Since there is a huge amount of work that has already gone into the pure research of these EMI or EMC (if you want to be charitable);taking on a production chip for investigation (which does not add to knowledge which is already out there) is really not publishable material. So at this point, I cannot but only take a cursory look at this problem. However, this does not completely rule out the possibility. So I will see how it unfolds before I give you a commitment which is akin to wasting of my time. After all, I am not a consumer advocate, I am only a fair person--a good Samaritan, if you like.
We all know that just like water, or light, electrical field (and related currents) do not like sharp bends. They kind of spill over the bend in something akin to a slipping car, lot of eddies and reflection are created at these points with spillage of field as radiation. This causes major problems.
If I recall correctly, AMD came out with their 1 GHz processor in the June of 1999 with a 180nm process. In about a couple of years they were running at about 1.8 GHz with the same manufacturing process. I think Intel was able to squeeze out 2GH with its 180nm process with Willamette core. In a decade since then the die has shrunk to 32nm (I think 45nm production), electromagnetically (or electrically) every die-shrink by a factor of 2, should allow the frequency to double, so going from 180nm to45 nm, we should be looking at clock speeds in the range of 6~8 GHz.
Although the die has been shrinking like clockwork, they have not yet cracked 5 GHz ceiling. Putting spring loaded pins in a socket (having sharp bends) will not help their cause much. I feel comfortable in saying without equivocation that they are barking up the wrong tree with these LGA sockets.
For the overclockers; even if you could jack up the current, and cool the CPU to subzero temperatures, you will still experience instability fairly quickly. This instability, is not primarily due to heat generation, or the inadequacy of current supplies, or clock multipliers. It is the result of the much ignored EMI which corrupts data and is a tough nut to crack ;-)
I suppose that is all I have to add. I hope for the sake of the consumers that this problem is fully investigated by people whose job it is to do so, and they are paid to do just that.
Neil Reply
dia - Sunday, October 25, 2009 - linkYou sir are a dunce.
So now 20% of 1366 pads do not make contact either? 272 or so pads without contact? This is a canard of epic proportions.
You are looking at the Intel lab test imprints on the base of your CPU, not those from your socket. Look again and quit spreading FUD. Reply
neilmarzman - Monday, October 26, 2009 - linkDo you what a "canard" means? Look it up! I think you should loose the adjectives and adverbs in your writing. Generally it is good way to objectively assess the substance of your writing, or lack thereof. Reply
dia - Monday, October 26, 2009 - linkQuit sidestepping the issue at hand and provide real evidence of your claims.
Where is your evidence of 230 (socket 1156) or 270 (socket 1366) pads without contact?
Your story is false, so yeah it's a canard.
dia - Saturday, October 24, 2009 - linkHe's probably busy tapping out his pipe and slapping the dandruff off his tweed jacket as we speak (sterotypes, dont ya just love 'em?). If he really does have the equipment at hand to do this, let him show us 20% of his CPU's pads not making contact with the socket pins. His posts are nothing more than static background noise until this evidence is shown. A man of his supposed calibre should have no problems in bringing the enlightenment of real physical proof to the masses. Reply
neilmarzman - Wednesday, October 21, 2009 - linkI have been reading Anandtech almost since it inception. At the beginning, the site was providing good information. Those were the times when these guys were earning their spurs. They would get the boards and microprocessors when they became available. Then there was a time when they grew big enough to snoop around at the expos and pick up on bits of news. They were still useful.
Now that they have become fat and happy; they have become a conduit for the manufacturers. They are "embedded" just like the MSM press was "embedded" during the Iraq war. They are allowing themselves to be willingly used as conduits for drumming up support.
The shameless lead up to the release of P55 is a great example. These days they have access, they sign NDAs and get products before they released. Although they were able to drum up a lot of demand for the P55 platform (as indicated by its early prices), by providing users with tidbits of teasers and "pictorials", they never posted any meaningful results. I am 100% certain that they failed to do their job with integrity; why do we not have reviews for the higher end P55 boards? I think it is because they were unable to run the tests that they had hinted at, because the tests failed.
Take for example Gigabyte P55 UD6 board. It promised a lot, but putting in 6 memory sockets which could not be used was a disaster. The LGA 1156 is a slap on the face of electrical engineering 101. You do not transfer currents through point contacts (which are DC and and they do mention, when they are forced to admit), and you definitely do not use spring-loaded contacts for data pins (which they do not mention), as at these frequencies, impedances come into play.
I was not overclocking--personally I think of overclocking in the same league as some morons put in a 1000 HP engine in a Mustang GT, but do not have the knowledge to match the transmissions or strengthen the chassis, thus blowing up the cars--however, about 20% of the pins (power and data) did not contact the processor pads.
This site is still stuck with the power and overclocking; so they are only concerned with the power pins. The data pins are the more useful part of a processor (just like the transmission of a car)which are most affected because of tenuous electrical contact. It is here that EMI issues come in to play by messing if there are design errors in the hardware.
The Gigabyte board was not only dumping core, routinely, it was doing so at low frequencies. Intel, in their eagerness to make an end run around AMD, have created a dud. However, Anandtech people are still defending them by dishonest claims like, "the Gold pins are supposed to pierce the oxide layers". They got away with the LGA1300, because it was a novelty. component manufacturers were bound to cut corners; this is America after all. Just like Anandtech, every one has a right to turn a profit.
I knew it that Intel was going to crash and burn when they hired two of my laggard doctoral graduates around year 2000(who were better suited for a career in a community college than doing useful research).
Now, I see Anand writing about picking up phone and talking to Intel brass. I does not bother me that he is being manipulated by those people by whoring for access. Again it is their right to make as much as they can, but you have to keep and eye on who you get into bed with; they might give you a bad case of crabs. The damage these shenanigans are doing to his readership in addition to causing them monitory harm will come and bite them. Beware of the chickens coming home to roost.
I liked those times when these guys were using soldering paint to develop workarounds for unlocking the legitimate functions of processors. Now they might as well be on their payroll, and they probably are.
The thing is that this fat and happy state will not last long.
I am really disappointed in Anandtech,
Neil Reply
Porksmuggler - Wednesday, October 21, 2009 - linkAnandtech still provides greater technical insight than the majority of hardware sites.
You sound like a nutter with allegations of Anand "selling out to the man" It doesn't surprise me that you see the P55 as a failure. Anyone who could foresee Intel's downfall from the hiring of two doctoral graduates, must be saturated with hyperbole.
Your analogy to automobile customization is insulting to those that truly understand the tolerances of the hardware. Many overclockers have the knowledge to not "blow up" their systems. If you do not have the knowledge to safely overclock the hardware, its your prerogative to abstain, but passing judgment on the entire practice is idiotic. Reply
neilmarzman - Wednesday, October 21, 2009 - linkEnlighten me a bit more. Did you read that they were my "students". If I don't know their real ability, then who does?
Yes, overclockers are penny-wise pound foolish. BTW, I have know Intel before many of you were born; they were able to out-market Sun Microsystems Sparc processors, which were RISC. Full instruction set is a waste of time and money, however, if you have the money and unfair advantage owing to underhanded tactics, you end up winning, because more people in the world are foolish.
It is like QWERTY keyboard, or more Betamax and VHS, or for your generation HDDVD VS Blue Ray; when both these formats are destined to the dustbin due to better control over downloadable data, increasing bandwidths, and better encryption; in a few years you will be hard pressed to find any, just like the venerable 8 track. Clueless people do strange things. P55 and LGA1156 will put a major dent in the Intel, the motherboard manufacturers, the component manufacturers, and the reviewers.
In reading your mail critically, I notice a glaring lack of substance. You have not provided a single technical argument--even of a general nature--to support the LGA packaging; I presume that you never had the advantage of serious schooling. I am also guessing that you probably own a souped up car or two(with broken trannies) and a few burnt our overclocked computers with a lot of LEDs ;-)
However much I understand your passion, I would still prefer that you stick to the issue at hand: why has anandtech not posted the data on the the boards that they have been "testing" for months? The NDAs are not in force anymore, so what is the excuse? Where are the results?
Next time, be careful when using adjectives. I am old and experienced, and I am quite capable of upping the ante. However, it is better to stick to the real issues at hand. Last I looked this was supposed to be a technical site, not a Dear Abby column, so keep you emotions in check.
Neil Reply
1stguess - Thursday, October 22, 2009 - linkI'm not an expert so i cannot affirm whether pinpoint contact on the pads is the big issue. I do however like hearing a voice that is not a afraid to take an informed stance.
While some posters might take an offense to your style of not pulling any punches Neil, It makes for some really entertaining reading. "Broken trannies", "clueless people do strange things", haha.
So let me ask, you think that both Foxconn and Intel are complicit in this p55 failure?
BTW I refunded my p55 platform in exchange for a 1366 board & i7 920, but still have an aversion to buying Foxconn even on this platform. Might need therapy. Reply
neilmarzman - Friday, October 23, 2009 - linkNow that we are being civilized. Let me try to conjecture; based on my over 25 years of experience as a Professor of Electromagnetics, who still likes to tinker.
If I had to make an educated guess, I will say that the ultimate responsibility lies with Intel. I am sure you will see this misalignment with Lotes sockets as well. It may not be visible to the naked eye, since if they are using more gold, the conductivity will improve, and as a result the Vtt pins will be able to withstand greater current draws, without leaving burn marks. However, it does not mean that all the data pins are making solid electrical contacts.
Power pins work with DC, so the impedance, (other than some indirect
EMI), is mostly resistance. Their inductance and capacitance do not play any role at all.
The inductance and capacitance which keep you guys from overclocking to the kingdom come, are the main impediments when designing a high frequency packaging. Since the silicon die itself, is not amenable to any fancy design work, since it is mostly on/off transistors. The nifty designing comes into play when packaging the silicon. The layout of the design at this point is critical, one misplaced pin will screw up the entire package (I meant the entire design). If there are sharp bends, if the traces are too close, if the traces are electrically too thin (compared to the wavelength); we will see huge instability. After the processor is packaged, it is necessary that this fine engineering is not frittered away by poor design starting from the pinout on.
Of course the first thing that processor sees on a board is the socket. If the mating mechanism is not foolproof, you lose all the advantage. I think it is the duty of the microprocessor manufacturer to make the processor packaging "idiot proof". Consider the case of these LGA sockets, the onus of this responsibility has been transferred to the socket manufacturers, who are small potatoes and who come an go. I did not see anything wrong with those zif sockets which required straight pins. They were almost foolproof: they had good contact and straight lines. The LGA socket has sharply bent conductor pins (for providing spring loading) which play hell with the impedance.
I am not sure that I understand the trade off. Unless Intel, somehow believes that as long as they can defend their microprocessors,they will be just fine; Even if the applications in which they are being used do not work. The customer usually does not care about these fine nuances. They quickly figure out that having "Intel Inside" is not a good thing ;-)
It is not about blame game, it is about providing a robust product to the consumer. Their ability to defend their processor will not protect them from tacking a hit.
Now, we all know that processors, have many parts, and as a result many features and full functionality is never tapped by everyday user application. With most people only using Office, email, chat, or watching porno, or playing games. Only when you run a mathematically intensive program you use can approach full tapping the processor capacity of a microprocessor. This is where these processors start to dump cores.
Keep in mind, that with all these new GPUs, most of graphical work is done outside the processor, so even graphically intensive applications will not put the processor through its paces. With P55 they are forcing the GPUs forcibly rely on the processor. This does is not to help out the consumer, this is mainly aimed at creating a bear-trap for their would be competitors:the GPU manufacturers, who now deserve a place at the table. There is no technical merit to it. In nature, when you dig holes for others; you can sometimes fall into them yourself, especially if you are not too bright. But I digress...
Moving along, usually the processor manufacturers can get away with serious follies. After all, how many people do any real computing?
Changing tracks, as promised, I installed an LGA166 processor into a Gigabyte EX58-UD5 yesterday. I did not experience any core dumps or any instability with normal chores. It too has a FOXcon socket; so I pulled out the processor and looked for pin impressions on the pads. Guess what? about 20% of the pins again did not make contact.
I think LGA1366 dodges the bullet, during normal use, because it does not have to work with a P55 and most of graphics does not need the help of the CPU.
In conclusion, my somewhat informed conjecture is that sockets LGA, are begging for a opportunity to fail. That is not what I would have expected from people at Intel; however mediocre their R&D people maybe. This is clear incompetence!
My very best,
Neil Reply
dia - Friday, October 23, 2009 - linkNot sure I follow that ZIF sockets have no right angles in the transfer point from PCB to junction/clamp contact with the 'straight' CPU pins. Are you entirely sure about this? Or are we to assume that all Intel engineers know a lot less than you do about package design/layout/stray capacitance/inductance?
So your 1156 CPU has around 230 non-connecting pads (you said around 20%)? Can you show pics to verify this, or does it only show up on your microscope? If some of those are signal pins and you're not experiencing 'odd behaviour', dropouts from the OS or even non-boots, one has to question if you're even looking for the right thing.
I'll be very surprised if there is no scuff mark showing contact on most of those pads. If you can't show pictures, I shall take a leaf out of your book and assume you have something to hide. I hope you're not referring to the pin prick indents from Intel's test jig socket. That would be funny and would certainly 'lower the ante'.
Rajinder Gill - Friday, October 23, 2009 - linkI've entered all the overclocked results I have on file to date into the graphing engine. These will go live sometime over the next few days hopefully (provided I get all the text finished and in for edit). A note of warning; the results are all sub-zero cooled, so won't interest to some of you. I will post up the actual screenshots too (just for those of you that doubt the benches were actually run..lol) These results were due to be posted with the socket issues in a single article but I had not finshed benching one of the LOTES based boards (just finshed that this week - EVGA E659).
No further info yet from any vendors regarding sockets/non pin contact or otherwise. I'll stick up the results I have regardless.
Rajinder Gill - Friday, October 23, 2009 - linkBTW, here are some of the results I uploaded via imageshack. Just to prove the benches were actually run @ sub-zero ;)
Plenty more on file, final results will be up in grpahs for easy cross compare and also highlighting where we lost a board. Reply
ClagMaster - Friday, October 23, 2009 - linkImpressive overclock results -- even with Liquid N2. Did any of the sockets fail while these benchmarks were being run?
Raja. I saw a posting at CPU3D which featured this article which quoted you by name.
There was a quote of an engineer working at Intel:
"Think about it ... at 1.65V, you are around 250watts ... this is 150AMPS!gigabyte gave what the Overclockers asked ... now, use it with moderation ... I tested on a mecanical [sic] thermal dummy ... the [Gigabyte GA-P55-UD6] can deliver up to 160AMPS without occilation [sic] ... at this point, you are more than 2x the specs for currents ... and 60% over the voltage ... and 263% of the based power ..."
"my guess in those cases is "finger print" or oxidation due to [liquid nitrogen] condensation plus an incredible UD6 voltage supply that does not bend under load. (thing requested by the OC community)"
I still think operating the i5/i7 at stock speeds for a Foxconn LGA 1156 will not result in failed sockets.
Rajinder Gill - Friday, October 23, 2009 - linkHi,
Yes I lost one of my boards during these benches.
That 'Intel' response is from Francois. He's got a point but I'm not sure if grubby marks on the pads are the cause given that most of the VCC related burnout happen on the same part of the land. I'm not sure we'll ever get a fully informed technical response as to the exact cause but you never know.
neilmarzman - Thursday, October 22, 2009 - linkFunny, so you were around for the QWERTY keyboard... interesting :-)
Experimenting? With what?
If you cannot read critically, my only purpose is to remind this site that integrity counts for something. Instead of getting in bed with the manufacturers. They should try to report their findings without sugarcoating. I am sure you are not unaware of phenomenon of whoring for access.
Anand or anandtech is small potatoes for me to defame. It is the monitory harm he is causing to his readership which concerns me more.
However, I do not question his right to do whatever will get him the most money in the shortest time. That is his birthright. If in doing so he kills the goose which lays the golden egg; that is also his business.
I think that this site is opening itself up to potential litigation by cheer-leading for manufacturers by intentionally providing or withholding selective information/misinformation, just like CNBC used to do, and I would hate to see that.
If you have a background in electrical engineering, more power to you. I was merely mentioning "a finishing school" :-) It that a big enough ante for you?
None of you guys have the equipment to test anything including those at Anandtech. Running a few test suits, or measuring total input current is not real testing. Again it is more in line with souping up your car (a la Tim Allen and his lawn-mower). My gardener likes to indulge souping up his car, he has a 1000 horsepower engine, with N20 injection in it. The trouble is that it always broken: an axle here, a burned out clutch there. He even managed to explode his engine. To me that is overclocking, and that is fine with me. However, when I buy something I want to know if it will perform within manufacturer's specifications.
Doesn't it bother you that the data pins are not making contact, and the only reason they stumbled upon the partial reason was ironic serendipity... by looking at burn marks! That is as low tech as you can get. I am going to check out a socket LGA1366 as well and see if FOXCon is getting a bum rap (it is easy to finger the small guy). It could as easily be a design flaw on part of Intel. After all, both the socket or processor pads can miss the tolerances.
BTW, the amount of gold used has nothing to do with placement or strength of contacts, it only affects the conductivity if physical contact is made. On the other hand, the issue of placement affects the total impedance even if no contact is made, two out of the three elements of impedance still play their role. This was another ridiculous canard.
Neil Reply
Porksmuggler - Wednesday, October 21, 2009 - linkyou're not exactly "upping the ante" with this rambling about Betamax and RISC, and yes many of us were around for both. You seem to post only to insult the author, Anand, overclockers, and Intel. If you have a different agenda, please let it be known.
My background is in electrical engineering, I do not own a "souped up" car or any burnt out computers. I did get a laugh out of the imagery though :) Believe it or not, there are many overclockers who do it for the sake of experimentation alone. It's not about being penny-wise pound foolish, regardless of the stereotype you have created in your mind. As I mentioned before, if you do not have the knowledge, or the resources, perhaps you should abstain. Reply
JDD - Tuesday, October 20, 2009 - linkI just don't understand all of this jibber jabber dimples or not if you install the chip and every pad is not making contact with a corresponding point on the socket. It's not right. Fix it. End of story. This is not about how much you can get away with. Overclocking or not. Fix it. That's it. There should be no more discussion. Than just Fix it Reply
dingetje - Tuesday, October 20, 2009 - linkso does yours have dimples or not? ;) Reply
JDD - Tuesday, October 20, 2009 - linkYep dimples are visible on my i7-870 that is sittin in the box. Im just waiting for all this to get worked out before I get a motherboard. I have a case and power supply to get anyway so by that time i get those items hopefully this will be resolved. Reply
ClagMaster - Wednesday, October 21, 2009 - linkThank you. Please keep digging.
Later Reply
Polecat - Wednesday, October 21, 2009 - linkI just could not take the tension any more. I had just purchased and assembled an ASUS P7P55D PRO i7 860 one day before this story broke. Yesterday I drove one hour south to a Microcenter and bought an EVGA P55 FTW 132-LF-E657-KR with a LOTES socket on it and the Asus is going back. I can't take the idea that my expensive CPU could possibly burn up or have its life shortened due to this socket issue.
I have every intention over over clocking this bad boy and I want to do so with a high degree of comfort that the described issue will not be the end result.
I have also called Asus tech support who swears that they have not received any calls returns regarding this issue. I called Foxconn and EVGA as well both of whom say they were unaware that this was even a confirmed real problem. In other words they are reporting no returned boards due to this issue (at least to me).
Thank you for reporting this.
JDD - Wednesday, October 21, 2009 - linkRaja, The question I asked was what are manufactures saying about the pins not touching the pads, Just putting it together not even starting the machine just putting into the socket. Are you saying that they are saying that is an overclock issue. Your not even turning it on for god sake. Reply
mudman - Wednesday, October 21, 2009 - linkAnd finally, we have a case of a stock setup using Asus board...burnt socket pins...
http://forums.hardwarezone.com.sg/showthread.php?t...">http://forums.hardwarezone.com.sg/showthread.php?t... Reply
neilmarzman - Wednesday, October 21, 2009 - linkRaja, is defending his patrons. If a pin does not make a solid electrical contact, it has nothing to do with overclocking. I doubt if these people have a microscope; therefore they can only see discoloration which is caused by high electrical resistance at pin contacts, which is caused heating and arcing which burns the pads.
I viewed the contacts under the microscope. Roughly 20% of all pins are not making contact. Anyone,who claims that the all pins do not need to make contact (especially data pins which will not leave burn marks), is talking out of his backside. Wasn't this the person who made the stupid remark about pins needing to pierce the "oxide" layer on gold contacts. I wonder if he even took chemistry 101. From his name he appears to be of Indian origin, he only needs to look at his moms jewelry box to see that gold does not oxidize. Now you can make some compounds of gold, but never oxides.
I want them to release the board reviews as they are, instead of busily trying to cover them up and cook up data. I don't know if I can trust these people anymore.
Neil Reply
Rajinder Gill - Wednesday, October 21, 2009 - linkYou are so far off the mark about me 'defending my patrons ' its incredible.
I have not had a single answer back about non contacting pins, hence I have nothing to report. My last correspondance with the vendors quoted the Foxconn email which talks about a top plate replacement. To date no vendor is willing to commit on the cause, in fact most don't even think it's an issue of non-contacting pins.
If I wanted to 'defend patrons', I would not have posted anything in the first place.
neilmarzman - Wednesday, October 21, 2009 - linkThis is something which cannot be proven without looking at your and your site's financial data. Similarly, it cannot be disproved, without the same data. So I will be the bigger man and withdraw my "your patron" assertion. I should have known better to accuse you without solid proof. So please accept my apologies.
Now, back to business. Pray tell me about the "oxide" layer of gold and why data pins are not important (since you keep talking about power pins only). So, let's get back to the useful issue, instead of throwing mud. I apologize for my "unprovable" conjecture. Can you give me a straight answer?
Did you guys have tried to check the continuity and robustness of the contacts of the processor pads and socket pins. If I were you I will buy a FOXCon LGA 1156 socket (from the open market) mount a processor in it then manually check all connector pinouts. Now that will be a real service.
PS: BTW, you had two pin impressions on the pads, I have only one. Because I mounted it only once. Could it be that you are getting more impressions due to multiple mountings; thus underestimating the gravity of the problem? Reply
Rajinder Gill - Wednesday, October 21, 2009 - linkStance from companies using Foxconn sockets is that there's no real problem. The tech dept's are putting it down to operator error/extreme OC.
That being said, it is possible ASUS may move their P55 line up over to another socket vendor (they are looking at qualifying other sockets). The Foxconn sockets did pass Intel qualification back in June. So it's really a case of - are there sockets out there from pre June qualification that should not be, or is the overhead of the Foxconn socket limited by deisgn in comparison to those from LOTES or TYCO AMP?
I had a big conversation with one of DFI's tech guru's about this and he's as stumped about the cause as anyone (they've had a socket burn issue on their end too). Every reported case has happened under overclocked state so far. Until we get this happening at stock it's going to be difficult get answers from those in the know. The only way to test the sockets themselves would be to use tools that only Intel have access to (a transient load tester deisgned around the socket to measure the voltage drop via the socket).
I've got one Gigabyte board here using the Foxocnn socket and it has not burned out under extreme OC, so it's still random I'm afraid.
JDD - Wednesday, October 21, 2009 - linkRaja, When you talk to these manufactures are you warring your overclockers hat or your consumers' I understand you being concerned about burnt pads and pins, but have you brought up the fact not all pads are being contacted but the pins, what do they say about that. Also the ones that have changed so far, Are they doing so because there afraid of losing sales of boards or DO THEY SEE A REAL PROBLEM? Reply
Rajinder Gill - Wednesday, October 21, 2009 - linkHi,
Like you I'd like to see why it happens but cannot find anything 100% conclusive to explain it. Until it starts to happen at stock the companies in question will not respond with anything other than 'this is an overclocked issue and the socket is qualified for use'. Some tech depts are telling users they have never even heard of the problems (i've had some emails referred to me with responses). That element aside, the answer from vendors is always that it's an extreme overclocking issue if at all. Onyl thing I can tell you is that I've not had a single burnout on the other vendor sockets thus far. I don't know if that helps you, but it is the only real information I have at this point.
dank69 - Thursday, October 22, 2009 - linkI'm not sure you answered JDD's question. What do they say about pins not making contact?
I just bought a 920 and an evga x58 SLI with a foxconn socket. after reading this article, I checked my cpu for pin contact. There are a few pads that show no signs of contact and others that look like they have 2 points of contact despite the fact that I only inserted the chip one time. Are there any reports of 1366 foxconns having the same contact problems? Reply
dahwang - Wednesday, October 21, 2009 - linkWhen more than half of these boards claim to support overclocking, such as building in unique features that could otherwise have no other use than overclocking, the vendors cannot just simply wipe their hands of this mess. Claiming that it is an "overclocking" issue, is simply a refusal to take responsibility for a flaw in their feature-set and design.
The P55-GD80 even has an "OC Genie" which is a one button overclock. Does that mean that this feature is pretty much useless? If the vendors are not going to support OC, then they really need to stop marketing about it.
I doubt any car company could install a gun in a car, but tell consumers not to use it, because it's not a supported feature and would void their warranty. It wouldn't fly at all and I think a civil jury would agree. Unless these vendors start taking a pro-active stance in resolving this issue, I foresee a class action civil suit that will end up costing them more fixing the problem. Reply
SixOfSeven - Wednesday, October 21, 2009 - linkA better analogy might be, you drive your car 40 mph over the speed limit, the engine explodes, and the manufacturer refuses to honor the warranty. (On the other hand, if it's 400 mph over the speed limit, they may have a point.) Reply
xanonwk - Tuesday, October 20, 2009 - linkWhat is the board revision of the ASUS P7T55D Deluxe burnt out? I wonder if my P7P55D's board revision is same as the one Raji tested.
Porksmuggler - Tuesday, October 20, 2009 - linkClagmaster, seriously, I read your "facts" and observations a few pages back, and you have no idea what you are talking about. Here's a fact, I opened a sealed i5-750, and guess what, the pads were completely untouched, no testing marks at all. I'll freely admit my particular board with a Foxconn socket does not have the issue, but that's no reason to claim any absolutes. Then I read your last comment about power draw, are you kidding? You claim a masters in nuclear/electrical engineering and 30 years experience...you need to consider retiring. Reply
ClagMaster - Tuesday, October 20, 2009 - linkSeriously, my Q6600 has the same dimple marks the photos in the above article has. Since this is a new, factory sealed CPU I can only conclude these must be from pins from factory testing machine. The actual LGA-775 socket has pins which are rounded on top, rather than points where high voltages can concentrate to cause arcing. So I have difficulties accepting the dimples as an indication of the prescence or lack of socket pin contact.
As far as power draw, I realized from the P55 schematics that the PCI-E x16 sockets and memory are controlled through the Lynnfield CPU. In the LGA-775 socketed motherboards the Northbridge contains the PCI-E and memory controllers. So for LGA-775 sockets, only the power to operate the CPU is passed through. I was just pondering, since I do not know where to find the detailed engineering information, whether the PCI-E controllers also route the 150W of power through the CPU/LGA-1156 socket to partially power the graphics cards.
I do not know the facts of this matter but I would like to have this question answered by people more knowledgeable than me. I suspect that the PCI-E signal leads do (which have some current associated with them) but the power leads bypass the CPU socket and come from the power supply.
If this is true, there is a lot more current going through LGA-1156 than LGA-775 or LGA-1366 and would go a long way in explaining the melted pins.
Yes, its true the i5-750 has a TDP of 95W. What I am questioning though is whether more power (than 95W) is being passed through the LGA-1156 socket than is presently understood by this community.
BTW -- I would love to retire and spend the rest of my years hiking, hunting, competitive shooting, cross-country sking, and building computers.
Later Reply
Porksmuggler - Tuesday, October 20, 2009 - linkI'm not inclined to do your homework for you, but just so you know, Intel's electrical, thermal, and mechanical design specifications are readily available. The pins have well documented mechanical specs. The lands on the sealed i5-750s I have opened are untouched, and once installed do have marks that indicate pin contact. Your speculations on power draw are incorrect. Also the TDP of 95W does not represent maximum power, it is the thermal solution design target. Many in this community presently understand this, as does Intel, Document Number:322167-002. I'm glad you are looking forward to retiring. It's interesting to see someone post their political/social beliefs(pg. 14), education/work experience(pg. 16), and hobbies all in one article commentary :) Reply
ClagMaster - Wednesday, October 21, 2009 - linkI would not think of you doing my homework. But I do appreciate a useful tip on where to look.
I will take a look at these specifications(obviously in the Intel website). It's a question of availability of time and I have more pressing matters to attend.
I am not adverse to posting opinions and questions even if they later prove to be wrong or foolish. I am not adverse to risk like a certain nation is. At least its simulating thoughts in others. Thomas Edison (a great experimentalist) said that for each success he had to experience 10000 failures. You learn more from the failures than the successes. Reply
ClagMaster - Tuesday, October 20, 2009 - linkI was contemplating differences between the LGA-775 and LGA-1156 sockets and realized the LGA-775 has accommodated much greater loads without failure during extreme overclocking than the LGA-1156.
Then something occurred to me.
Since the i5/i7 Lynnfields have the PCI-E controller built in, that means an extra 150W has to go through the LGA-1156 socket, through the PCI-E controller on the i5/i7 die, to the PCI-E x16 sockets. That means simply considering the 95W load of the i5/i7 CPU is only a fraction of the energy passing through this socket. the problem. So for normal operation with I can have up to 95W + 150W or 245W actually going through this socket. This is a lot of power (current) going through this socket.
Raja, it this true? Of course a graphics card or two will have seperate PCIe 6pin sockets for plugs from the power supply. But still, there is going to be a lot of current going trough this socket.
If this is true, that the LGA-1156 sockets are passing the PCI-E power as well as CPU and memory power, then no wonder these sockets are starting to fail during high overclocks.
I am starting to question whether the LGA-1156 is appropriate for serious gaming rigs which have dual SLI graphics cards. Reply
baldheadeddork - Tuesday, October 20, 2009 - linkI'll defer to Raja but I think you're mixing terms.
The thermal design power (TDP) of the i5 series is 95 watts under load, but the CPU uses a lot more power - 120 watts at idle and at least 195w under load. The PCIe controller spec can provide up to 150 watts per device under load, but the TDP load for the controller is going to be substantially less. So low that the i5 CPU still stays under 200w TDP under load without hyperthreading.
dahwang - Tuesday, October 20, 2009 - linkIs there a reason why none of the other major tech blogs have picked up reporting on this? Other than a few other small blogs, I haven't seen a story similar to this. I would at least like to see a post from toms hardware or HardOCP. It'd also be nice to see a second viewpoint. Reply
JDD - Tuesday, October 20, 2009 - linkHere a couple of links but seems that they all point to Anand because Rajinder Gill was the first to break the story.
vvelumm - Tuesday, October 20, 2009 - linkI just got off the phone with a Tech Support Supervisor about
Maximus III Gene and the foxxconn issuse. He relentlessly told me they are doing testing and "THEIR" motherboard's have no issuses with foxxconn type. He basically guranteed over the phone that the maximus iii gene which all have the foxxcont bracket has no issues that is being talked about online.
To me it just feels like they are trying to cover their asses but i guess we won't know until someone tests it. Reply
xcimo - Tuesday, October 20, 2009 - linkI agree! Reply
dingetje - Tuesday, October 20, 2009 - linkjust give it some time...i predict these boards are gonna kill a LOT of cpu's...p55 will be known as a cpu killer by 2012 ;) Reply
michael19 - Monday, October 19, 2009 - linkThank you for all the useful information Raja, keep it coming. Reply
SixOfSeven - Monday, October 19, 2009 - linkYes, excellent summary of mfr responses, and much quicker than I expected.
There have been a lot of responses stating that this problem only affects drastically overclocked boards and suggesting that it can be ignored by those running at stock (or mildly overclocked) speeds. The actions of Foxconn, Intel, and the other companies involved tell a different story. That they made a change to the part indicates either a) they believed there was a risk of problems at stock speeds or b) despite disclaimers, overclocking is really a supported activity and they believe they have to deliver products which function correctly when overclocked. Reply
Syny - Monday, October 19, 2009 - linkSo, I´ve read most of the discussions here, and I'm really worried about my i7 860 overclocked at 3.6Ghz with 1.246 voltage. I don´t exactly know, what do I have to expect from this Socket issue. I´ve got Gigabyte P55-UD5 Mobo which of course has Foxconn socket. So i´m asking as an ordinary user, who don't have any extra cash if something will happen with my CPU and MOBO ofc.
Could this 3.6 overclock, affect proper function of my CPU in future, maybe after a year or two years of using this not so high overclocked i7 860 ???
I need some reliable answer/s, because im considering right now, if it won´t be better, to go back at my stock clocks.
ps: my english is bad i know :/, hope u´re going to understand what i want. Reply
curtisfong - Monday, October 19, 2009 - linkC'mon people, read the article! This will not affect you unless you meet the conditions stated in the article.
32nm chips will only exacerbate problems with the foxconn socket because voltage will be lower so amps will be higher, for a given power budget. Current capacity of a wire is not a function of power or voltage, it is function of amps. This is one reason why power transmission cables carry high voltage (amps remain low and the current capacity of the wire is not exceeded - the other reason is to minimize power loss). We should expect to see identical failures at lower power with 32nm chips vs. 45nm chips.
And to one of the posters above, no, a mild OC will not hasten failure on the socket. As long as the current capacity of the contact does not exceed its maximum load (which is partially dependent on the socket ie. foxconn vs. lotes / tyco) it will not experience failure. Reply
JDD - Monday, October 19, 2009 - linkSeems to me that earlier in the article people were saying that not all the pads were making contact. Going back to the design with the pins on the CPU, when it was inserted into the socket there were contact with every pin on that chip regardless of what that pin was used for. Why should this be any different? The correct number of pads we designed into the chip and all should make contact . Where not even talking about turning the thing on, just inserting it into the socket. If it was designed this way it should work this way. If Intel didn't want all the pads to make contact I would think they would have made less of them and made each one bigger. I don't see what all the debate is about? If the pad was put there is should be used for something. Reply
moronsworld - Monday, October 19, 2009 - linkOverclocking shows evidence to some degree on how your system will perform in the long run. Even if it might not affect you right now in the long run these foxconn cheapened boards will harm your cpu in the long run. If your contacts are off by a little bit, the negative affects of that will build up overtime and in the long run will burnout your cpu faster than normal. So I suggest you not listen to these foxconn/intel monkeys that say that its ok to have a foxconn board. Whoever is saying that these foxconn boards are ok if you're not gonna OC is either a foxconn worker, intel worker or just a plain monkey who doesn't understand a think about computers. Oh and please someone delete the post above me that's trying to advertise clothes. Reply
mudman - Monday, October 19, 2009 - linkSomehow I feel it maybe a way from Intel to discourage "extreme" overclocks. Maybe this is their way of capping clockspeeds to 4GHz. Any higher than that and there goes your 1156 setup. If you wanna go higher, try 1366... Reply
safaan - Sunday, October 18, 2009 - linkHello all,
I have ordered just last weak a new Intel i5 and Asus P7P55D. And then I read this article on Friday.
What should I do? I don't have in plan to overclock processor but still as you said it can happen once. And no warranty will be there.
What would happen If I choose MSI P55-CD53? How can I be positive that it has Lotus chipset? And do you think Lotus if 100% without this problem?
And which motherboard do you recommend if I choose Core 2 Duo LGA 775 processor?
Thank you.
Safaan Reply
ClagMaster - Sunday, October 18, 2009 - linkBe cool. Don't panic. You made a great choice. Accept the parts and upgrade your new computer and enjoy it. The i5/P7P55D should provide you with years of service since you will not overclock it.
Please read my comment on the preceeding page about this article. This article is discussing a socket failure during extreme overclocking (>160W) where currents and voltages are sufficiently high to cause pin/land arcing and pin melting and distortion.
Extrapolating this performance to lower voltages and currents of normative operation (95W) is bogus (inappropriate) and will not cause these failures.
The article discusses pin contact on the basis of dimples found on i5/i7 that were placed there by factor test devices. Some lands do not have these dimples and the author claims they are evidence the Foxconn 1156 socket pins are not contacting these lands. And attibutes this as evidence of non-existent pin contact and the cause of these failures. This is a nonsense.
dingetje - Sunday, October 18, 2009 - linkClagmaster forgot to mention that he will refund your money when your cpu gets fried ;) Reply
Rajinder Gill - Monday, October 19, 2009 - linkFoxconn say they fixed burnout issues by identifying a socket problem back in May. Apparently they had already sent sample sockets from the first Intel spec out to some of the vendors though. In July, two vendors suffered socket burn issues in house and reported this back to Foxconn. Foxconn explained the specification change to those vendors and the vendors continued to purchase socket stock from Foxconn.
A recent benching session of single thread of 32m drawing around 7.5 amps from the EPS 12v line @ 5GHz lead to 2 ROG boards burning out, one is mine another a clasoe friend - same bench and same current draw.
I was also sent an EVGA E657 around this time without full retail box just to beta test. That board had a Foxconn socket (unbeknown to me), after an OC session at around 4.8GHz on one fo my CPU's one of the CPU pads had fused to one of the pins.
DFI sent a board to a user to beta test, he OC'd to 4.7 on air and his socket burned out too (Foxconn socket). Most of this took place after July. This was supposed to be the revised Foxocnn socket. The revision cites a new top plate being used to correct problems.
Now we've got reports of some retail boards from ASUS too, one during a gaming session at 4.1GHz. so yes all overclockied, with the only conecerning burnouts being the single 32m ones which draw very little current to VCC.
So, a bit of a weird mess and some vendors are not using the Foxconn parts until they are sure they are ok. DFI, MSI and EVGA have moved over to LOTES and TYCO AMP exclusively for P55.
ClagMaster - Monday, October 19, 2009 - linkThe failures occur during operation during extreme overclocking where voltages and currents. Though I admit an overclock at 4.1 Ghz is not so extreme.
Raja. What is so different about Foxconn relative to LOTES or TYCO AMP LGA 1156 sockets? Did they change the pin alloys to something cheaper, less conductive and oxidation resistent?
Still, I would not send back a P55 motherboard with a Foxconn socket because of this extreme overclocking issue based on what I know of the physics of arcing and conduction. That is because I do not overclock and for normal currents and voltages arcing should not occur.
If I were Asus, MSI or EVGA I would not accept a return of an undamaged motherboard. Reply
Rajinder Gill - Monday, October 19, 2009 - linkPhysically it's really hard to tell. Foxconn say their revision is in the top plate, but I have not seen anything other than the one I have on my boards here. Further a report from DFI revealed the user issue I reported above from mainland China (that was single thread 32m at 4.7Ghz though).
If I get any more info on this I'll update.
BTW 32m single thread at 5Ghz only darwas about 60w to VCC. So it is a little scary.
ClagMaster - Monday, October 19, 2009 - linkWell, I am interested in what you find out.
Later :) Reply
Rajinder Gill - Monday, October 19, 2009 - linkThe only real diff in the lotes top plate are the tabs that apply pressure to the CPU (they are larger on the LOTES top plate).
With regards to the arcing - it's nealry always the same pins that burn (the same location I mean). Never the VCC pads that are further in the centre of the land. Even the 2 situatons reported on air, its in the same place. Reply
xcimo - Monday, October 19, 2009 - linkWas there any case of this with mild overclocking on air? Such as a i7 860 @ 3.8Ghz ? I am wondering if this is enough of an issues to order a different board than the P7P55D Deluxe that I currently have on order.
Can you post details about thoses 2 burn on air?
Thanks Reply
Rajinder Gill - Monday, October 19, 2009 - link4.1 GHz was one case air cooled during gaming.
other case was a suicide run on air @ 4.7 running a single instance of 32m.
So, both higher than 'mild' OC's really. Although the current draw of both is not exactly earth shattering.
safaan - Monday, October 19, 2009 - linkI just contacted a distributor in my country and he said IF processor would be burned because of socket-board, ASUS would NOT cover the new processor, unless they decide differently (if they admit the whole series had a problem). Reply
Rajinder Gill - Monday, October 19, 2009 - linkI don't think anyone will warranty OC'd damage (regardless of the vendor in question). So far, the lowest OC this is supposed to have happened at is 4.1GHz during a gaming session. I've asked the user for some pics to confirm.
This is what Foxconn stated to one of the vendors;
In the early April, ASUS and Gigabyte obtained a few Foxconn 1156 socket samples for testing purpose. However, around May, Foxconn discovered the caps of the sockets may have some issues and immediately informed INTEL. INTEL responded that the design change would be made in August, but Foxconn strongly requested the design change had to be issued ASAP. Foxconn issued the SCR in May and resend the modified sample sockets to ASUS and Gigabyte.
During the test run in July, ASUS and Gigabyte accidentally used the old/unmodified sample sockets and caused the burning of the CPU. After the clarification from Foxconn, both companies accepted the explanation and would keep using Foxconn 1156 socket . So far, NO similar burning issue has occurred ever since.
dingetje - Sunday, October 18, 2009 - linkcancel the order and go AMD ;) Reply
Jumpem - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - link********************************************************
Someone from AT please read this, and respond!
The dimples are there on brand new, never inserted CPUs. This has been verified via photos in this thread, at HardForum: http://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1460140">http://www.hardforum.com/showthread.php?t=1460140.
The contact with the socket is the longer scuff mark imprints. Which all of the ones with "bad contact" in the AT photos have.
JDD - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkI tend to agree on this because I have an i7-870 sitting in a box never been in a socket because I am waitiing to see what this is all about before i buy a board. and using a magnifing glass checked it out and The dimples are all there? Reply
frank828 - Sunday, October 18, 2009 - linkthanks for that info.
with this now known, how in the world are we supposed to know what kind of scuff is good and what isnt? or is this really a non-issue?
JDD - Sunday, October 18, 2009 - linkI think we need a couple more people to confirm what i see is correct, someone who has never installed the chip. or we get something official from a manafacturer motherboard, intel or someone this guesing and not knowing for sure is crazy Reply
JDD - Sunday, October 18, 2009 - linkHow about these guys at anandtech don't they have a chip they havent blown up yet? Reply
Rajinder Gill - Sunday, October 18, 2009 - linkyeah the pricks are from factory CPU's. The Foxconn head contact should leave a small scuff mark on every pad, but it does no seem this always happens due to incorrect loading. Reply
Rajinder Gill - Sunday, October 18, 2009 - linkhttp://img27.imageshack.us/img27/5551/cpumelt.jpg">http://img27.imageshack.us/img27/5551/cpumelt.jpg
another one, damage not so severe on this one, but getting close. Reply
nofumble62 - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkLand of opportunity Reply
DahakaCL - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkHi there again.
I read a lot and my MIIIF have this problem, i don't want to keep this MB so i decided sell it and get EVGA SLI 132-LF-E655-KR, if anyone ( again xD ) have some information about this model please let me know!!.
I have a F1 Extreme POT from Kingpin and i don't wanna blow up this plataform lol.
Thanks. Regards from Chile Reply
CW1d - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkI am fascinated to read that there are people who are willing to accept less than the original design specifications as long as the product works. Of course the definition of what 'works' means is of absent. In this particular situation we have one manufacturer who was able to produce a socket that satisfied the Intel design requirements and one who appears to not have been able to satisfy those requirements. We also seem to have customers who are happy to shell out their money (or maybe theirs parents money) for products that are not up to spec. With the rational 'As long as those products work' - well at least for the short term. I wonder if those same consumers would be as cavalier about buying a automobile with a braking system that was not quite up to spec but worked under normal and fair usage, namely that no one exceeds the speed limit or has ever had an extra passenger in the car than the recommended total number of passengers. So if the brakes were to fail because their was one passenger to many or the vehicle was traveling a few miles above the speed limit then of course the car company that produced the brakes was not responsible, rather it is the user who is to blame. Sound familiar? Somehow I think that notion is a bad one.
The argument that all is fine as long as it 'works' within stock usage holds no water. Even the manufactures themselves acknowledge that with their preprogrammed profiles to over clock a CPU. They endorse the practice of wringing extra performance above the stock parameters with the over-clocking software included with the drivers, and very pleased I am that they do so and long my they continue. So let us just put aside that notion of acceptable usage AKA stock only and move on shall we. The issue is not really about how the product is used. The over-clockers noticed it first. Yes. Just as racing drivers have pioneered many of the safety features we take as standard in our daily runabout cars. (Yes I am in the automobile industry so forgive the car analogies)
Why should the consumer accept second best? Why should the consumer accept a product that can potentially damage their other components? I see no real or compelling reason to do so. To check my own set up I pulled my CPU that is running at 'stock' from my Gigabyte UD3R board and checked to see the indentation on the pads. Yip I too have a similar pattern of absent indents. So that means that my stock set up with the stock Intel cooler installed corrects as per the instructions that come with it is not making contact correctly between all pins and all pads. That does not make me happy.
What the way forward is, well I have no idea. Adding a shim under the latch will not be a good idea. The very same over-clockers who first noticed this issue, will certainly tell you that over pressure on the fragile pins is not a good idea. So I guess for folks like me who need to use their machine for work and can not afford to buy another system just yet, we will have to wait and see. Reply
ClagMaster - Sunday, October 18, 2009 - linkLast night I was debating whether to spend some of my valuable time replying to your post. You accuse me of being complacent and unthinking. No, I am not complacent. It's just the 30 year experienced engineer within me having a questioning attitude over this article and an elderly head shaking over the fear-ridden opinions and panicked responses of many of its bloggers.
Here's a fact:
Last night I opened a box containing a brand new Q6600 processor. I took a magnifying glass to the CPU pads and found there were dimple marks on the CPU. Also some of these pads did not have these dimple marks in certain patterns. Since this is a processor from an unopened box from the factory, I must conclude these dimple marks are from the test equipment and have no bearing at all on how well the LGA 775 socket engages its pins. None what-so-ever. Understand? Such an assertion is bogus. The same is true for the i5/i7 LGA 1156 CPU pads. These dimples are from factory test equipment and NOT from motherboard Foxconn, LOTES or whatever LGA 1156 sockets. Some dimples are missing probably because these pads most likely not necessary for testing the processor.
I also took a magnifying glass to a LGA775 socket pins of a motherboard. The pins are squared at the end. No pinheads. I strongly suspect the LGA 1156 pins are also squared at the ends too.
Here's another fact:
Intel and AMD test their CPUs for performance and reliability. The performance of these CPU's falls under a bell curve and they are binned according to market objectives. If you bought an i5, you probably have a second-rate core. It operates at lower frequencies before failing. You have no choice in this matter except to spend the extra money for the first-rate core.
Here's an observation:
The LGA 775 and LGA 1156 technologies are identical and I doubt Foxconn and other manufacturers have changed their manufacturing processes for LGA 1156. They have been making LGA-775 for five years and have sufficiently perfected the process to provide acceptable sockets. LGA 1156 is an extension of LGA 775. The pin-to-pin length variability ought to be the same. Foxconn may have changed the alloy or plating of the pins. What is different for sure is the clamping mechanism. The clamp mechanism may not provide as much compressive force to the CPU and the pins, though all are in contact with the pads, to provide a minimal gap to avoid arcing under extreme conditions. These are more likely issues.
Here's another observation:
The failed sockets and pads occurred during extreme overclocking where maximum voltages and currents are experienced. These maximum currents and voltages are well over design limits established by Intel. The damage is from arcing and melted pins from too much current. Overclockers deliberately abuse their processors until a limit is reached. In this case the obvious limit of the i5/i7 processors is the ability of the LGA 1156 socket to conduct the necessary electrical energy. That the LGA 1156 failed as it did during these extreme conditions concerns me not. And my posterior bleeds for those overclockers who belly-ache about these mishaps which are of their own doing.
Here's a considered opinion:
Extrapolating performance of Foxconn LGA 1156 sockets from extreme overclocking conditions (>160W) to normal operating conditions (<95W) of operation is totally bogus. During operation within design TDP, arcing that burns CPU pads will not occur and current is not sufficient to melt and distort pins. Arcing is a threshold process. Gap voltage has to be sufficiently high at localized points within the gap to ionize the air within the gap. Once started, more ionization occurs, plasmas are formed and burning happens. This does not happen during operation at normal operating voltages and currents.
As far as I am concerned, the Foxconn LGA 1156 sockets are adequate for normal operating voltages and current. This socket functions within the design specification. And this has been borne out through the benchmark tests of Gigabyte, Asus and MSI P55 motherboards at Anandteh.
To return an i5/i7 CPU and a P55 motherboard because of fears borne from this bogus extrapolation is irresponsable and not an acceptable reason. The CPU and motherboard had not failed you and is not likely to fail you if operated it as Intel intended it.
This is mindless, fear-ridden behavior.
This article by Rajinder Gill is poorly conceived and uses information that is (in my opinion) bogus. What is bogus are the dimple marks on the i5/i7 processors which are no indication of how well motherboard LGA 1156 pins engage the CPU pads. I would have liked to have seen more relevant information on pin alloys and bracket compression forces in this article between Foxconn and LOTES sockets.
The failures of Foxconn sockets during extreme overclocking cannot be extrapolated to operation at normal voltages and currents as many fear-ridden bloggers have attempted to do.
This contents of this article will provoke ill considered actions of owners to return perfectly-good i5/i7 CPUs and motherboards to vendors. These motherboards should provide years of service if operated to normal voltages and currents. Reply
chrnochime - Monday, October 19, 2009 - linkSo CW1d is the same person as Clagmaster?
Impressive background, but then again I never refuted your expertise in the auto field.
Am I missing something here, or what you said basically confirmed what I've been stating in the first place, that what's happening at extreme OC cannot be used to extrapolate behavior of the same socket at normal operating frequency? Then again, this statement goes both ways, that even though it does not correctly lead to induction of socket failure at any frequency beside OC, it also does not eliminate the possibility of the failure.
I don't have time to type out something as carefully worded and detailed as your post was, so you'll have to settle for hastily typed response.
I apologize if that first post came off as an attack of your character.
ClagMaster - Monday, October 19, 2009 - linkAccepted :) Reply
chrnochime - Monday, October 19, 2009 - linkI didn't write that in the first post. nvm. Not paying attention AT ALL.
Guess it's up to the reviewers and websites to clear this up. I do want to finally buy a quad-core though. Reply
RadnorHarkonnen - Monday, October 19, 2009 - linkWhat is not acceptable is a short life span of a determined product.
During the "Bad Caps" season (2003-2005) i blew 3 Boards during the warranty period. I Overclock, mildly.
A bit after those episodes, many OEMs extended their warranties because normal, inside specifications use, was causing problems in the end of the warranty or shortly there after.
OCing a PC, will just make it degrade faster. It took 6 months of heavy OCing a Palomino 1500+ to 1900+ to show bad caps. 2 years after, most of the "stock" PC were having problems.
It took Raj a few hours to reproduce the problem with a decent overclock. I give 6-8 months to massive failures being reproduced in stock/OEMs machines. Remember that we overclockers we take good care of our rigs, that doesn't happen with Joe Sixpack and his OEM BOX.
I work for 15 years in this world, From Bad Caps, to Bumpgates. First OCers find out, then it spreads to everybody else. We just degrade stuff faster.
Good Article Raj. Reply
Mrwright - Monday, October 19, 2009 - linkTo Clagdoosh
Have you even thought intel use foxconn sockets in testing? The majority of intel branded motherbards are made by foxconn? Also you comment on binning, you are ignorant and plain wrong. intel are extreamely good at producing top quality silicon and the majority of cpus are faster and un neededly binned down to lower spec models just to fill that sector of the market, thats why you get such high overlocks from the core 2 range even the celerons and pentium dual cores. so you are an idiot sir! I hate people like you! Reply
chrnochime - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkPoor/inadequate braking performance on a car might lead to death, but a oc'd PC would rarely lead to the same result, unless a fire was started because of the failure of components inside a PC.
OCers can certainly claim that their overclocking can lead to better tech filtered down to mainstream users who don't oc, but that's just wishful thinking. All the oc do is stress the components even more than usual, and the only thing that produce is need for better PVM/cooling, and frankly the way Intel/AMD designed their accompanying MB components, the parts are already adequate for non oc use, and then some. So what's the use for those fancy overkill heatsink/pvm when most average user won't ever need them anyway?
Racing technology that filters down to production cars actually are actually quite useful in various ways. Fancy/overkill HS/fan does little to average users.
But do continue to come up with those similarities between auto industry and the issue at hand. I always welcome entertaining(if not useful) reads.
Mrwright - Monday, October 19, 2009 - linkYou are really full of opinions aren't you, with all of your posts simply causing arguements. All you do is rebut what everyone else is saying. I doubt you even have an 1156 motherboard let alone know the extent of this issue. You are trying to make out that Intel CPUs are not designed to be overclocked, but if that is the case then what is the point of the Extreme Edition line of CPUs, let alone the fact that the majority of Intels CPUs are binned down. Most Intel chips should get an extra 1GHz out of them without breaking a sweat and you have the nerve to say that OCers don't lead to anything?
It is actually Ocers that lead to AMds Athlon 64 2000+ - their super energy efficient chip which uses OCer practice to make the CPU more stable at low voltage: the holy grail of overclocking.
You actually sound like an Intel representative trying to belittle this major issue.
chrnochime - Monday, October 19, 2009 - linkFrom what you just wrote I'd assume you've read all of my posts. If that is the case, well I'd say you got way more time than I do LOL. BTW, me having opinions is different from anyone else here, how? Please...
I don't rebut everything that everyone says. If that was the case I'd reply to each and every post, wouldn't I.
Actually I don't have the 1156, but then I do frequent the various oc forums and have read up on all of the posts related to this, as much as I can.
And your mention of 1 CPU that's, according to YOU, based on OCers experience. Out of countless that either CPU manu. has released over the past ~2 decades. Isn't that amazing?
The 2000+ is just Lima Core with downclock and various energy saving optimizations. Since when did overclocker underclock anyway? Yes, what I thought, they're call OVERCLOCKER for a reason.
Want link from website, here:
As for you stating I'm an Intel rep; No, I'm not. I'd gladly be working at Intel, but then again if I were I'd be too busy as an Eng. there to have time to post here. Reply
ClagMaster - Monday, October 19, 2009 - linkI am an engineer who works for an architect-engineering firm. I have master degrees in nuclear and electrical engineering. I do not work for Intel, AMD or any of the motherboard manufacturers.
Some of the information on this post is bogus and I am within my rights to refute this. Reply
Etern205 - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkIf you check out your boards, not only is the socket made by foxconn, but other components as well like the PCIe, PCI and ram slots to even the usb ports
The name are usually stamped on the side or top if you want to see who makes it. Reply
nofumble62 - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkBecause the loading points are in the middle of the CPU, I suspected the CPU was not seated evenly.
Have you guy tried pushing the CPU top deck hard with your thumb while closing the lever. This may help, for sure won't hurt. Also when tightening the heat sink, tighten the bolt/screws gradually in a cross pattern like you tight your car wheel. Reply
Rajinder Gill - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkTried all of that, it did not help. Reply
CW1d - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkhmm you would think that the chaps at AnandTech would know how to seat and mount a CPU by now. But I am pleased that it is cleared up now. OK guys no further need to ponder this, just mount your CPU cooler correctly. NOT
Seriously this is a more than a simple mounting technique issue, the potential for hardware to be damaged even when run at stock is very real. While there is some redundancy built into any design, certainly the hardware is not meant to be operating with marginal contacts between pins (socket) and pads (CPU) and most certainly is not meant to be operated with so many none contacts between the pins and pads. A marginal contact is a hazard in its own right, fewer than designed contacts will place to high a burden on the remaining contact points, with the marginal contacts being most at risk. Basic electronics as many have remarked already.
For me the issue is not what is wrong specifically, rather how is it fixed. How do the motherboard manufactures and vendors react and proceed from here. They are aware of the problem, we hope. Are those afflicted motherboards recalled? What about collateral damage because of the Foxconn socket anomaly? In a litigation happy society like the US and to a lessor extent here in the UK interesting times are ahead, especially if no positive reaction from the Vendors is forthcoming.
ClagMaster - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkIntel/Foxconn has warranted these products to the consumer as being fully functional for a reasonable period of time provided they are operated within design parameters (such as frequency, voltage and current). If the processor was operating at the rated power of 95W (i.e. no overclocking with liquid N2) and these pins arced and failed within the warranty period would result in replacement or refund of the product by Intel or the motherboard manufacturers.
This is a just and responsable redress for product failure.
This product failure is not a life-threatening situation and would not attact the attentions of attorneys who specialize in these lawsuits. Not enough money to extract in this case since loss of life has special emotional impact for those who have undue regard for human life.
Overclocking a CPU is deliberate abuse. Overclockers keep pushing the limits until something fails. Failure during overclocking is the responsiblity of the owner. The failures shown in this article occured during extreme overclocking and is the overclockers responsability. Intel/Foxconn has no control over over someone deliberately exceeding established design limits and cannot be held responsable. Its foolish to speak of litigation under these circumstances.
How many of you people have turned over a LGA 775 CPU and counted the dimple marks on the bottom of the CPU? I should disassemble my E6600/Intel DG965HW rig right now to make sure! I do not think the process Foxconn and others use for making the socket pins (their length) has changed between LGA775 and LGA1156.
Has anyone considered the tensioning mechanism for LGA1156 has changed. And there may well be less compressive force on the processor resulting in pin-to-land contact less than that of LGA775. Shimming with light cardstock between the CPU and clamp would solve this problem. The difference between Foxconn and other brands could be the height of the post the end of the bracket engages.
I think LGA1156 pin-to-land contact is sufficient for normative usage at 95W.
Being an American myself, I have a low opinion of selfish, cowardly, fear-ridden opportunists who think themselves special and abuse tort laws for selfish purposes. This has been encouraged by the American legal community (lawyers, judges and legistors) who have lost their moral compass (justified in part by seperation of church and state) and profit greatly from this. And the American media and education establishments have played their roles in this debasement by creating unreasonable expections and lazy mental habits. For them the ends justifies the means and over the years these people have really brought American culture to the current low level of dependency, fear, selfishness, and greed.
I am disgusted with where my country has gone and where it is going. The political and social initiatives of the 1960's has not raised the American people to the highest standards. Instead, they have lowered everyone to the lowest common denominator. This is all part of a program of inwardly directed Imperialism by the American government to disabuse its citizens of responsable self-government and make them dependent subjects. You cannot have freedom without personal responsability.
Consumers are responsable for their choices. And I reject the consumerist notion that the consumer is always right. Reply
Kaleid - Sunday, January 03, 2010 - linkOT but I wouldn't go to any church to look for a moral compass Reply
Mrwright - Monday, October 19, 2009 - linkI would like to point out something: I am the person who posted the pic of my i7 860 on extreme systems forums - and guess what, I had never overclocked that cpu and I was experiencing erratic behavior with it crashing etc, so the problems are not only confined to "extreme" overclocking!
Also everyone is arguing what proper contact marks even are? either a pin prick or scuff mark? People are saying that new cpus have marks on them For the factory, Well just a thought.. does intel not use foxconn to manurfacture most of their boards I bet when testing the 1156 cpus it would have been on a foxconn socket!
1stguess - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkWell, Absolutely no one can tell me with certainty that this i5 rig of mine with Foxconn socket would not fail within the next two years of normal usage before i upgrade. I've never been much of a gambler.
2 hours prior to writing this post I mailed my i5 750 & Asrock p55 Motherboard back to retailer for a refund. I don't need the headaches.
Unfortunately for some, the window for refund or exchange of their computer components has shut. Foxconn, due to manufacturing the only socket reported with consistent p55 burnout, is the odd man out.
I totally understand why people are mad as hell.
What will i do now? I think 1366 920. Reply
ClagMaster - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkI would not worry too much about it if you do not overclock because of this appearent issue. There are many other things that could go wrong with a mobo besides the pin ends arcing. This should not happen with normative currents and voltages.
Personally I think the problem is there is not enough compressive force on the CPU with the new clamp design to force the CPU against all of the pins. I find it difficult to believe the pin lengths (rather the variablity of pin lengths) is any different between LGA 775 and LGA 1156. However, the clamp design is.
If I had a P55/LGA1156 motherboard, I would cut some card stock (about 5 mils) and shim it between the clamp and CPU. This will apply additional compressive force so all pin ends will contact the CPU lands and provide a little extra insurance. Its a simple fix. All you need is card stock (such as the back cover of the mobo manual), an razorblade, a cutting board from the kitchen, and a little patience. Its not hard to make and fit.
Are you mad or just afraid of the risk? Its too bad you sent in the i5 750 and Asrock p55 back to the retailer for a refund. It had not failed you during the time you owned it. Reply
Solaire - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkWhether the problem lies within the pin length or in the clamp design does not matter. A person should not have to create a shim to ensure proper contact between the CPU and socket no matter whether they are overclocking or not. Reply
petergab - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkI have some questions here:
1. When do you expect the answers from the Motherboard manufactures? 2. Is it possible that just some badges were faulty?
3. Any comments from foxconn?
4. Do you know of any (possible) reports without OC attributed to this problem?
5. How much was your i5-750 overclocked? How long did it take to form the dark pads?
6. This will have a damaging efect on every system in the long-run (about 5 years) even without OC, won't it?
Raji? Reply
rickbee - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkIs it possible that 1366 boards are also affected, has anyone checked for lack of pin/pad contact? Reply
Fleeb - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkRead the article and the comments thread. It has been mentioned several times. P55 sockets only. Reply
JDD - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkFirst a big thanks for Raja for this info, I know the guys at anandtech are always on top of things.
I was searching other sites but not finding a lot of this issue of pins not making contact with all the pads . Could this be that people are just not noticing it unless they have a reason to remove the CPU? I just wanted to know what other people are saying, or if they even know?
dingetje - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkI reckon the shit will hit the fan when stuff starts failing in numbers...let's hope it's just foxconn sockets, but I kinda doubt it....it looks like a design flaw Reply
Rajinder Gill - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkhttp://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showpost.php?p...">http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showpost.php?p...
Seems just Foxconn socket only so far to us, no reported incidents of any other socket with this amount of non-connected pins. Reply
Rajinder Gill - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkhere's the pic from that post..
frank828 - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkis it just me or does that picture show proper contact with the socket? Reply
Rajinder Gill - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkLook at the areas highlighted in red. Reply
frank828 - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linki did.
it looks like the picture you posted after you inserted the processor into the lotes socket.
am i missing something? are you looking at the the small nick/poke marks or the slight wear indication on the gold? on my screen i see the wear mark on the red circled area.
i thought you were saying that the wear marks on the processor after using the Lotes socket was correct? Reply
Rajinder Gill - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkIn the case of the Foxconn socket a scuff on a pad usually indicates poor contact due to incorrect pressure between the two surfaces. Reply
frank828 - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkok this is getting confusing as to what is normal and what isnt.
i just took another close look at the two pics at the end showing the foxconn and lotes. am i missing something? i'm looking at the circled red areas on the foxconn and it seems that there is little to no scuffing, then i look at the lotes and i see more of a scuff in the same area that was circled.
Rajinder Gill - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkhttp://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showpost.php?p...">http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showpost.php?p...
Seems just Foxconn socket only so far to us, no reported incidents of any other socket with this amount of non-connected pins. Reply
TontNZ - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linkI've just received one of these boards (New Zealand) and it has a LOTES socket. I'm not sure if I'm one of the lucky ones!
Hi Raja - A big thank you for the heads up on this one. I was going to by a Gigabyte mobo. Reply
JDD - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linkAm I correct that the Intel boards are ok becasue they use there own sockets? Will this be an alternative? Reply
SixOfSeven - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linkIntel does not manufacture Intel-branded motherboards. Nor do they manufacture the sockets and associated hardware. Reply
miahallen - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linkThen who manufactures these?
http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductList.aspx?Sub...">http://www.newegg.com/Product/ProductLi...=&Sp... Reply
dg1000 - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linkNow that might sound ironic, but Intel motherboards are made by Foxconn, so we can say with certainty they all have a Foxconn socket on-board... Reply
canontk - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linkDon't assume since it's an Intel board every part is made by Intel.
These are pictures of the DP55KG.
Look closely at the base plate on the back of the board. Reply
JDD - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linkI now have a $500+ paper weight and this guy thinks i want to buy a GUCCI bag, On second though maybe I should have I would have gotten more use out of it. Reply
dingetje - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linkyou could put the (no doubt shitty) bag over your head so nobody can see you cry ;) Reply
7Enigma - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linkI think regardless of what your plans are for a build (serious OC or stock) these chipsets should be avoided. Even with Gary's many hours of testing we have no clue what potential problems will arise in a year from now. I know some of the readers commenting upgrade systems every couple months but there are probably many more of us that keep systems for 5+ years. In my case my gaming rig gets handed down to my dad for last-gen gaming, and my dad's computer gets handed down to my wife as a facebook/iTunes/junk box. So an average service life for a system in my possession is closer to 7-8 years and from reading comments on this site for a long time now I've seen similar cases.
I think Anandtech should take a much more cautious approach to recommending these for ANYONE.
"However, none of the boards have developed pin problems so we feel very safe in saying that any problems will probably occur only in extreme overclocking scenarios."
That could be a short-sighted comment...
Thank you for the article. Reply
ClagMaster - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linkHas anyone tried cutting light cardstock and shim it between the CPU edges and CPU bracket on a Foxconn 1156 socket?
That might add enough force on the CPU to engage the remaining pins.
If you operate the Lynnfield/P55 as Intel intended it this damage to the CPU and socket would not be an issue. Good article though. This is something I will be looking for when I get my Lynnfield/P55 next summer. Reply
dingetje - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linksomeone has been watching MacGyver ! :P Reply
rickbee - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linksome are suggesting that the lack of pin contact will eventually have a detrimental effect on setups which are operated as intel intended(not overclocked or over volted). there must be significant numbers of P55 boards already installed which have this pin problem, besides all the stock in the various distribution channels. There could be some interesting warranty claims Reply
ClagMaster - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linkThis is illogical.
All of the pins must make contact or signals cannot be tramsmitted and the chip simply will not function. Contact with all pins is definitely being made for Foxconn 1156 sockets, though not at tightly as with other manufactured sockets. The abscence of dimple patterns on some of the CPU pads discussed in this article do not indicate contact are not be made.
The damage observed in these photos is from arcing when voltage and currents becomes excessively large. For normal operation (lower currents and voltages) of Lynnfield/P55 these conditions do not exist and the CPU pads will not be damaged.
Using light cardstock between the outer rim of the CPU and the bracket adds additional force to the pins to increase the metal-to-metal contact between pads and pins and reduce the likelyhood of tip arcing or melting during extreme overclocking. Reply
dingetje - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linkholy shit....no seriously, wtf
p55 is so screwd if this is a substantial problem Reply
rickbee - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linkSo as someone who was just about to buy components for an i7 build, looks like I should be looking at another platform as i'm concerned with long term issues which could be caused by lack of pin contact, even without overclocking. i dont want to make a mistake, this is a significant outlay on hardware for me and my first major upgrade for 5 years. Are the socket 1366 boards affected as well? Reply
SpaceRanger - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linki7 socket <> i5 socket. None of the i7 sockets have exhibited this behavior. I was leaning towards an i5 upgrade, but this nailed it shut. It's either gonna be an i7 solution or bust... Reply
Gasaraki88 - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linkNo. Reply
tajmahal - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linkHow in the world can you not lay the blame for the screw ups in the 1156 platform at Intels feet? This isn't the only reported problem with that platform and the i5/i7. Reply
moronsworld - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkWith logic. Since the Lotes nor the tyco were effected but the foxconn was simple logic would say that foxconn is the problem. Have you ever heard of logic? or simply common sense? I'm sorry but I'm fed up with idiots. Reply
Rajinder Gill - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linkPerhaps because it's only happened in the Foxconn sockets? Reply
Morbid666 - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linktotally agree Reply
AnnonymousCoward - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linkIt's interesting that all 7 of the blackest, most burnt CPU pads are not ones that were circled red for poor contact. If each circled pad has just 5 ohms of contact resistance, about 20 of them in parallel carry the same current as 1 good-contact pin, so you effectively lose about 19 power pins in that area (leaving you with 15 good-contact power pins in the area that carry double their designed-for current). Reply
Rajinder Gill - Friday, October 16, 2009 - link[url]http://www.xtremesystems.org/forums/showpost.php?p...[/url]
That cpu has been used with an air cooler. Anyone notice a familiar pattern of poor contact? It's the sheer volume of poor/little contact pins that is alarming. Reply
jmurbank - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linkI had small hunch that this socket type will not work or will cause problems. In the beginning, Intel had problems about the processor retention bracket getting in the way of some heat sinks. Now this problem comes up because it seems it has been scratched. I read and watch videos stating to wiggle the processor with this socket type in place to make sure it makes a connection. Gold is soft, so wiggling these type of processors in place is big no, no. I guess this one reason why AMD has not yet use this socket type for desktops.
The traditional socket has always worked. Why change it?
There is an old saying, "if it ain't broken, don't fix it." Reply
Matt Campbell - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkNice problem solving. It'll be interesting to see how manufacturers react, particularly to customers who have already been affected. Reply
vailr - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkMaybe Intel should provide for the end-user, a "CPU pin contact check utility" software that would methodically check each CPU pin for good contact.
Are the CPU contact pads gold plated? Seems like both the CPU pads and the socket pins should both be gold plated, to avoid oxidation problems. Reply
AnnonymousCoward - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkThat's not really possible. If some power pins aren't connected, it would be unobservable, while there would be higher current density going through the remaining pins on that supply. Reply
vailr - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linkIf currently "not observable", then maybe Intel needs to re-design their circuitry to enable a sort of virtual "stockyard corral wrangler" (pick your metaphor) to ensure that every CPU pad has adequate electrical contact with the socket (each CPU pad representing a different "cow", so to speak). Even make it part of the bios boot process: you'd go into the bios setup, and see a graphical display of the CPU's pin contact status. Maybe wishful thinking, but then: why not? Reply
AnnonymousCoward - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linkYes, it's wishful thinking. There are many barriers. The CPU output pins can't have a voltage/current driven to them since they're only connected to other devices' inputs. The CPU power pins are, like I said, all on the same node, so you can't measure them individually. As for the CPU inputs, the force/measure capability probably doesn't exist, and even if it did, it can be hard to distinguish contact resistance from the internal resistance of ESD diodes. Reply
vailr - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linkOK: so how does Intel do their quality control testing at the factory? They DO test each CPU before they sell it. So: they must have a method to determine whether a freshly manufactured CPU that's being tested has all of it's functions "present and accounted for". To include: whether or not this or that portion of the pins (that are power input pins) are fully functional. Otherwise it's rejected and put in the recycle bin. Reply
AnnonymousCoward - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkIntel's testing involves interfacing the CPU with a tester machine, which has all sorts of instrumentation that can drive/measure voltage/current on every pin. Those machines can cost millions. They also use very expensive sockets that make a perfect contact with each CPU pin. Motherboard sockets are cheap, easily bent, not designed for very many insertions, and in this case they're not making good contact. Reply
vailr - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkIn a mult-core CPU, why couldn't Intel re-design the internals so that at boot-up, core A would double-check/verify the pin contact status of cores B, C, & D; then hand off to core B to check core A's pin contact status. Sort of like: how you used to see the DDR memory being checked & verified on the boot screen during the PC boot-up process. Which could be enabled or disabled in bios setup.
And: I'm not talking about Intel's "million dollar testing machine", that verifies the complete CPU functionality. Just a Yes/No decision on whether the pin contact status is: Pass or Fail.
Alternatively, Intel could maybe add a very small "fifth CPU core", which would have the sole function of checking the pin status at boot time. Reply
AnnonymousCoward - Sunday, October 18, 2009 - linkYou can't test the pin/socket interface with built-in tests within the silicon. Those can only test internal characteristics. Testing pin connections would require extensive complex extra circuits and hardware on the motherboard, which I don't think would be feasible. Reply
xanonwk - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkRaji is generous to ASUS and other motherboard makers giving them too much time and still tolerating them of no responses. But, they have to not responding Raji otherwise what they can do other than replacing all faulty boards then filing Chapter 11 to go bankruptcy. I think we need to get ready to filing class suite against these board makers if they continue to submerge. Reply
chrnochime - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linkFor Pete's sake proofread your writing before posting. Reading what you just wrote gives me headache. Reply
goinginstyle - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkWe are talking failures based on extreme overclocking actions. While I would like to think the boards are capable of handling the loads it is obvious they are not. What else would one expect from a midrange platform and I am surprised something else did not go wrong considering the power draws and clock rates Raja listed.
It is bad news for the benchmark only crowd but since they made it obviously clear that normal speeds and overclocks are not really a problem then I think much more is being made out of this than what it actually is, another component failure from pushing the board/cpu far from its intended limits. Yes, other sockets work and the board guys should use those on overclocking centric boards.
Usually we hear about MOSFETs or chokes exploding and nobody thinks otherwise since it some crazy dude with LN2 trying to break a record, so the socket is not holding up in the same conditions. Who really cares but a couple hundred of users at most. I would rather know about stock or slightly overclocked failures than this stuff. Reply
cmdrdredd - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkThe problem DOES occur on stock settings. Read the replies here, there's a few that talk about random instability without overclocking. That is BAD! You can't talk your way around it and cannot spin it. Foxconn blew it, literally. Reply
faxon - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkgiven how many of the boards sold at frys come with accessories all manufactured by foxconn (they have the foxconn logo on pretty much everything from biostar, evga, gigabyte, and MSI, with the only other brands being ASUS and intel), im concerned about how many of these boards are using the foxconn sockets, and it would be of use to make a listing of all boards that use these faulty sockets. Reply
faxon - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkooh i should note, every board i have opened so far to put up for demo came with a foxconn socket protector just about, with the few that didnt being our EVGA FTW and an asus board, excluding the intel boards since they're all made by intel Reply
Dainas - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkgotta love that great Foxconn Taiwanese QA. It sure as hell wasn't a matter of if they knew, but how many did and were hiding it. This is monumental idiocy. Reply
moronsworld - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkSorry bud most of the motherboard manufacturers are from Taiwan. Get your facts straight before bashing a whole country. Gigabyte DFI MSI ASUS to name a few, are all Taiwanese based. Please don't say anything if you don't have anything intelligent to say. Reply
chrnochime - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linkThe boards aren't QA'd in Taiwan, they're QA'd where they're manu.
Don't group Taiwanese products with Foxconn. There are products that excel in their respective areas, this isn't one of them.
If you don't know WTF you're talking about, it'd be wise to stay silent. Reply
Rindis - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkWho saw the (presumably) bum pad on the bottom row in the first photo and assumed that's what the problem was going to be? Reply
Sandmen - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkAn electronic technician with 50 years experience.
How do you think those marks come to be there after some insane OC? Reply
DahakaCL - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkHi there, sorry for my english :uy.
Few days ago i buy a Maximus III Formula and recently i red this great article, if anybody have some references or detail about this MB from asus will be just great.
In two weaks more y was planing a OC session with Dry Ice and F1 pot from Kingpin.
Regards from Chile. Reply
Rajinder Gill - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkMake sure pin to pad contact is good if you can before you start out. Assuming the CPU is brand new, you should get a good indication of how many pins are making contact with pads.
So far, we've had two Maximus III boards with the problem under 'extreme OC' (if you can call it that).
Sandmen - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkLack of indentations could present a problem but will not ruin your CPU and/or MB and you will have the rigth to a replacement.
On the other hand, the second picture on this review clearly shows several overheated points of contacs on the sockets (and you can be sure that the matching pins in the CPU had been damaged too)and in this case the manufactures (Intel or MB's ones) will have the rigth to refuse replacing this units.
People needs to understand the difference between keeping the core from melting (thru good cooling) and the capacity of the pins contacts to handle the very large amounts of current needed for this extreme overclocking.
This pins and sockets are not designed to widstand heavy OC because plain and simply there is no room to make them any larger.
Personally, I OC'd my i7-860 from 2.80 MHz to 3.5 MHz. That is a 25% increase end everybody should be happy with this kind of improvement. Reply
muddocktor - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkNo, IMHO you are missing the point here. The lack of indentations on some of the pads points to sloppy tolerances in the socket design or execution and are not acceptable in any case. Since this socket is so new, who knows what kind of life you will get out of a crap built socket even running at stock speeds over the course of some years instead of a few months. Intel designed this socket to support a set number of pads and pins to deliver power efficiently and safely to the processor and if the pins in the socket aren't making proper contact then the socket manufacturer isn't following Intel's design guidelines for the socket, since it is forcing fewer pads and pins to deliver more current due to lack on contact on the "bad" pins in the socket. Reply
SixOfSeven - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - link"...who knows what kind of life you will get out of a crap built socket even running at stock speeds over the course of some years instead of a few months."
Exactly. Reply
IKeelU - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkI will preface this by saying that overall I believe this article to be good thing since it informs serious overclockers of an unsuitable product for their hobby.
That being said, laying the blame at the hardware manufacturer(s) doorstep (either Foxconn for not adhering to the spec, or Intel for "goofing" up in designing the spec) is absolutely absurd. You guys significantly overclocked your processors; ie. you ran them *completely* out of specifications. At which point something broke, and you then point your fingers at the hardware manufacturers. The only parties who we actually know (for a fact) were out of spec are those who overclocked their CPUs.
If you want to accuse Foxconn of anything, look up Intel's specs and do some real materials testing on their product. "oooh look, we can't see the pin marks" - so very, very lame.
SixOfSeven - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkUh, read my post again. My CPU pads look like the ones pictured here; I ran at stock settings; I saw flaky behavior consistent with poor power delivery to the CPU. I seriously doubt that I'm the only one.
In any case, it's a little sleazy for MB manufacturers to promote boards based on their overclocking prowess and then refuse to support them because users overclocked the things. Reply
Voo - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkWell the thing is, that there ARE other manufacturers who got this right, so why shouldn't you blame someone who apparently cut corners to cut the price for doing so?
It's probably not easy to get a replacement because of the fact that the boards were OC'ed, but nevertheless it's a inferior design. Reply
Rajinder Gill - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkHJ IkeelU,
I think you're failing to realise that this only happens with the Foxconn sockets so far. The fact that four processors have no pin indents in similar locations from 4 seperate Foxconn boards is the issue at hand. Further the article stuipulates several times who's at the most risk. No problems at similar OC's on the LOTES sockets. Missing pin contact in these kinds of volumes is not good.
IKeelU - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkI totally understand that this only happens on Foxconn sockets - I read the article. My point is that it doesn't matter. Say you've got two products: When used in spec, they both work fine. But when used out of spec, one works and the other sometimes does not work. Obviously, the first product is superior to the second and if given the option, the consumer should choose the first. However, the manufacturer of the second product is in no way at fault for anything. In fact, they did their job. No more, but no less. Reply
moronsworld - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkok even if it is for cases of overclocking, wouldn't it effect your processor in the long run even if it wasn't overclocked? I mean it isnt making contact..... I'm pretty sure there's bound to be some problems in the long run. Reply
moronsworld - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkAnd I just want to say that foxconn products suck. I will never buy a foxconn product. Never did never will. Look up foxconn on wikipedia they seriously need better business ethics/policies. Reply
AnnonymousCoward - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkSo you'll never buy an iPhone, since "foxconn products suck"? And how many other countless products do they assemble? Reply
SixOfSeven - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkI shipped my (Foxconn-manufactured) Intel DP55KG MB back to Newegg yeseterday after several days of random refresh errors and warm-boot failures. The BIOS settings were all stock, memory was on the approved list, big PSU, etc. When I saw this piece today, I had a look at the processor pads and saw the same sort of pattern of non-contact. I assume that if this sort of thing is bad enough it could show up in non-OC situations - correct?
Of course, in a few days I'll get a replacement DP55KG with the same defective socket. Anyone else getting tired of being an unpaid system tester? Reply
JDD - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkSo if I am not going to overclock at all just leaving it stock, and I get a P55 board from GIGABYTE I should feel confident I will have a long lasting setup? or NOT ? Reply
Gary Key - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkI have only had one problem running on air at overclocked settings (single pad burn) and none at stock. That said, missing pin contacts is still a problem but it has not affected any of my test results on 15 boards so far. Where we have had the problems is with Raja's extreme overclocking tests (along with others in the link to XS).
I cannot guarantee it will not be a problem, but several thousand hours of testing at clocks below 4.3GHz and CPU voltages below 1.4V have not indicated any pervasive problems with boards from every manufacturer. Reply
Rajinder Gill - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkTough call. Where I think ther a good chance you might not have problems I think it would be prudent to wait a while. I suspect there will be revisions, so best advice would be to wait until you hear what each vendor is doing about it.
james jwb - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkYou've gone against Foxconn now. If you live on a high floor, when you go home tonight stay away from the windows. Reply
Sandmen - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkThe amount of current that can pass thru 2 contact surfaces is determined by the amount of surface contacts and the materials is made off, and this CPU and MB's are not design with contacts pins to handle high overcloking.
Even with enough cooling to keep the core safe, eventually you will damage the points of contacts between the CPU and the MB.
Haven't you ever seen what happens to a regular electric outlet when you plug too many things to it?
May be a socket with more contact surface to each pin will help, but as it is rigth now, even when I can go higher with my i7-860, I just keep it at 3.5 GHz.
Sorry overclockers, try an i7-920. Reply
Morbid666 - Friday, October 16, 2009 - link- well said.
loose connections in 110V/220-240V systems are the number one cause of domestic fires. here where cooling is so essential this type of contact is unjustified. the burns i see illustrated in above pictures are the same burns i see at work where mains cables melt like candle. Reply
vshin - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkOn a more ominous note, Newegg seems to be wiping cutomer reviews of certain motherboards that have had a spate of negative "DOA" entries. One example is the Gigabyte UD3 where there use to be 7-9 reviews with a couple DOAs but now they're all gone. I wonder if the problem is more pervasive than we think. It seems to me there have been a lot more DOA reports for the p55 launch than prior launches of new chipsets. Maybe all those DOAs are due to lack of contact with key pins.
I suggest coating either the pins or the CPU with some kind of colored powder or other thin substance and then check to see if any residue is transferred to the other side after installing the chip. This will help differentiate whether the pins are making light contact vs no contact at all. Reply
ClagMaster - Monday, October 19, 2009 - linkI noticed that too on the Gigabyte UD3R motherboard.
Newegg will remove posts that it deems is irrelevant and/or excessively negative -- appearently at the behest of the manufacturer. I saw this done on a $1500 Core 2 Extreme QX9775 for the Skulltrail platform that had posts that complained was absurdly expensive. Most did not own this processor and gave it a poor or very poor rating. Reply
wolfman3k5 - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linkNewEgg deletes and manipulates reviews. I buy allot of stuff, and almost every time that I've left a detailed review about a hardware failure, NewEgg shot me an email that it doesn't meet their guidelines. Not to mention that I've left a couple of reviews where I got screwed with Mail In Rebates (cough... by Gigabyte ...cough), and NewEgg deleted them. That's why this days you see so many dumb ass reviews on NewEgg, things like: "This 5870 pwns NVidia, final nail in the coffin...". But as soon as you give some detailed account of trouble, or say that NewEgg has some of the worst pricing and return policies, or their customer service has become unbelievably stupid, you're not going to get your review published, or if it slips trough, it will get deleted. NewEgg needs a good spanking from the Better Business Bureau, unfortunately they have grown large, so allot more people need to file complaints.
All that being said, I kind of miss the point why people buy Sockey 1156 parts... Doesn't make much sense, and the savings aren't really there, unless of course, you're willing to put up with this crap. Reply
PrinceGaz - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkI always preferred PGA as my first thought when LGA775 was introduced was "do spring loaded pins in the socket really make as good a contact with the CPU, as a socket which gripped the pins on the CPU?".
I know that LGA allows for a greater pin-density than PGA, but PGA939 as used by the Athlon 64 wasn't unacceptably large (roughly halfway between LGA1166 and LGA1356). Reply
Kibbles - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkIs there a way to see which manufacturer you got? Do they look any different? Reply
yacoub - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkGood to know.
Btw, do you guys still have P55 motherboard reviews coming, separate from the super overclocker guide article? Reply
Rajinder Gill - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkI've got a 4 board OC showdown in the midst (although it's using sub zero) - which has been delayed mid testing because of this socket issue. Kinda makes everything moot for me..lol
I think Gary may have a couple of full comprehensive reviews coming though I'm not sure of the specific board models. Reply
pcfxer - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkFoxconn is being CHEAP and they got caught with their pants down.
Any compnay that has the amount of surface area to contact and only uses 5% (sometimes 0% ehh ohhh) is being CHEAP. It doesn't take an Electrical Engineering Degree to know that th TYCO/Lotes and LOTES solutions are superior designs. Reply
strikeback03 - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkDepends. Sometimes you want a more pointed contact to ensure it pierces any oxide layer that might have built up on the surface and gets into good metal. But they do seem to have trouble ensuring that their pins are properly aligned. Reply
AssBall - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkSince gold doesn't oxidize I don't really understand what you mean here. Are you talking about the pins or the LGA? Reply
Rajinder Gill - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkMaybe dirt from grime riddled fingers :)
There is a definite issue with pin alignment when the CPI is clamped. I re-checked indents by using a stock Intel cooler and nothing chagned in terms of contact on any of the pads. I have 4 CPU's on the shelf that have been in around 4 boards from 3 vendors (all using the Foxconn socket). Most disturbing thing in all of this is that each of them have similar non contact patterns. Boards were brand new out of box.
ekoostik - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkIs there an audible sound that tells you you've made good contact between pins and pad?
Having done exactly 1 build, last week with an 1156 socket, when you close the lever to secure the chip in place, is there an audible noise? Does that tell you that it's made good contact? Kind of a crunching sound? Not very loud mind you, but made me nervous. I'm afraid to take the chip out and look for fear of contact not being made again. Reply
funky24 - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linki seen same issue on evga x58 classified 759 with 300% more gold on it exacly same issue burned pins and proc like that even worse on evga forums that 300% more gold slots are even worse then regular slot becose gold then to melt easier Reply
JDD - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkDoes anyone know if GIGABYTE is having the same issues on the GA-P55-UD5? Reply
Rajinder Gill - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkTwo UD6 cases I know of have been reported. I don't think it's solely confined to model mind, merely how many pins were contacting the pads when the boards/CPU's were pushed hard. Reply
JDD - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkSo with all that is being said who's board is using the good sockets? Reply
Rajinder Gill - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkEvry vendor has boards in the channel with FOxconn sockets. the only selected model exlusive to a custom LOTES socket is the Classified 200 model from EVGA.
DFI have a batch of Foxconn baords in retail, although all newer ones should use LOTES (or equivalent).
MSI have boards spanning their entire lineup on LOTES and Foxconn.
ASUS and GB seem to be using Foxconn only at present - we'll update if we hear anything today.
Still a bit of a lottery out there.
mapesdhs - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - link
Am I right in infering that X58 boards are unaffected?
Rajinder Gill - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - link1366 has not seen any related reports of this from consumers that I'm aware of.
LGA installations will always have some pins that don't touch pads properly. It's just that here the problem seems to have escalated to the extent where we get burnouts.
Kougar - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkThe moment I built my own LGA1366 system I began to seriously wonder for the first time about contact spacing tolerances and current draw... with contact points so small and the never-ending desire to overclock to the best compromise between speed and acceptable 24/7 voltages for absolute stability it seemed like something was going to give.
Now we will get to see how the manufacturers respond, I'll definitely be watching. Regardless of overclocking circumstances the lack of any contact on a few of the CPU pads is just not acceptable, let alone the very poor contact on many of them. Reply
Morbid666 - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linki honestly think that this new approach for intel to differ from amd by making an entirely new socket standard is a total flop. they claim it prevents from cpu pins being bent. i installed 100s of pin cpus - never had that problem. so they've created more issues - as electrician i can tell you that by less contact there is much more heat generated when conducting current. Reply
Totally - Sunday, October 18, 2009 - linkAMD also usa LGA sockets for their opterons and I believe their new desktop Socket G34 is also LGA. Reply
strikeback03 - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkI purchased an AMD CPU new that had bent pins. Reply
coolkev99 - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linkI like mac n' cheese Reply
moronsworld - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkman this sucks i wanted to buy an i5. I guess im not gonna be buying one until everything gets resolved or a company other than dfi says they wont use foxconn brand. Reply
Rajinder Gill - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkEVGA are focusing on TYCO AMP and LOTES too from what I've been told. Reply
ipay - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - link... are those Foxconn sockets putting 2 pins to some contacts and skipping other contacts entirely?
If you look at the pictures - particularly the last one - it looks very much like this is happening, whereas other socket manufacturers are getting it right.
Will be interested to see how this turns out - for Foxconn's sake I hope they haven't tried to cut corners. Reply
gmyx - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkI noticed the same thing. May pads have 2 marks right beside a pad without a mark. It seems like alignment or pin count is off. One the first row above the alignment notch (not the triangle - the half circle) there are 12 pads but 16 pins?
This could be from multiple boards or just one. If you have blank CPU (no pad indentations) and put it in one of these boards and check the results. Reply
Visual - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linktwo pins on the same pad would be a major wtf.
i guess it is more likely the double dents are a result of using the cpu in two different mobos. still, i wouldn't know for sure.
and it definitely seems worrisome how close to the pad edge some of the dents go even when there is only one dent.
i honestly didn't think a cpu could function with even a single pin broken...
what if a similar mis-contact thing happens with a data pin? wouldn't that completely prevent the cpu from working? why does it not happen in that case, how are power pins different than data pins? or is there some redundancy built in for those also? Reply
PrinceGaz - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkIt is likely that all the pins are making contact, even the ones where there is no visible dent on the CPU but that those where there is no dent are only making a very gentle contact meaning only a tiny point on the pin is touching the CPU quite lightly.
So long as there is some contact, that doesn't really matter too much for a data-pin as they only carry a few milliamps of current at most and therefore the size of the contact area doesn't really matter as it won't get hot enough to make any difference.
The problem occurs when dealing with power-lines drawing upwards of a hundred milliamps where that tiny contact area is going to get very hot and potentially fail. The more that fail, the worse the problem becomes for the remaining power lines as the load on them increases so that those which could just about cope before now also fail, and so on until there are too few left for the CPU to operate reliably or the current being drawn through those that are left exceed what the mobo/CPU were designed for and one or other fails. Reply
Rajinder Gill - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkSome users have experienced non boots, and it is liekly that key signal pins have not been making sufficeint contact. In the case of VCC/VSS - you have a lot more pins than the CPU needs to post, which is why you get deep into use before noticing the problem. Reply
Rike - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkAnybody know whose socket they are using? Reply
Rajinder Gill - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkFoxconn it seems so far, not seen anything else from them in the marketplace myself. Reply
punjabiplaya - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkIs Foxconn aware of this issue? Reply
Rajinder Gill - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkI know DFI asked them for an explantion over a week ago after they suffered a similar burnout to ours in their labs - so yes. Reply
papapapapapapapababy - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkbwahhaha Reply
tynopik - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - link'Extreme' modified 'Overclocking', not 'P55'
you can do extreme overclocking on a calculator Reply
Etern205 - Saturday, October 17, 2009 - linkI can do extreme overclocking on my abacus! :P Reply
Rajinder Gill - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - link*Scours the Futuremark Orb looking for 3D Mark scores submitted using one of TI's scientific range of calculators*..lol Reply
jigglywiggly - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkSucks for p55 owners bwahhaha
Oh wait, I'm still rocking a qx6700, I paid 1000$ for this in 06 :P Reply
pullmyfoot - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linksucker. why would you spend $1000 on a CPU when next years $300 CPU is going to be faster? Reply
strikeback03 - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkThat argument could apply to just about any top component at any time. If they have the money to burn, they get something a little nicer a little sooner. Reply
Souleet - Friday, October 16, 2009 - link$1000 on a CPU...must be very proud consider it took Intel half or even less than that to make it. Reply
jonup - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkI think that was his point. Reply
Ben90 - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkThat sucks... Good info to know; ive seen quite a few burnt out sockets over on XS and was wondering what exactly was causing the problem Reply
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7bourne - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkTom's hardware reports a wave of exploding phases and capacitors when overclocking lynnfield board.
http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/budget-p55-mot...">http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/budget-p55-mot... Reply
yacoub - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkin other words, they don't make 'em like they used to. Reply
dajeepster - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkthat does really suck... does anyone know what socket manufacturer that Asus uses?..... i've got the P7P55D deluxe. I'm not overclocking yet, but i had planned to in the near future once i get all the water cooling supplies i need Reply
xanonwk - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkI am using P7P55D as well. Does Intel and ASUS honor the warranty if my borad and CPU are burnt out because of this faulty socket?
Rajinder Gill - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkGood question. Some vendors will use the 'you were overclocked' card, so I'm not sure at this point. I sent ASUS an email over 2 weeks ago highlighting this problem and have yet to receive a response. Reply
Gary Key - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkYou should be fine with that board (and others in the same class) with water cooling. I probably have run the P7P55D Deluxe board about 1400 hours so far without issue. Half of that time has been spent at 4.2~4.3GHz. As Raja stated in the article, it appears all of our problems have come when using Phase cooling and LN2, while really pushing the voltages and subsequently the power draw numbers start peaking over 140W. Reply
Rajinder Gill - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkASUS appears to be using Foxconn sockets on their entire P55 lineup. Reply
Phatcraig - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkAt least _some_ ASUS boards have the LOTES socket. I just got a replacement P6T Deluxe V2 with a LOTES socket. However this was an RMA after having serious random issues with the prior board, and although I didn't check the socket brand then I suspect it was Foxconn as the symptoms point to contact problems ala this article. Since Newegg got it right after a bad first experience, I wonder if Newegg knows and has a stash of good boards if the customers RMA...
FYI, this new board works like a dream. Rock solid stable i7-920 at 3.8ghz with 12gb ram running at 8-8-8-24 timings and low voltage settings (12 gb of RAM adds significant system strain and usually lowers overclocking potential). And I'm sure I can get more out of it, as I haven't optimized it yet. I couldn't get 12 gb stable on the last board at stock speeds. Reply
chrnochime - Friday, October 16, 2009 - linkAt least read the article before assuming socket 1366 boards are affected too.... Reply
Ben90 - Thursday, October 15, 2009 - linkThis article only applies to 1156 boards, 1336 dont have this problem Reply
Inimbrium - Wednesday, May 30, 2012 - linkMy ASUS P5K-EPU's Tyco burned. Ok, after 3 years of use, two of which by the previous owner who only clamped 3 of the 4 CPU cooler bolts... Reply
Oxford Guy - Saturday, October 04, 2014 - linkMy Gigabyte P44 UD4P has never enabled me to overclock much with any stability. I guess it must be the Foxconn socket. I have spent a lot of time and followed a lot of guides and it's just not reliable above 3 GHz with my i5 750. Reply