Intel Pentium Processor 965 Extreme Edition Review

Temperatures

When we got the Intel 965 processor Intel informed us that the Vcc, Icc, and power specifications provided with the Intel Pentium Processor Extreme Edition 955 still apply to the new Intel Pentium Processor Extreme Edition 965. With no major difference thermal differences we were shocked when we found a new heatsink. Below are four of the most common heat sinks that we have used over the years from Intel. The newest is on the left and the oldest is on the right.

Just by looking at the blades one can tell they aren’t the same heatsink. The one that came with the Intel 965 (the one on the left) doesn’t match the one that came with our Intel 955 sample (the second one from the left). Let’s take a look and see how the new heatsink and stepping do on our test system.

With the room set at a constant 70F we found that our processor was able to idle at 39C with the reference heatsink and thermal pad! If you look back to our original 955 article we were getting 51C at a lower clock frequency. With the Enhanced Halt State (C1E) technology added to the Intel 965 processors and new heatsink design we found the temperatures of the Intel 965 to be within reason for the first time in years. Running several applications at once we saw the processor hit 56C under load, but even that is not bad. Since we were running tests on the Intel Bad Axe reference board we could get some temperature utilities to run, but using the utilities available we see an improvement in idle and load temperatures. In terms of power conspution we were seeing 139-140W at idle and 200-205W when running SuperPi, Sisoft Sandra, and Sciencemark benchmarks at the same time.