Intel® Core™ i9-7960X X-series Processor

Scannerman · Saturday at 5:44 PM

I had to purchase one of these used and I'm waiting for it to come home to papa. Perhaps I should have did more research on it before I pulled the trigger because intel lists the number of maximum memory channels at 4 and the system board I ordered uses 8 DIMM slots. I'm not too worried about this as intel listed the 6900K that I'm currently using @ 4 maximum memory channels and it works with 8 populated DIMM slots just fine. I was just wondering if anyone here is familiar with the i9-7960X X-series Processor and if there might be anything I should know about it. Any constructive input on this specific CPU would be appreciated. Thanks

BamaInArk · Saturday at 5:48 PM

Doesn't that X299 use 2 slots per channel?

Scannerman · Saturday at 5:49 PM

BamaInArk said:
Doesn't that X299 use 2 slots per channel?

My X99 does so very likely the X299 does also.

bobkn · Saturday at 6:24 PM

Scannerman said:
My X99 does so very likely the X299 does also.

It's been a while since I used my (Asrock) X99 board, but that's not correct.

Quad channel operation is enabled with a set of 4 matching DIMMs. You don't need to populate all 8 slots. (If that's what was meant by "2 slots per channel".)

I await word on how well that Socket 2066 CPU works in a Socket 2011-3 MB. If that's still the plan.

BamaInArk · Saturday at 7:10 PM

bobkn said:
Quad channel operation is enabled with a set of 4 matching DIMMs. You don't need to populate all 8 slots. (If that's what was meant by "2 slots per channel".)

That is what I meant. Quad channel with 8 slots to get Quad channel you only need to fill 1 slot for each channel = 4 slots. However there are 2 slots available for each channel allowing 8 sticks of memory.

Scannerman · Saturday at 7:42 PM

bobkn said:
It's been a while since I used my (Asrock) X99 board, but that's not correct.

Quad channel operation is enabled with a set of 4 matching DIMMs. You don't need to populate all 8 slots. (If that's what was meant by "2 slots per channel".)

I await word on how well that Socket 2066 CPU works in a Socket 2011-3 MB. If that's still the plan.

Yes I was aware that the system will run with 4 matching DIMMs. What I was somewhat concerned about is whether the 2066 would run with 8 populated DIMM slots, but it seems reasonable that would as my X99 build also has quad channel and 8 DIMM slots and runs fine. The original plan was to run a 6900K chip in a 2066 socket but I decided not to bother despite some saying that it will. I mean, the goal here is to run a system that actually legitimately supports Windows 11 so the experiment is pointless. No matter what I do with that Broadwell chip it ain't gonna happen no how. Is Win 11 worth buying a whole new work station for? A: Likely not. Work stations (at least good ones) cost a lot and there's really not a whole lot about Win 11 (as is) that justifies the thousands of dollars a full system will cost just to replace another perfectly good work station that ran fine without Win 11 and let me boot to Linux any time I wished with CSM on and without losing my intel soft RAID GUI.

Frankly, I don't even know if an X299 board will give me this option. Seems like Win 11 just turns your PC into a hardware money pit; but the extra 4 lanes was tempting and I've never owned an i9 chip for personal use before so I thought I'd give it a go. I'm just not familiar with this CPU at all and that's why I'm asking if there's anything I should know about it.

bobkn · Saturday at 10:48 PM

I guess I misremembered what CPU was to be tried in a socket for which it was not made.

Not sure what's being asked. The i9-7960X is on the blessed list for Win 11.

I hope that the i9-7960X will be used with apps that can exploit the additional cores/threads it has over the I7-6900k. If not, it may not feel like much of an upgrade.

Scannerman · Sunday at 2:46 AM

Compatibility for FCLGA2011, FCLGA2011-v3, and FCLGA2066 Sockets...

Discusses LGA2011/LGA2011-v3 sockets and Intel® Processor and Intel® Desktop Board compatibility.

www.intel.com

According to Intel the 6900K is not compatible with the 2066 socket so somewhere along the line I read some misinformation. Good thing I didn't bother to try it. I'm quite certain with the apps and the drives I use that the additional cores/threads and bandwidth will be put to good use. That it won't feel like much of an upgrade with a genuine, legitimate installation of Win 11 would certainly be a great disappointment. Rebuilding this beast will take me a while. I expect to have it on the bench test for a few months before I put it in a case. I have a lot of pokers in the fire in addition to domestic exploits, but I may make a video or a video series to show a work in progress.

I was hoping someone here might be familiar with the chip and might give me a few pointers since this is the "builders" thread. I realize this is a discontinued CPU but I tend to gravitate toward a slightly older style UEFI and I'm not a big fan of ThreadRipper. I also like using hardware that has been tried and tested and proven to work well so I'm not big on early adoption either. I'm hoping this board will last ten years at least.

Scannerman · Sunday at 8:31 AM

Scannerman said:
That it won't feel like much of an upgrade with a genuine, legitimate installation of Win 11 would certainly be a great disappointment.

It would not surprise me because Win 11 doesn't impress me at all. Still, it would be a great disappointment... For me to go out of my way to cater to this unnecessary compatibility and watch Win 7 Ultimate run so much smoother on much older hardware... Yes.

Scannerman · Sunday at 10:42 PM

BamaInArk said:
Doesn't that X299 use 2 slots per channel?

It does. I was concerned that perhaps the CPU wouldn't support the system board because it is limited to quad channel and the board has a total of 8 slots so I didn't know if it would function on a fully populated board like my 6900K does. Upon further investigation I noticed that Intel listed my current CPU @ 4 channels of memory so I should be okay with this. I'm guessing they daisy chain the memory banks?

XxXxX · 2025-02-03T02:14:56-0500

is this of help with Ram slots and configuration.

https://greatpcreview.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/MSI-Creator-TRX40-Recommend-Memory-Configuration-for-8-slots-768x537.webp

best of luck, Steve ..

Scannerman · 2025-02-03T14:40:57-0500

XxXxX said:
is this of help with Ram slots and configuration.

https://greatpcreview.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/05/MSI-Creator-TRX40-Recommend-Memory-Configuration-for-8-slots-768x537.webp

best of luck, Steve ..

That looks like a layout for an AMD platform.

The manual for this board puts it this way.

Scannerman · 2025-02-03T14:45:23-0500

I'm thinking the RAM is daisy chained. It looks much like the layout in my X99 series board.

PCUser · 2025-02-03T16:34:08-0500

Scannerman said:
I'm thinking the RAM is daisy chained. It looks much like the layout in my X99 series board.

Looks like some fun will be had

Intel® Core™ i9-7960X X-series Processor (22M Cache, up to 4.20 GHz) - Product Specifications | Intel

Intel® Core™ i9-7960X X-series Processor (22M Cache, up to 4.20 GHz) quick reference with specifications, features, and technologies.

www.intel.com

Scannerman · 2025-02-03T22:03:00-0500

PCUser said:
Looks like some fun will be had

Intel® Core™ i9-7960X X-series Processor (22M Cache, up to 4.20 GHz) - Product Specifications | Intel

Intel® Core™ i9-7960X X-series Processor (22M Cache, up to 4.20 GHz) quick reference with specifications, features, and technologies.

www.intel.com

I like a snappy, responsive system that doesn't take ages to transfer files. I also like hot swappable bays that allow me to examine a hard drive in a heart beat and work on it if need be. I also like using multiple drives and multiple arrays, specifically 0, 1, and 10. I also like multi-booting because some operating systems work better at some things than other operating systems. Besides, I have more flexibility and options with software when one app won't work right because another is on the same OS.

Win 11 tends to hang and lag on this Broadwell chip and I can't get all the drivers for it so Skylake it is. I have every reason not to be impressed with Win 11 but if runs at least as well as Win 7 Ultimate does on this rig when I run Win 11 on an i9 7960X I'll be happy with it. Hopefully it will let me run IRST alongside my two LSI/BROADCOM/AVAGO cards like my X99 does. Yeah, it's going to be a bit of fun.

Perhaps I might even get back my Linux without having to disable CSM.

PCUser · 2025-02-03T23:10:32-0500

@Scannerman
Skylake is great. A bit under appreciated by some, but handles Windows 11 Pro very well.
Throw some ram in and enjoy!

Scannerman · 2025-02-03T23:30:47-0500

PCUser said:
@Scannerman
Skylake is great. A bit under appreciated by some, but handles Windows 11 Pro very well.
Throw some ram in and enjoy!

Thank you for the encouragement. I'm entirely unfamiliar with this architecture. I imagine it's still a little old to be spectre/meltdown proofed but I'm on a limited budget here. I'm a little addicted to that X-tra cache this class of chips offers and perhaps I should have opted out for a Xeon, but what's done is done. Hopefully I won't have to pay X-tra for it at the Post Office because of tariffs. :smirk:

It should be here in about a week.

PCUser · 2025-02-03T23:52:20-0500

@Scannerman
Any changes or increased tariffs is idiotic and just plain stupid, bad economics. Only a moron would do that right now.
I hope you have fun with your CPU and rig.

Sincerely,
not a fan of tariffs lol

Scannerman · 2025-02-04T00:00:59-0500

TBH I can't blame Trump for what he did and I'm a Canadian. This is a political lesson in reverse psychology and it's working. Canada needs to clean up her act. Donald knows how to posture and sadly Canada doesn't have a leader like him. Is it bad economics? Sure it is. Was it a smart political move? You better believe it. Trump is calling everyone's bluff and everyone at the table is folding.

PCUser · 2025-02-04T00:14:00-0500

The problem is all consumers ultimately end up footing the bill with higher prices, which hurts an economy. Add to that already existing inflation, supply chain issues, price gouging and more, and it's a recipe for economic disaster such as a double digit inflation, recession or depression.

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