Intel Ivy Bridge
Intel’s Ivy Bridge Processor: Top Ten Reasons to Upgrade Intel

Intel will be launching the Ivy Bridge platform later this year and while the company has faced delays in shipping the next generation chip, we finally have some indication of what the performance will be like.

According to CPU-World, Intel has adopted a 'Tick Tock' regime for the launch of its new CPU architecture and new processor technologies for the last five years. On a Tick, a new process is introduced which will give a small performance boost, and use significantly less power. A Tock introduces a new architecture, effectively new circuitry, using the now established manufacturing process.

This year however we seem to be getting both a Tick and a Tock, with the 22nm Ivy Bridge being essentially a die shrink of the current Sandy Bridge platform (Tick) while the integrated GPU is also getting a performance boost (Tock).

According to a set of benchmarks performed by Anandtech, using an Ivy Bridge i7-3770K at stock settings and across a set of eight CPU tasks, the new chip showed a performance boost of between five and 15 percent, averaging out at 10 percent. Things were even better when we look at the graphical performance, with the average performance boost rated at 33 percent, peaking at 50 percent.

However it was not all smooth sailing for Ivy Bridge as things got pretty hot under the hood. CPUID Hardware Monitor indicated the CPU reached over 100C when running Linpack, and around 90C when running Prime 95. This means some cooling systems may not be able to reach the same clock speeds as they achieved with Sandy Bridge.

We will find out for ourselves when the chips do launch later in the year.