Have been looking forward to upgrading my i5 to an i7 and finally got the money together to do it. I had checked out possible upgrades including a better i5 but decided that I wanted an i7 and chose this one based on reviews and product information. I have a Dell Inspiron 3847 that came with a i5 4460 running at 3.2 gigs. I don't overclock so I wanted something that would run faster without having to overclock it. This seemed the best bet for me. I made up my mind when I brought a i3 system running at 3.7 gigs. This little system had a bit of zip to it and it, so far, has run most anything I could throw at it along with it's GTX-750 Ti SC graphics card. So I ordered the i7 and it came in right on time and I opened the shipping box to see what I had. The first thing I noted was the included heat sink fan combo that came with it. It was OK, but plastic push pins have failed me before as mounts on the case fans so that I didn't like. Also it was about half an inch thick and the heat sink fan combo on the existing i5 U was about an inch or over tall and had much larger fins. I did note that the heat sink combo that came with the i7 had a copper surfaced area where the heat sink seated on the U but the pins and size made me decide to stay with my i5's old heat sink cooler that came with the system. (I also noted that the i5 combo mounted to the MB with already mounted screws so if I needed to I could still switch combos a bit easier. (This didn't turn out to be the case, however.) So I got the Inspiron and brought it to the kitchen table where I do any inside-the-case computer work and removed the side and got busy. Laying it flat and grounding myself well, I proceeded to remove the heat sink fan combo with the only problem being it took a bit of force to get the screws holding down the heat sink to come loose as they were tightened down really well. After getting the screws loose, I checked out the mounting for the fan heat sink combo to see how it had been mounted so I could make sure and replace it properly. I like the way the heat sink was held down with four springs which push the heat sink down onto the top surface of the processor and provide a very firm fit after you've got the heat sink compound on. (I used Artic Silver which works for me.) The one thing that surprised me a bit was the amount of force that was needed to re-latch the hold down clip. It was a bit more than I felt it should be, but after checking how the i5 felt it wasn't all that much force to latch it. (Made sure to get the new chip in right too.) After I got the heat sink compound on and replaced the heat sink combo, and got it tightened down firmly. it was time to see what it would do. I normally leave the side off till I check out any new installation I do. In that way you can find any problems and correct them. The last thing I did was re-plug the heat sink fan back into the MB and then took the system to the Computer Room and hooked everything up. I turned the power on and went to the BIOS as a check to see if the U was seen correctly and it was with all functions showing OK. I then got the only glitch of the hold morning when I exited the BIOS and instead of booting to Windows10 Pro, it just shut down. Ops, I said to myself and pressed the power button again. This time the system started up with no problems and booted right into Windows. I noted it felt sort of like my i3 in that it seemed to zip into Windows instead of sort of "walking" in. I had been reading that these i7s were noted for running a bit hot, so I ran Speccy and checked the temps. At idle it ran at 35 to 36c and under load it topped out at 65c and that was lower than what I expected it to be. A very pleasant surprise indeed. I got another one when I checked the actual speed the i7 was running at. It settled in at 4.2 gigs. and I hadn't done anything but install it. I sat there and watched the temps for a bit and noted that they didn't get above 40c when idling and when I loaded it down it just stayed around 65c with only one time peaking out at 68c. It seems I might have done a fair job with the sink heat fan combo too. I then loaded up one of my favorite games ( Me) and got killed off right away as I failed to respond quickly enough as I was expecting the AI to be a bit slower. Nice! Overall the system "feels" solid and runs that way. I note it has the "zippy" feel the i3 has but more so. In my games, I'm finding myself having to react a bit sooner than I used to and that's really a pleasure. So far, the only thing that popped up was the shut down at the first boot up after installing the U. It's not given me any other problems at all and it's nice to have things actually load up when clicked on without any little pauses and have the game scene transition loads go by so fast that you can't even read the hints anymore. Very Nice! One other thing that I was happy to see was when I checked the activation status of Windows 10 Pro and found it was still activated! Another very good thing to see! Overall I think I got a real winner here!
Update: 4/17/16: One thing I did notice with this U was that, at first, it was a bit unstable and ran a bit warm. I noted the first time it booted up a slight freeze then reboot and then Windows came up. The first set up was this way and then I started having freezes, lockups, and unannounced reboots running at 4.3 gigs. It seemed my first impressions were a bit high. I did a reset of the heat sink compound and tried again. Same thing at 4.3 gig. After placing my old i5 3.2 gig back in for a check and it running just fine, I decided to try once again. I removed the i5 and put in the i7. This time I cleared the BIOS as I had run into having old BIOS values mess me up at times. I also added a 120mm fan to the case's left side to set up a bit more air flow thru the case. I reseated my sound card and graphics card, and I made sure all cables were tight. This time when I booted up, the system did not hang but booted to the screen informing me a BIOS clear at been done. It was smooth and there wasn't a hang to it. I went into the BIOS and disabled the on board sound and that's it, I left everything else like it was and booted into Windows 10 Pro. Windows booted up without a problem and loaded fine. I cranked up the Intel Extreme Tuning Ulit, and checked things out. Turned out I was again running at 4.2 gig. The system seemed OK, but was some of the readings looked a bit off to me, so I decided to try a test and sure enough the system seemed to be a little shaky to me. I decided on another test before I ran any stress tests. I set the system at 4 gigs solid and observed the readings. Things seemed to setting down and the temps seemed to stabilize around 35 to 40c. Not as low as hoped but in range. Since I hadn't planned on an overclock anyway, this would be OK IF they didn't get much higher. I then ran 10 minutes worth of U stress and memory tests after a 5 minute benchmarking in Intel's uitil., and then a 10 minute stress test under OC and the system sailed thru them all with the temps never getting above 83c but just spiking to it and no locking up, freezing or reboots. I've noted it seems to run around 35-40c when idling and around 70-76c under load. The main thing now is it seems very stable at 4 gigs for me and that's what I wanted even if it took me a little while to get there.
Update: 7/18/16: OK, so here's the finally setup I had to run with. First, turned Turbo-boost OFF in BIOS. Second, ran Intel Extreme Tuning Tool and set U core voltage on this system at 1.1005 volts, with Manual static setting only as that was the setting that got me the most stable running. (No Adaptive as, on my system, this causes lock ups and reboots when sudden voltage spikes up or down hit the U.) In this set up, the system is very stable, runs cool (Around 35-40c idle and 50-60c under load) and allows me to run my games and any thing else without any problems at all. The only problem that I run into every once in awhile is when somehow the static setting gets switched back to the adaptive set up and I don't spot it in time, I'll get the total system lock up and need to reboot by the power button on the system, otherwise no problems and system runs very solid without problems. (I've play one game 12 to 24 hours without a problem with the static setup.) (Think that Intel should allow the to "set" the most stable profile ae the "default" profile for their system but they don't.) I maybe should have got the "locked" 4790 but I wanted the 4 gigs running speed and not 3.6. Still think it's a really good buy.
| Processor | 4 GHz core_i7 |
|---|---|
| Wireless Type | 802.11bgn |
