Socket 1156: the first processor socket for the CORE family of CPUs

Official sales of devices based on the Socket 1156 computing platform started in 2008. These were the most productive processor solutions and the most functional sets of system logic. Up-to-date this processor socket was considered until 2011, when it was replaced by the LGA 1155 platform.

Prehistory of appearance

In late 2007 and early 2008, it became obvious that the LGA 775 processor connector reached its maximum, Intel had to offer something new to the market for the further development of the processor technology. This "something new" became Socket 1156. The layout of its semiconductor chips was radically redesigned, and the changes introduced made it possible to achieve a significant increase in performance. Among the nuances that allowed to increase productivity, we can distinguish:

• The emergence of HT technology, which allowed one processing unit to create 2 data processing streams at once.

• Integration of the "north bridge" of the logic set into the CPU. This accelerated the exchange of information between the processor and RAM. Also, this solution simplified the layout of motherboards. Well, the very exchange of information between the "north bridge" and the processor for this reason is much simpler.

• Transfer from the system board to the silicon crystal of the CPU of the built-in graphic accelerator. When using the built-in video accelerator, this also allowed increasing the speed of the PC.

All the previously listed innovations are relevant to this day, they can be found even in the most recent models of central processors from this computer equipment manufacturer.

List of chipsets

Only 4 possible sets of chipsets were submitted for this platform. Separate in this list is P55. He did not allow to use the built-in video accelerator and was aimed at installing a discrete graphics card. The corporate segment, in turn, was targeted by Q57. In this chipset there was support for proprietary technology from Intel - AMT. With its help, the network administrator could connect to the PC and gain control over it. Also this chipset supported the built-in graphics adapters in the CPU. The almost complete analog of Q57 was H57. The only difference was that in this case AMT technology was not activated. The H55 chipset was the least functional solution for Socket 1156. The motherboard on its basis did not allow creating RAID arrays, which were available to owners of all other solutions. Just like in the previous case, these motherboards did not support AMT technology.

CPUs

The most affordable solutions for Socket 1156 were Pentium chips (they had higher frequencies and 2 computational modules) and Celeron (in this case there were both single-core and dual-core models, the frequencies of these CPUs were the lowest in the family). On the upstairs there were processors of the i3 family. They had 2 units, but the presence of HT technology allowed them to be turned into a full-fledged 4-core CPU. Even more productive family of processors was i5. They could be 2- (with HT support and 4 threads, like i3) or 4-core. The increased clock speeds and the larger cache memory allowed them to avoid junior models without performance problems. The most productive processors are i7. In this case, the cache memory has been further increased. The same can be said about frequency. Also the number of threads in this case was 8, and the number of cores was 4.

Prospects of the computing platform

Of course, since the beginning of the sale of this platform, it's been 8 years already, during this time the LGA 1156 processor socket has become obsolete. Even the manufacturer itself is no longer supporting the Socket. Owners of such PCs have the sense already now to think about updating their computer. For the most part, the computational resources of this platform are sufficient to solve most problems. But the time is not far off when it will not be enough. Therefore, it makes sense to think and look aside LGA1151, which is now the most advanced computer solution.

Summary

So far, Socket 1156 is relevant. But it is definitely better now for the owners of such computers to think about a new modernization. Very soon, the moment will come when such a PC will become obsolete and will not meet the requirements put forward to it.