Intel Core 2 Extreme QX6850 and Massive Price Cuts
by Anand Lal Shimpi on July 16, 2007 3:04 AM EST- Posted in
- CPUs
We finally have it! After well over a year of asking nicely, rudely and creatively - we know when AMD's next generation microarchitecture is being launched.
Well, sort of.
Barcelona, as you maybe remember, is the code name for AMD's next-generation server processors. AMD recently announced that in August, it will unleash Barcelona unto the world at clock speeds of "up to 2.0GHz." But Barcelona only applies to the server world, and today we're reviewing a desktop microprocessor, so when do we get to see AMD's brand new Phenom processors on the desktop?
We'd expect Phenom in our hands 30 days after Barcelona's launch, making it approximately September/October by the time you'd see a preview/review and widespread availability about 30 days from that. If all goes perfectly, AMD's Phenom chips should be in customers' hands by November or December at the latest.
Penryn, Intel's 45nm update to its current Core 2 processors, will also make its debut at the end of this year, potentially spoiling AMD's launch party. A few possibilities exist with Penryn:
1) Penryn could launch across the board at all clock speeds and at competitive prices, quite possibly the worst case scenario for AMD, or
2) Penryn could launch strictly at upper clock speeds/price points, allowing AMD to have an easier time competing at lower speeds, or finally
3) Penryn could launch at lower clock speeds and price points, giving AMD an equally hard time as in the first scenario
It's important to recap AMD's impending launch as we've had yet another round of price cuts, making buying a new CPU today very attractive.
Today is supposed to mark the introduction of the first 1333MHz FSB quad-core Core 2 Extreme processor, the QX6850 (mouthful anyone?), as well as the official launch of the entire 1333MHz FSB lineup. But this is the second Core 2 Extreme launch that coincides with a ridiculous (in a good way) price drop, so we can't help but shift our focus for this story, at least for starters...
| CPU | Clock Speed | FSB | L2 Cache | Pricing |
| Intel Core 2 Extreme QX6850 | 3.00GHz | 1333 | 4MBx2 | $999 |
| Intel Core 2 Duo E6850 | 3.00GHz | 1333 | 4MB | $266 |
| Intel Core 2 Duo E6750 | 2.66GHz | 1333 | 4MB | $183 |
| Intel Core 2 Duo E6550 | 2.33GHz | 1333 | 4MB | $163 |
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xsilver - Wednesday, July 18, 2007 - link
One question has still yet to be answered:how far does the e6850 overclock vs how far the q6600 overclocks
from previous articles the q6600 doesnt reach much beyond 3ghz unless you have supercooling?
but the e6850?
Slash3 - Monday, July 16, 2007 - link
I know this is a bit after the fact, but would it be possible on the "vs" charts, to plot the negative performance improvements (read: performance loss) in a left-of-center fashion, instead of having both extending to the right of zero, with a negative sign tacked on? It makes it pretty difficult to scan visually. Go from -100 to 0 to +100 in the same X axis, and just increase the granularity a bit to fit things on, in cases where there are significant negative values. The E6850 vs Q6600 is a good example. Negative and positive, all over the place. Just friendly commentary. Excellent writeup, otherwise. :)DerekWilson - Monday, July 16, 2007 - link
as was explored in a previous video artilce, we could simply add 100 to each of these and compare the bars with 100 percent meaning eqivalent performance. negatives would be less than 100 while positives would be greater than 100 ...personally, i don't mind the negaive numbers in a different color paradigm. if the readers would prefer the "centered at 100%" style, we will certainly adapt.
i don't know how the other editors here feel, but marketing guys like to show us graphs around 100% performance of something ... because of that, it just ends up feeling wrong to me. :-)
dev0lution - Monday, July 16, 2007 - link
No red lines? That's a pretty impressive lineup for the prices Intel has. Looks like there might be Q6600 in my future very soon :)tuteja1986 - Monday, July 16, 2007 - link
where is this price cut.. i don't seem em in newegg.webdawg77 - Monday, July 16, 2007 - link
July 22ndDerekWilson - Monday, July 16, 2007 - link
fixed the red lines issueThatguy97 - Thursday, June 18, 2015 - link
back then i stuck to dual core with my e6600 going all the way up to 4ghz ish speeds