Intel's Pentium 4 2.80GHz - Moving to the Head of the Class

We knew exactly how fast the 2.80GHz Pentium 4 was when we wrote about the Athlon XP 2600+ last week, but it was a matter of timing that kept us from commenting on it. As Intel regains the performance crown, some very interesting things begin to happen; for starters, now the 2.53GHz Pentium 4 drops to an affordable sub-$300 level to make room for the new 2.6GHz and 2.80GHz parts. This is obviously highly competitive with AMD's Athlon XP 2600+ although once you get into the lower price ranges the Athlon XP offers a much better value for your money.

The new 400MHz FSB parts should be good overclockers as they have low enough multipliers to be advantageous. We had no problem taking all of our CPUs based on the new core steppings up to the 3GHz mark and although your mileage may vary we weren't trying very hard and got great results while simply using stock (retail) cooling on the Pentium 4. If you're not planning on overclocking however, the 400MHz FSB parts should only be reserved for nonperformance oriented applications as their performance is noticeably less than the newer 533MHz FSB CPUs.

With the release of their 2.80GHz processor out of the way, Intel has now set the stage for a number of other exciting announcements at their forthcoming Developer Forum in two weeks. Only time will tell what we'll see there, but you better believe we'll be there covering it for you.