After being released a bit early, Intel has released their Core i7 chips officially today. Micro Center started to offer theirs a day earler on Sunday when I received a newsletter in the e-mail and Newegg was giving everyone a sneak peak at their prices. And, not to miss a beat, several manufacturers have also released new systems featuring the speedy new chips in case you were looking for something a little less cheap than the $8,238 Falcon Northwest Core i7 machine is just a tad out of your budget. Here are a few of the ‘more affordable’ machines out there if building your own isn’t quite up your alley.
Dell Studio XPS: Starting at $949
Dell XPS 730x Gaming Desktop: Starting at $1999
Gateway FX6800: $1249.49 Engadget
Alienware Area-51 X-58: A surprising $1649
Those are just a few of the more mainstream offerings. I am sure the other manufacturers will be rolling out theirs soon and even more affordable desktops will be coming as Intel releases the more mainstream desktop processors and motherboards early next year.
It seems today was the end of the Intel NDA for the Core i7 as tons of review sites have simultaneously released their reviews. A few key features among many others that the i7 brings to the table include an integrated memory controller for lots of memory bandwidth, QuickPath Interconnect which replaces the Front Side Bus, a new chipset X58, and of course a new socket, the LGA1366. The Core i7 also brings back hyper-threading so its four cores can run eight processes simultaneously. That is just the quick rundown, but there are tons and tons of reviews and thorough breakdowns out there to check out. I’ve included a few that I particularly found useful.
HotHardware: Getting To Know Intel’s New Core i7, Video Spotlight
Computer Shopper: Intel’s Core i7 Debuts: Systems, CPUs, and Motherboards Reviewed
CustomPC: Intel Core i7 – all you need to know
Engadget also has a writeup about the Falcon Northwest Mach V featuring the Core i7 and a whopping 12GB of RAM. Its other features include liquid cooling, dual ATI Radeon 4870X2 video cards, 1 TB of storage, and Blu-Ray AND HD-DVD. The price to be one of the first on the block with Core i7? Only $8,238, ouch! The system does look amazing though, so I am sure it is worth every penny in workmanship if you have the cash to afford it. It isn’t like an Alienware system which are very tacky.
Full Article and pictures: Engadget
All in all it has been a fairly exciting day in the wide world of CPUs. Yeah, the systems out right now are pretty pricey, but the mainstream and more affordable systems are coming and this is just a taste of what more of us can see down the road. The new architecture by Intel sure looks like a winner so far.
At least for some lucky customers, the I7, Intel’s latest CPU offering, has come out early. The official launch date is November 17th, and it looks like he got his on November 1st. According to his overclocking and benchmarking he got to 3.840 GHz on air cooling so far and run SuperPi (1M) in just 10 seconds. Pictures are courtesy of the Overclock.net forums. Check out the link below for more information and to join discussion.
Here is the original information which has since been removed:
I just picked up an i7, the P6-T and Corsair memory at Central Computer in Sunnyvale, CA.
They had more there, so go get them!
Installing now.
s-spec: SLBCJ
3Dmark06 (basic edition)
CPU score only:
- 3.2 (stock) – 5606
- 3,480 (mild oc, I know) – 6011
- 3,840 – 6608
Superpi (1M) at 3,480 = 11sec
at 3,840 – 10sec
NOTE: i haven’t run prime95 on the above OCs. Only using the stock fan which is surprisingly quiet. Temps are 35c using realtemp 2.7 at idle for the 3.8. and for chess fans. at 3.6 fritz 11 benchmark is relative speed of 27, with 13,000 kilo nodes per second
Discussion: Overclock.net
Woot, I got on Engadget for the tip.
It seems that the original image was removed. However, the image on my site remains. So, feel free to hotlink to it, I have plenty of bandwidth to spare.
SANTA CLARA, Calif., Aug. 11, 2008 Intel Corporation announced today that desktop processors based on the company’s upcoming new microarchitecture (codenamed “Nehalem”) will be formally branded “Intel® Core™ processor.” The first products in this new family of processors, including an “Extreme Edition” version, will carry an “i7″ identifier and will be formally branded as “Intel® Core™ i7 processor.” This is the first of several new identifiers to come as different products launch over the next year.
Products based on the new microarchitecture will deliver high performance and energy efficiency. This “best of both worlds” approach is expected to extend Intel’s processor leadership in future mobile, desktop and server market segments.
“The Core name is and will be our flagship PC processor brand going forward,” said Sean Maloney, Intel Corporation executive vice president and general manager, Sales and Marketing Group. “Expect Intel to focus even more marketing resources around that name and the Core i7 products starting now.”
Full Article: Intel
This renaming is to go in line that this is the 7th iteration of the main Intel processor and it is the i786. Though, I am not sure why they didn’t just go with Core 3 like it was originally planned. This will just cause more confusion for generation consumers. Either way, these chips should be great when they finally come out.