Intel - Core 2 Extreme QX9650 review

Intel is releasing information about its next-generation Penryn Core 2 processors in carefully controlled stages. Penryn is the code name for the move from a 65nm process to 45nm, which dramatically reduces the size of the processor core. This reduces the cost of production and also frees up space on the core, so Intel is able to raise the quantity of L2 cache from 4MB to 6MB for each dual core Wolfdale package.

Penryn uses the same LGA775 package as Kentsfield and also shares the same layout, so a quad core processor uses two dual core chips, each with their own L2 cache. In the case of a quad core Yorkfield Penryn the amount of cache increases from 8MB to 12MB.

The other new feature with Penryn is the SSE4 instruction set. If you're running software that supports SSE3 or earlier then you shouldn't expect Penryn to show an advantage over Kentsfield. On the other hand, software such as the latest version of the DivX encoder that does support SSE4 should show Penryn in its best colours.

Intel told us about the architecture and fabrication process of Penryn early in 2007 and it has drip-fed us with information as part of its tick-tock process. In 2007 (a tick year) we'll see Penryn replacing Kentsfield with the new fabrication process on the same 1,333MHz FSB at similar speeds to Kentsfield. In 2008 - officially designated a tock year - Penryn will move to a 1,600MHz FSB and speeds will ramp up towards 4GHz.

We now have a sample of the 3.00GHz QX9650 quad-core Penryn which is directly comparable with the QX6850, so we can report on the performance of Penryn but we don't know anything about the pricing of the new processor.

Well, strictly speaking that's not true, as the QX9650 will be priced at $999 in quantities of 1,000 but that's always the case with the fastest CPU in any of Intel's ranges of desktop processors. Intel will tell us about pricing of the rest of the range in a week or two as the launch of QX9650 is presumably intended to spoil AMD's imminent launch of Phenom, but we can make some informed guesses.

The quad-core Q9550 will run at 2.83GHz with a price about half the QX9650, say £349. There will probably be a 2.66GHz Q9450 priced around the £199 mark and maybe a Q9300 that runs at 2.5GHz which will be somewhat cheaper.

Dual core models will be more relevant to the man in the street so the 3.16GHz E8500 may well be the gaming processor of choice for less than £200. We expect the 3.0GHz E8400 to cost close to £100 and then there will be cheaper, slower models such as a 2.83GHz E8300 and a 2.66GHz E8200.

But that's all guesswork.

We compared the QX9650 with a QX6850 which both run at 3.00GHz on a 1,333MHz FSB using an Asus Maximus Formula SE motherboard with X38 chipset and 2GB of fast DDR2 memory on Windows XP SP2.

In PCMark05 there was near-identical performance from both processors so we don't expect that Penryn is going to cause a revolution, however it showed a small advantage in video recoding with Nero 8 and a decent seven percent saving in time when we used the SSE4-enabled DivX 6.7.