Core i7 975 review - Introduction

In a world where fast is never fast enough there's a rare breed of people that are always chasing down and hunting the even better products out there. We call them gurus. Today their curiosity will be satisfied as Intel decided to make their fastest processors even faster, and sure... we like that.

Yes it is the much rumored Core i7 975 Extreme Edition processor that is launching today. A new stepping and build revision (D0) for the Core i7 series processor combined with a petit frequency increase and some minor subtle changes that make the fast even faster.

So while we all expected Intel to launch their Core i5 processors, which I feel is a much needed product release, we see the best and most expensive processor getting a little better. Kind of weird when you think about it, especially in a time where people have way less money to spend. Since we touch on the topic of Core i5, let us inform you that the Core i5 processor series is now delayed to early September 2009, according to sources at motherboard makers, not Intel. When that time arrives, Intel plans to launch three Core i5 CPUs with frequencies of 2.93 GHz, 2.8 GHz and 2.66 GHz and priced at US$562, US$284 and US$196 in thousand-unit tray quantities. All of them will feature a TDP of 95W.

But heck, let's get back to Core i7 shall we? The processor tested today will run at a steady 3.33 GHz, roughly 133 MHz faster than its 965 Extreme predecessor. It is running steady at 6,4GT/s QPI as well. This also will be an Extreme Edition processor, meaning it will have unlocked multipliers, and that means we can overclock the living daylights out of it.

Today at launch day the processor popped up in several webshops already at a selling price of 999 USD and in the EU roughly 950~999 EUR is what we are seeing right now. That is the same price as the Core i7 965, and as such we expect to see the Core i7 965 XE slowly being phased out.

What we'll do today is to have a deeper look inside the Core i7 processor, the technology, the architecture, a nice little photo-shoot and obviously a decent benchmark session to see where this product establishes itself performance wise. All in all we've got a lot to cover, so hover onward to the next page where I'll show you what specifically is being launched today.

Oh yeah... and this is what we'll be testing with, an eVGA X58 Classified motherboard and OCZ Blade 2133 MHz DDR3 memory. Life here at Guru3D.com does not suck, no Sir :-)