Core i7 950 to be replaced by 960

[Heinz68]

Looks like the Intel's mainstream Lynfield is going to be very competitive with the Core i7.

Written by Fuad Abazovic (http://www.fudzilla.com/content/view/14188/1/)
Friday, 12 June 2009 09:15
Core i7 950 to be replaced by 960. In Q4 2009
Intel has once again changed its mind about its top of the market line-up. The company has just launched Core i7 975 Extreme edition and Core i7 950 top performance SKU and it already has plans to replace it in Q4.

According to Intel's current plans, Core i7 960 comes in Q4 2009 and it should replace Core i7 950 and coexist with Lynnfield clocked at 2.93GHz, a CPU that still misses its brand.

Core i7 960 will run at 3.2GHz, but with 4.8 GT/s bus speed, has 8MB of L3 cache and its maximum turbo overclocking speed of single core is 3.46GHz. The CPU has the same 130W TDP as well as official support for only DDR3 800 and 1066 but as we said before, this is something to do with all Bloomfield CPUs rather than a single CPU glitch.

Core i7 960 is basically a crippled version of Core i7 965 as the 960 has the bus speed limited to 4.8GT/s compared to 6.4GT/s with Core i7 965 and the new 960 won't be multiplier unlocked. We suspect that the performance difference between Core i7 950 clocked at 3.06GHz and Lynnfield quad clocked at 2.93GHz was not big enough, and therefore Intel has to quickly replace Core i7 950.

[CaptNKILL]

They can mess with chips all they want, as long as there is a good $200-$250 i7 and an X58 with SATA 3.0 by the time I'm ready to upgrade. :p

[Heinz68]

Yes that's DEFINITELY is the best deal, but for some the lower priced
Lynfield might be the best choice.

[hell_of_doom227]

Yes that's DEFINITELY is the best deal, but for some the lower priced
Lynfield might be the best choice.

i5 wont be 6 Core ever, new i7 6 core will be 100% compatible with the current x58 boards. Most of them are already and some need Bios update. i7 is the best investment.

[Heinz68]

I don't think people looking for mainstream Lynfield are going to be soon upgrading in premium 6-core Nehalem i also believe the P55 board are going to be cheaper. Also by the time they might be getting in the 6-core (if ever) there are going to be different i7 boards or at least revisions.

I might be upgrading into the 6-Core Nehalem depending on the performance gain if any. At present the slowest thing on my PC is the hard drive so my PRIORITY upgrade are SSD drives at the same time I'm going to be looking for the Sata 3 X58 board revision. So there goes what you call the best investment.

[Buio]

Sounds like a record short lifespan for the 950 then.

[hell_of_doom227]

I don't think people looking for mainstream Lynfield are going to be soon upgrading in premium 6-core Nehalem i also believe the P55 board are going to be cheaper. Also by the time they might be getting in the 6-core (if ever) there are going to be different i7 boards or at least revisions.

I might be upgrading into the 6-Core Nehalem depending on the performance gain if any. At present the slowest thing on my PC is the hard drive so my PRIORITY upgrade are SSD drives at the same time I'm going to be looking for the Sata 3 X58 board revision. So there goes what you call the best investment.

More cores would be for sure welcomed here especially because Windows 7 is highly optimizied for multi core setup. :)

[Maverick123w]

i5 wont be 6 Core ever, new i7 6 core will be 100% compatible with the current x58 boards. Most of them are already and some need Bios update. i7 is the best investment.

If the performance of the 2 platforms is within %10-15 I'm down with Lynfield as it will be cheaper.

I really think i5 is going to be substantially faster than people think it will be.

Lots of games don't even make use of quads yet so I'm not terribly worried about 6 core chips.

[CaptNKILL]

If the performance of the 2 platforms is within %10-15 I'm down with Lynfield as it will be cheaper.

I really think i5 is going to be substantially faster than people think it will be.

Lots of games don't even make use of quads yet so I'm not terribly worried about 6 core chips.

I still think the X58 chipset is the main reason to go i7. The CPUs are great but they're relatively power hungry and only really dominate in situations that make use of hyperthreading on all four cores. Having a solid Intel chipset with SLI support, a ton of PCI-E lanes and triple channel memory is pretty enticing.

With the i5 and the P55 you'll be limited to basically the same features as current P45 boards with DDR3 support.

I'm sure it'll be a fantastic platform, but the X58 just seems a lot more interesting.