Preview of Intel's Dual-Core Extreme Edition

ThinSkin writes "Intel let ExtremeTech.com sneak behind the curtain of its anticipated Dual-Core Pentium Extreme Edition processor for a full performance preview with benchmarks. Bundled with essentially two Prescott cores on one die, the Extreme Edition 840 processor clocks at 3.2GHz and contains a beefed-up power management system to keep the CPUs running cool during use. Expect Intel's dual-core line to hit the streets sometime this quarter. No word on pricing yet." Update: 04/04 17:26 GMT by T : Timmus points out FiringSquad's preview, too, writing "The benchmark results are mixed, with a few applications taking advantage of the new CPU, and some that don't." And Kez writes in reference to this article to say: "Our article on HEXUS.net, covering the P4 EE in detail, states the price as £650 (that's what we're looking at in the UK anyway, not sure about the U.S.)."

Comments

I don't feel bad at all

[Anonymous Coward]

I feel bad for the engineers who come up with these designs which are then crapped on by their marketting department.

You do realize that starting pay for expereinced R&D designers is about $120,000 a year. I don't feel bad at all. They could call them "ILoveGayCocK" chips and I still woudln't feel bad for the guys who get to make huge amounts of money doign what they love.

Re:I don't feel bad at all

[DickBreath]

You do realize that starting pay for expereinced R&D designers is about $120,000 a year. I don't feel bad at all. They could call them "ILoveGayCocK" chips and I still woudln't feel bad for the guys who get to make huge amounts of money doign what they love.

Two points:

1. I still feel bad for the guys making these. If a project has a sucky, even embarrasing name, do you want to tell your friends: "Hey, I worked on the SuperSuckyJunk project!" Sometimes, marketing can embarass you way more than you can embarass yourself.
   
2. You could have said "ILoveCocK" instead and leave Gay out of it. From experience I can assure you that
   • they all work the same and are operated in the same way, regardless of the orientation of the attached person on the other end
   • the basis of this opinion formed from more than a reasonable sampling of the non-gay kind

Re:How about

[tehcrazybob]

Look, I'm very sorry I hurt all your little feelings. I am fully aware of the difference between the two technologies, and I apologize for my mistake in my first post and my sarcasm in the second.

Here's my first post, rewritten properly:
True dual-processor systems have two separate processors, in two separate sockets, cooled independently of each other. Dual systems are nice for number-crunching and multitasking because tasks can be assigned to whichever core is currently doing less work.

Intel's new dual-core places two cores on one chip. It's convenient because it offers some of the advantages of true dual systems, but I am sure they also had to make concessions because of heat and more limited connections (since both cores are connected through the same socket). I also doubt there will be much of a price advantage over a typical dual system, because any technology this new and unique will be extremely expensive.

I would also like to say that I don't know anything about AMD's offering of dual-core, so I can't comment on why their way is better. I'm sure it is, because AMD's way is always better, but I don't actually have proof of that.