Intel quietly rolls out Core i7 960 processor

Intel has quietly made a new addition to their "Bloomfield" series of processors, the Core i7 960. Coming in at the same 3.20GHz frequency as the original Core i7 965 Extreme Edition, which was replaced by the now flagship 975 Extreme Edition, the new chip will effectively take the 950’s position in the Core i7 lineup.

Besides having a faster clock, the Core i7 960 features the same $562 list price and basic specifications as its 950 predecessor, including four cores, eight threads, 8MB of L3 cache, 4.8GT/s QuickPath Interconnect speed, 130W thermal envelope, and LGA1366 package. It's also priced in the same range as the Lynnfield-based Core i7 870, which fits into cheaper LGA1156 motherboards, drops the faster QPI link in favor of DMI, and uses two memory channels instead of three.

The new chip has actually been available for some time in Australia (home of our own technical editor Steven Walton) so we've had some hands-on experience with it already. Although not in a dedicated review, you can find some benchmark numbers in our Intel Core i5 750 review and see how it fared against the competition.


Source: http://www.techspot.com