Imagine getting this Intel Core i7 975 Extreme in a Laptop!!!  This thing has to be the Worlds Most Powerful!!

http://www.lpc-digital.com/store/3302695/product/cl-221-3

Like wow Joe that laptop does not even come with a OS with the base price of $2275.88 The guys at work got to get one of these things.

Thanks for the link gona give that a really good look.

Themadmanazn Toms review is going places - but still not everything I'm trying to find yet. Seems what I'm really looking for is being sat on for now.

Thanks for the link!

Bugger the i7, I might skip that and go straight to this, a 6 core AMD Opteron w/ hyperthreading and 34% more performance than its previous quad core CPU's.

Hehe, when will it ever end?

WOW 6 core AMD. I love AMD!

You realize if it is 34% better than the Phenon II, it is still slower than the i7...

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/phenom-x4-955,2278.html

Look at the real world video and audio encoding numbers. Game numbers don't mean much with processors because they are almost mainly dependant on GPU.

Plus by the time that comes out, Intel will also release the Westmere which will be on 32nm tech and faster than Nehalem.

Intel is planning more cores as well. Their experimentation with a TON of cores (like 16) is on the graphics processor Larabee. I think at release it will have 8-16 x86 capable cores.

I will be honest, AMD needs a miracle to catch up with Intel.

Thats been the case with Intel processors since Core 2 IMO.

Not to be an jerk, but the Phenom II just slighty beats out a Q6600... thats like a 2 year old processor on 65mn tech... AMD sure knows their stuff...

Let me clarify why I am such an Intel fan

I study processor design and Intel really pushes the bountry on new processes and technology. They have designs that work really well and they know their stuff. AMD has been going downward ever since Athlon 64.

Example: Are car fanatics excited about new Honda Civic? No. It is a great car, great price, great resale value, but nothing really wow. How about new Nissan GT-R? Thats a different story. It is a super car, pushes the boundries of speed.

So I am not just hating on people who use AMD, they are fine, they work and are priced decently. But at the end of the day, they are nothing amazing from my point of view.

@themadmanazn Umm, the Phenom II 940 beats the q9400 at most tasks, while the 955 beats the q9550. Yes, they can't compete with core i7, but very, very few people need the power offered by it.

Um, which i7?  and which Phenom II?   As I read it, the 6 core opteron is 34% faster than the Phenom II 940... the 955 had not yet been released at time of writing. So, if benchmarked against the 955, the 6 core Opteron may indeed be closer to the i7 920 than we realise.

I'm no expert and I don't read up on every CPU's development or release, but I do know this, while not as fast as equivelent Intels, AMD CPU's are value for money and are reliable and sturdy... and for the average joe with not a lot of money, they certainly fill a place in the market that's needed.  Without competition, God knows how much higher Intel prices would be right now.... thank God for AMD.

Um, the article stated that the 6 core Opteron IS being shipped to OEM's now... it's only the 12 and 16 cores that are slated for 2011 - 2012... and being first of its kind, who knows where AMD will end up taking the 6 core.  So in fact, AMD have siezed the initiative this time, and Intel may yet find itself having to run for its money.

Maybe????  But then AMD's CPU side of things has struggled some since it acquired ATI... which by the way, is currently leading the way in GPU techology/development, so maybe that miracle isn't so far around the corner after all.

Forever the optimist, me.

Starkers > Most of what you said is true. I posted the benchmarks for the 34%, feel free to go look at em. I am not sure what you refer to when you say AMD is more budget than Intel, they have plenty decent processors for cheap. As a previous poster mentioned, there is no way in a sane person can you call any quad core budget. Dual cores are the standard these days and the Intel E1400 is a great example. It is 2GHz wich is decent, but can easily be overclocked to 2.4 or 2.8 on a aftermarket air cooler. It only costs $49 wow, thats budget there. 

Here is my major issue with your reply Starkers

Ever since AMD aquiced ATI, it has been down hill for them. They use to compete with nvidia, now they have been reduced to budget cards just like AMD's are budget CPU's. Nvidia has held the fastest GPU for pretty consistantly ever since AMD aqcuired ATI. Also Nvidia is pinoneering the way with CUDA projects. Video encoding, graphic design, scientific research, all accelerated by CUDA. One example is here: http://www.dvhardware.net/article27538.html But again, thats one example out of MANY.

Also Nvidia has acquied physx allowing gpu's to be used as physics processors, not some stupid specialized physics processor.

Recently nvidia released their GeForce 3D vision kit. It works phenominally and they were out before ATI.

Last year Nvidia held the largest graphics conference NVISION. THey had tons of professional seminars as well as vendors and sites for the everyday folks. They even went out of their way to cordinate with Videogames Live (the most awsome videogame concert series).

The glory days of the Radeon 9700Pro are over, not to sound like a borken record but AMD no where close to Nvidia. 

Lastly check out this article and you will see, the Phenom II performs slightly better than the Q6600, again a 2 year old chip.

http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/phenom-ii-940,2114.html

Starkers > You love AMD and thats fine. I hold no grudge against AMD. I favor the side who is push technology and currently it is not AMD.

My point precisely!  And I wouldn't exactly call AMD processors 'budget' CPU's, either.  Budget can often imply cheap and nasty, and AMD put out quality CPU's that are sturdy and realiable at a more affordable price.

It's a fact that Intel has been the market leader for quite some time, and that, I think (others too), is what they use as leverage in their pricing policy to charge more for their products.  However, what is NOT reflected in Intel's pricing is the fact many of their products come from China, where they can exploit cheap labour to reduce production costs.  Funny thing, that, Intel customers are not see that being reflected in retail prices on 'new' CPU's being manufactured in Asia for considerably less than earlier (US built) models. 

A New Intel CPU seems to come out at the maximum price they think the market can bear, seeming to drop in price only when another model or three have replaced it.  In other words, the item comes down in price when (in computing terms) the market believes it is obsolete.  OK, this may be true of other companies, but market leaders tend to become so adept at it they forget the consumer and value for money... and Intel seems to be one of those companies.

While this may be true in the US, it's not necessarily so here in Oz!  For a start, ATI cards do not seem to be as popular here as Nvidia for some reason (supplier/retailer preference, I don't know) and can be harder to get... hence the prices can be much on a par with Nvidia cards.  When I was doing my upgrade recently, I did look into an ATI card and found that anything in the 47xx - 48xx series was above my budget... in the AUD $300 - $400's 

There were a few 46xx series cards within my price range, but I settled with a Galaxy 9800GT @ 1gb for $210 because it was still $30 - $40 cheaper and on a par with or better than the 512mb ATI cards available at the time... 2 of, to be precise.  So I guess it also depends on where you are at the time, supply and demand as to what you end up paying, though AMD CPU's seem to be quite popular here, and better priced than Intel equivelants, given we Aussies pay more than our US counterparts for anything PC related.

Yup, $309.95 at the time, best local price. Like I said, though, it comes down to popularity, supply and demand.  If an item for whatever reason isn't too popular/selling too well, suppliers tend not to buy in quantity to get bulk discounts, and thus we pay more as the register... ATI graphics cards, here,  seem to fall into that category recently.

In fact, my regular PC store doesn't stock ATI cards any more... Pat will get them in if specifically ordered, but they don't sell well enough for him to keep them, so-say, gathering dust.  The store I eventually got my upgrade parts from had only 2 ATI cards in stock, a 4670 for $269.95 and a 4770 for $309.95, yet there were several Nvidia cards from the GTX295 dating back to the 6800GS.

WOW, what a difference a month/6 weeks makes... that and/or I'm living in the wrong area.  I just checked on PriceSpy and prices have fallen dramatically... best price on a 4670 @ S109.00 and a 4770 @ $147.67 best price.  Shoot, even the Galaxy 9800 @ 1gb I ended up getting @ $210 is like $55.00 cheaper. Isn't it always the way.. buy something and a while later you see it cheaper elswhere. 

Thing is, a lot of the listed outlets with those ATI cards are interstate or non-local to me, so even if their prices were a 'little' cheaper than local ones at the time I was in the market for a new card, I don't know that I would have save much by the time $30-$50 was added for S&H. Still, I'm gobsmacked at the 'then' and 'now' price difference, though I'm thinking locality also plays a part in it, given I see so few ATI cards around here... then I suppose there's the profiteering greed factor of some traders to consider also.