Intel Core 2 Extreme 2.6 GHz X7800 Announced

[diamond.g]

Actually the GHz war is still going. You're going to hit a wall trying to code so many parallel operations at once in order to improve speed. Then you still have to fall back on raw clock speed alone. Penryn isn't that great of a change when compared to Core 2, you do get higher and cooler clock speeds moving to 45nm.

$637 for the T7600, $529 for the T7700, and then $851 for the X7800. I can picture Apple offering it as a custom option but not as stock.

The 44w TDP isn't that scary compared to the old PowerPC 970FX at full load.

Do you think Apple will offer factory overclocked systems?

 

[Object-X]

Pretty please

<shakes Magic 8 ball and reads:> "Signs point to yes".

Does the Magic 8 ball say I'm getting Blu-Ray with that too? And how about a 512MB NVIDIA® GeForce™ 7950 GTX?

Please please please say yes!

 

[Dustman]

Okay, I gotta say something because it hurts reading it every 2 minutes in every imac related thread. People seem to forget that the last rev. iMac G5 chugged along just fine with an insanely hot (hotter than an old dusty pentium 4) processor, so, really there is no reason at all for apple to be using laptop chips in the iMac, other than it's one less thing to order for them. And desktop /laptop chips are the same speed, just cost different.

I personally would think that if apple did make a mid range tower, that it could possibly include an overclockable chip. one can dream....

 

[Cheffy Dave]

My thought was maybe that these will go into the MBPs and then the current SR processors will enter the MacBook. Thoughts on that?

Now that's interesting speculation!!!!!!

 

[Clive At Five]

Do you think Apple will offer factory overclocked systems?

Like the water-cooled PowerMacs of yore? (oh, you doubt, but just stop and think about it...)

Seeing as how Apple is no longer battilling with a broken 3GHz promise and really lack-luster hardware upgrades anymore... I'm leaning towards no.

The Intel switch really eliminated their liability by putting them on par with the rest of the PC industry. They have no need to show off what they don't have anymore.

-Clive

 

[Cheffy Dave]

What does the "Extreme" mean? Is it just some arbitrary marketing that means "fast and cool so you want to buy it!"? Or does it actually reflect some type of change on the chip...

super fast, like in AMD's FX chips, only faster

 

[Eidorian]

Do you think Apple will offer factory overclocked systems?

I never said they would overclock. The X7800 just offers them a BTO for an even faster machine.

But hey...​

 

[Cheffy Dave]

The extreme chips allow for manual over-clocking of the cpu core. They also usually run hotter and are less stable as a result of forcing the chip to the "extreme" of what it is capable of. I have played with a few of the extreme processors over the years, and they are faster, but in my experience far less stable. I would prefer that apple stay with more stable and reliable chips that operate well within there performance range.

, believe me, just as in the AMD FX chips, stability isn't an issue with these chips. As a PC guy, looking to buy my first MAC, They will run hot, but they'll be stable, at least with mild to moderate OC'ing. Apple won't OC, so no prob

 

[Cheezex]

Ugh, I hope Apple puts some seriously good hardware in iMacs. I'm tired of my PC friends bragging about their cheap and easily overclocked 3.8GHz Core 2 Duo boxes.

 

[Clive At Five]

Okay, I gotta say something because it hurts reading it every 2 minutes in every imac related thread. People seem to forget that the last rev. iMac G5 chugged along just fine with an insanely hot (hotter than an old dusty pentium 4) processor, so, really there is no reason at all for apple to be using laptop chips in the iMac, other than it's one less thing to order for them.

Agreed on the hot-running G5 part. As I've said many times, part of what made the iMac so amazing wasn't just its creative design, but also this it had power. It was always just one step behind the PowerMac... Now it's three.

And desktop /laptop chips are the same speed, just cost different.

Untrue. Merom and Conroe may have the same clock speeds, but Conroe has better performance.

I personally would think that if apple did make a mid range tower, that it could possibly include an overclockable chip. one can dream....

Join the leagues of us who have been saying this for months...

The sad part, though, is that if they stuff a Conroe chip in the iMac, they'll use the excuse that the top model iMac is close enough to the Mac Pro so that there won't be the huge performance gap that there is today.

Besides, face it: a mid-range tower cuts into sales of Mac Pros ($$$) and iMacs (bundled displays ($$$)). Either way, it eats profits. Not many people would buy a mid-tower and an Apple Display, I feel.

-Clive

 

[Cheffy Dave]

I'm pretty sure Merom is not pin-to-pin compatible with Conroe. A new iMac would thus require a new Mo-board to use Conroe... as it would anyway to support all the steaming new FSB speed improvements. Is it wrong of me to be excited about the FSB? I think everyone could use a little more FSB speed...

-Clive

You'd be correct Sir!

 

[Eidorian]

Untrue. Merom and Conroe may have the same clock speeds, but Conroe has better performance.

Actually, at the same clock speed performance is about the same between mobile, desktop, and server. The difference are that you'll get a fewer amount of chips per batch to be used a mobile chips. (Hence the higher costs.) The same process is used to create both chips. Some just can cut it at 35w TDP. Don't forget the lower FSB keeps things cooler too.

 

[commander.data]

The Extreme is on a different PIN architecture, doesn't require buffered memory, and is easily overclockable. I think that's mainly it.

Essentially, it's the power-consumer variant.

Xeons in general also undergo extra validation, since they are targetted at workstations and servers, which means they should be more stable and are less likely to fail. The Xeon DPs that Apple uses are of course also validated for dual processor use.

 

[Multimedia]

X7800 In 17" MBP + 3GHz Quad Core In Next iMac

the first mobile "Extreme" branded processor, the X7800, clocked at 2.6 GHz

I'm thinking perhaps this will go only into the next 17" MBP as a build to order option since the 17" has enough room inside to keep it cool enough to avoid melting the case.

Intel also announced a new desktop processor today (Core 2 Extreme QX6850 quad-core), however the announcement does not look to have much bearing on the Apple community, as Apple has continually eschewed Intel's Desktop products in favor of Intel's less power hungry mobile products or more powerful workstation/server Xeons.

For interest, the newly announced Intel Core 2 Extreme QX6850 quad-core processor clocks in at 3.0GHz with a new, faster 1333 MHz system bus.

This seems like a candidate for the next redesigned for better cooling top of the line iMacs in August. Meanwhile the Mac Pros can go all 8 core since Clovertown prices will be slashed radically at the end of July. This would make the whole line very powerful and ready to take on whatever additional power Leopard would like to have in October.

 

[diamond.g]

I'm thinking perhaps this will go only into the next 17" MBP as a build to order option since the 17" has enough room inside to keep it cool enough to avoid melting the case.This seems like a candidate for the next redesigned for better cooling top of the line iMacs in August. Meanwhile the Mac Pros can go all 8 core since Clovertown prices will be slashed radically at the end of July. This would make the whole line very powerful and ready to take on whatever additional power Leopard would like to have in October.

From my understanding pretty much all of Intel's Core processors can hit 3+ghz on Air with little to no voltage bumping. I would imagine if that is true that we could see Apple actually offer faster "factory overclocked" options. I just don't see Apple giving us the ability to set the clockspeed ourselves. Besides where would we do that at (noting that there is no hit del for bios type option during bootup)?

 

[Bye Bye Baby]

The Good Old Days

Doesn't anyone just long for the good old days when the only thing that you had to know about processors was that the next revision that was going to show up in a mac after about three years was going to 1.33 ghz instead of 1.2?
I have been reading all the threads and I didn't follow one bloody word of what was said!
So in synthesis- all this hype and there isn't the slightest chance that these new processors will end up in a Mac! I think that's about right!

So, when does Penryn get off its backside and make an appearance?

 

[twoodcc]

sounds good. hopefully we'll see this in an apple computer soon

 

[k2k koos]

SURE CAN!!!!

As long as you don't mind the fact that making a phone call will be the same as putting a hot iron against your face!

ah, you are forgetting about bluetooth hands free devices, it's more like burning a hole in your pocket, then again, the creditcard that I'll use to buy one of those things is doing the same at the moment

 

[k2k koos]

please let this be the piece that apple was waiting for to make the new imacs. Ten months is really quite enough of the current models.

Let's not forget that the case used on the current model, has been around much longer than that, I know it got a little sleeker, but basically it is still very much based on the original G5 iMac. Something new, would be appreciated. Having said that, the same goes for the Mac Pro, and Macbook Pro casings, having been around in nearly unaltered forms since the G5 introduction, and the Alu case respectively on the G4 PB models. come on Johny Ive and co!

 

[BenRoethig]

Neither of these chips will make it in a machine running OSX unless Apple either expands their lineup or licenses the operating system. They have entry in either the high end desktop or desktop replacement segments.

 

[offwidafairies]

This is really exciting. I've been holding off buying a MBP til Leopard comes out. I'd love another update before then

 

[reflex]

The problem is that at the top end, getting a bit more clock speed gets very expensive. Getting an "extreme" dual core processor seems a bit stupid, because a low-end quad core processor would be cheaper and much faster.

Depends on what you're doing.

Most of the time 3 of the 4 cores in my computer's cpu do more or less nothing. But that one core will benefit from as much clock speed as it can get.

 

[mathwhiz90601]

Actually the GHz war is still going. You're going to hit a wall trying to code so many parallel operations at once in order to improve speed. Then you still have to fall back on raw clock speed alone. Penryn isn't that great of a change when compared to Core 2, you do get higher and cooler clock speeds moving to 45nm.

Yeah, but even if your code isn't optimized for multi-core, it doesn't have to share its one core with, say, system background processes running on the other core. Still an improvement.

 

[mathwhiz90601]

Ugh, I hope Apple puts some seriously good hardware in iMacs. I'm tired of my PC friends bragging about their cheap and easily overclocked 3.8GHz Core 2 Duo boxes.

Are they liquid-helium cooled?

 

[Eidorian]

Yeah, but even if your code isn't optimized for multi-core, it doesn't have to share its one core with, say, system background processes running on the other core. Still an improvement.

Then you're still going to want raw clock speed for that single threaded application.