swingerofbirch said:
I agree with you wholeheartedly.
But, I guess they COULD have put a pentium d in them...didnt they have dual cores?
yes, but they were significantly hotter, consumed much more power, and worst of all were
incredibly inefficient per clock versus C2D. If memory serves, when the Conroe/Allendale (the codename for C2D desktop chips under 2.4GHz with 2MB L2) benchmarks first came out after the NDA lifted, the
best Pentium Extreme Edition (
3.73GHz Pentium D Presler core, dual core, 2x2MB L2, 1066 FSB, 130W TDP) was in many of the tests at least
equaled by the Core 2 Duo E6300, a chip with the following specs:
Speed: 1.86 GHz Dual core
2MB L2 Cache
1066 MT/S FSB
TDP 65W
So a much slower, far cheaper C2D chip matches the best Pentium D Extreme Edition, though both are dual-core, have the same FSB speed, the Pentium D has a bigger L2 Cache, and each core is clocking at twice the speed of the Core 2 chip.
The C2D chips with the sole exception of the Core 2 Extreme X6800 version have a TDP of 65W- HALF that of the Pentium D series. Even the X6800 only has an 80W TDP.
To give you an idea of pricing, the *retail* version of the Core 2 Duo 1.86GHz chip at Newegg is listed at $193.
The retail version of the Pentium Extreme Edition dual core 3.73GHz chip at Newegg is listed at $1,015.
The rest of the Pentium D line has been dropped in price significantly since Core 2 Duo came out, its almost a fire sale. then again, they are much hotter, less efficient processors by far.
