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core2quad posts

Packard Bell imedia lineup gets an Acer-inspired refresh

by Vladislav Savov, posted Jul 3rd 2009 at 4:47AM

Packard Bell recently overhauled its logo in an effort to keep up with the times, but are its offerings up to the same task? The new imedia lineup immediately recalls the recently announced M-series desktops from Acer, and that's no accident. The innards are remarkably similar too, with the top models sporting Core 2 Quad or AMD Phenom II X4 processors, a 1.5GB GeForce GT230, HDMI out, Blu-Ray combo drive and a maximum of 8GB DDR3 memory and 1TB of storage. While none of the specs are on the blistering edge of innovation, there's plenty of power there and keen pricing could make them an attractive proposition. The entry-level Celeron-based units start at £299 ($490) in the UK.

Intel rebrands: Core i3, i5, i7 are in, Centrino on the outs

by Ross Miller, posted Jun 17th 2009 at 8:09PM

Intel's doing some spring cleaning on its branding structure, adding new Cores on the block. Joining the high-level Core i7 series will be the mid range Core i5 in the coming months and the lower-end Core i3's early next year. To be more specific, the Lynnfield chipsets will be either i5 or i7 depending on the feature set, Clarkfield mobile chips will be i7, and the 32nm Arrandale will at least at first fall under i3. Of course, with the new gang in town, some older monikers will be going wayside, and getting the slow fade out are Core 2 Duo, Core 2 Quad, and Centrino, the latter being eventually marginalized for WiMAX and WiFi products only. Making the cut are Celeron, Pentium, and the ever-resilient Atom names. We're a bit sad to know there will never be a Core 2 Dodeca, but hey, it's only a name, right?. Hit up the read link for more details, including a video interview with Intel's VP of Marketing Deborah Conrad.

[Via CNET]

Read - Intel's New Brand Structure Explained
Read - Fewer Brands, Greater Impact

ASUS' potent G51 gaming laptop headed for Computex

by Darren Murph, posted May 27th 2009 at 11:44AM

ASUS already struck a chord with portable gamers when it introduced the imposing W90, and now it's looking to do the same with LAN party goers who need something just a wee bit less gargantuan. Details are light on the forthcoming G51, but we do know that it'll arrive in a few form factors (15.6- and 16-inch models) and will give buyers the choice between a Core 2 Quad and Core 2 Duo processor. There's also room for up to 4GB of DDR2 RAM as well as a 1GB GeForce GTX 260M graphics card; furthermore, you'll find an optional Blu-ray drive, 2 megapixel camera, dual 500GB hard drives and a white glossy shell. Mum's the word on pricing, but we expect to hear more on this July-bound beauty at Computex next month.

[Via PCWorld]

iBUYPOWER's Core i7-powered LAN Warrior makes other SFF rigs weep

by Darren Murph, posted Apr 28th 2009 at 6:28PM

See that, Shuttle? Yeah, that's your worst nightmare. iBUYPOWER has just shocked the small form factor (SFF) world with a new rig that's potent enough to act as your standalone gaming machine. Equipped with a menacing look, a carry handle and room for two full-sized dual slot video cards, the aptly titled LAN Warrior caters to no one outside of the enthusiast niche. For the crowd willing to shell out for the latest and greatest, they'll find a Core i7 CPU (920, 940 and 965 Extreme available, up to five ventilation fans, an optional liquid cooling system, ASUS' Rampage II Gene X58 motherboard, up to 12GB of DDR3 memory, twin GeForce GTX 295 / Radeon 4870 x2 GPUs, four internal 3.5-inch bays, up to 6TB of HDD space, up to two Blu-ray writers, gigabit Ethernet, 802.11n WiFi and a planet-killing 1000-watt power supply. Amazingly, the starting tag on this one is just $999, and it's available now from the outfit's website. Full release is after the break.

Gallery: iBUYPOWER's Core i7-powered LAN Warrior makes other SFF rigs weep

Continue reading iBUYPOWER's Core i7-powered LAN Warrior makes other SFF rigs weep

Intel Core 2 Quad S-Series shaves power consumption to 65W

by Darren Murph, posted Mar 29th 2009 at 10:44AM

In a relatively hush-hush manner, Intel recently slipped out energy saving versions of its Core 2 Quad Q8200, Q9400 and Q9550 CPUs, all of which are suffixed with a simple "s." Put simply, these S-Series chips are built using the same 45 nanometer process technology as used on the regular models, and aside from TDP, all the specifications are exactly alike. The difference comes in power consumption, as the S crew sucks down just 65 watts compared to 95 watts in the standard issue models. Tom's Hardware had a chance to handle, benchmark and report on these new power sippers, and lucky for you, they found performance to be equal to that of the higher power chips. Granted, you'll have to pony up a few extra bucks in order to treat Mother Earth (and your energy bill) better, but at least we're working down the power ladder instead of the other way around.

[Via Tom's Hardware, thanks Jonathan]

Lenovo trots out new trifecta of unexciting desktops

by Darren Murph, posted Jan 16th 2009 at 7:01AM

Forgive us, but we just can't get jazzed about a trio of Lenovo desktops that offer up nothing innovative whatsoever. Sure, the IdeaCentre K220 may pack a Core 2 Quad CPU, upwards of 4GB of DDR3 RAM and an optional Blu-ray drive, but that's nothing we couldn't slap together ourselves in a few minutes. The K230 ups the ante a bit with room for 8GB of memory and Windows Vista 64-bit, while the lower-end H200 (shown above) becomes Lenovo's first desktop with an Atom under the hood. All three machines will be available this month starting at $449, $499 and $399.99 (bundled with the ThinkVision L195 monitor), in order of mention.

[Via InformationWeek]

Toshiba's three-GPU Qosmio X305-Q708 / Q706 laptops now available

by Darren Murph, posted Nov 6th 2008 at 11:42AM

Given that you've surely got rafts of free cash to burn through right now, we know you're eager beyond belief to drop north of four large on a new gaming notebook. To that end, we're utterly thrilled to announce that Toshiba's Qosmio X305-Q708 (starts at $4,199, goes to just under infinity) is available for purchase direct from the company. If that just seems downright insane to you, the three-GPU X305-Q706 is also available now for "just" $1,999.99. The big ticket inclusion here? An NVIDIA GeForce 9400M paired with two GeForce 9800 GTS GPUs. Or, enough to make Crysis weep.

Toshiba gets serious with $4k Qosmio X305-Q708 gaming laptop

by Darren Murph, posted Oct 21st 2008 at 10:32AM

Look out, Alienware / Voodoo -- a formidable opponent just rolled in, and it appears that some prankster stuck a Toshiba logo on whatever machine is hiding underneath. All jesting aside, Tosh is revamping its -- shall we say, vivid -- Qosmio X305 by introducing the Qosmio X305-Q708, which houses a potent Core 2 Extreme QX9300 CPU, 4GB of DDR3 RAM, a 128GB SSD, 320GB 7,200 RPM SATA drive, dual-layer DVD writer, twin NVIDIA 512MB GeForce 9800M GTS graphics cards, 802.11b/g/n WiFi, Bluetooth 2.1+EDR and Windows Vista Ultimate. You'll also find a full-sized keyboard with a ten-key number pad, four Harman Kardon speakers, HDMI / DisplayPort connectors, 1.3-megapixel webcam, Wireless USB / USB Sleep-and-Charge technologies and a 17-inch TruBrite LCD (though resolution remains a mystery). It should be available any moment for around $4,199.99, but we'd factor in a few extra hundies to have Colorware blot out the putrid "fiery Fusion" finish (seen better after the break).

Continue reading Toshiba gets serious with $4k Qosmio X305-Q708 gaming laptop

Intel bolsters its offerings with three new CPUs

by Donald Melanson, posted Sep 4th 2008 at 1:54PM

Intel is keeping a rightly low-key approach with this announcement, but if you're somehow not satisfied with any of its current processor offerings, you may find something more to your liking among the three it slipped out over the Labor Day weekend. Those include the 45nm Core 2 Quad 8200, which clocks in at 2.33GHz with 4MB of L2 cache and a 1333MHz FSB, and gets a somewhat more budget-friendly $230 price tag at the expense of support for things like Intel's Virtualization Technology and Trusted Execution Technology. If that's a bit much, you can also now snag the dual-core, 2.5GHz E5200, which packs 2MB of L2 cache and 800MHz FSB for $84, or the single-core 65nm Celeron 450, which rolls in at a respectable 2.2GHz and includes 512K of L2 and an 800MHz FSB for a mere $53. Hit up the read link below for the complete breakdown.

Team overclocks Core 2 Quad to 5.1GHz, claims world record -- too bad it's not

by Nilay Patel, posted Jul 31st 2008 at 5:02PM

So we hate to break it to the good guys at Tom's Hardware, but while we're impressed that they managed to overclock a 2.4GHz Intel Core 2 Quad 6600 to 5.1GHz using a cryogenic cooling system, it's not nearly close to the world record they're claiming -- we've seen P4's at up to 8.18GHz, and just a couple months ago someone jacked a Core 2 Extreme QX9775 on a Skulltrail board to 6GHz. Still, it's always fun to watch people pour liquid nitrogen over a mobo -- video after the break.

[Via PC World]

Continue reading Team overclocks Core 2 Quad to 5.1GHz, claims world record -- too bad it's not

Dell makes Core 2 Quad Q9300, Q9450 available in XPS 420

by Darren Murph, posted May 9th 2008 at 1:12PM

So, we hear you're edging ever closer to pulling the trigger on a shiny new XPS 420, huh? Lucky you, as it looks like Dell just opened up your options. While the only processor choices on the XPS 630 are the E8500 and the absurdly expensive QX6850 (it's an $850 addition), the XPS 420 now has a half dozen CPUs to pick from. Most notably, users can now get their rig equipped with a Core 2 Quad Q9300 / Q9450, both of which provide much more oomph than the baseline chips while not forcing you to refinance your home and pick the QX9650. So, when can the aforesaid 630 expect similar selections?

[Thanks, Evan]

AMD's Phenom X4 9850 gets pitted against Intel's Core 2 Quad Q9300

by Donald Melanson, posted Apr 9th 2008 at 6:56PM

We'd already seen a few early tests of AMD's new top-end Phenom X4 9850 processor, but the folks at Extreme Tech have now taken it upon themselves to see just how well the processor stacks up against Intel's similarly high-end offering, the Core 2 Quad Q9300. As was suggested by those other reviews, however, the AMD falls behind the (admittedly pricier) Intel processor in just about every respect, including its ability to be overclocked. On the upside, however, that lower cost will likely offset the performance issues for many users, and it does still boast "moderate overclockability" and run cooler than the Intel chip. ExtremeTech apparently isn't convinced that AMD's pricing is "sustainable over the long haul" though. For its part, the Q9300 makes the most of its four cores and 45nm manufacturing process, with the only significant downside being that it packs only have the cache of the rest of Intel's quad core line. That wasn't enough to stop it from snagging an impressive 9 out of 10 rating, however, with ExtremeTech declaring it "one of the best price/performance CPUs you can find."

[Thanks, Mike]

XtremeNotebooks launches quad-core Xtreme 917V laptop

by Darren Murph, posted Aug 15th 2007 at 10:02PM

Although being in the presence of a quad-core laptop doesn't have the same allure it did just months ago, packin' a Core 2 Quad processor into a 2.35-inch thick enclosure still manages to get us all hot and bothered (literally, we mean). The latest mobile gaming rig to come equipped with such a workhorse is XtremeNotebooks' Xtreme 917V (yeah, a rebadge of Sager's NP9260), which also features a 17-inch display, dual NVIDIA GeForce Go 7950 GTX GPUs, a dual-layer DVD writer, multicard reader, integrated webcam / speakers, up to 4GB of DDR2 RAM, room for three 250GB hard drives, a dedicated GPU cooling solution, optional TV tuner, gigabit Ethernet, WiFi, and a whole host of ports to boot. Granted, this sucka can only chug along for 60 minutes or so on its 12-cell battery, tips the scales at close to 12 oh-so-solid pounds, and starts at $2,399, but we know there's still a few of you out there willing to give it some love.

Intel announces simplified product-naming scheme

by Donald Melanson, posted Aug 9th 2007 at 10:55AM

It looks like Intel has come to the realization that its product naming scheme has gotten a little out of hand and, as Ars Technica reports, it's now taking some measures to simplify things a bit. Apparently, Core 2 Quad, Core 2 Duo, and Core 2 Solo will all simply be known as "Core 2" starting on January 1st, 2008 (presumably with some other means to differentiate then), and Intel Viiv Processor Technology and Intel vPro Processor Technology will henceforth be known as Intel Core 2 Duo Processor with Viiv (or vPro). Further on down the line, Pentium D and Pentium Dual-Core will both be shortened to just "Pentium," while the server-centric Itanium 2 gets demoted to plain old "Itanium." According to Ars, Core 2 Extreme, Celeron, and Xeon will all stay as they are. Simple, right?

Intel cuts prices on quad-core chips

by Joshua Topolsky, posted Jul 23rd 2007 at 12:02PM

Intel is giving a lot of cheap speed-freaks cause for celebration today, as the company has just announced some deep price cuts to its line of quad-core CPUs (and a few other price snips here and there). The chipmaker has knocked down the price of the 2.93GHz Core 2 Quad QZ6800 with a 1066MHz FSB to $999, the 2.66 GHz Q6700 to $530, and the 2.4GHz Q6600 to $300 (shaving off almost half of its price). With these new drops, the Q6600 has become the cheapest quad-core chip on the market, thus making chumps of the people who bought it a month ago, but those who've been waiting for the cuts will be glad they did. Additionally, Intel has reduced the cost of some of its Core 2 Duo processors, taking around $20 off of the cost of the 2.2GHz E4500 and the 2GHz E4400. Be sure to check out InformationWeek's complex breakdown of the cuts, and where to find the best deals.

[Via The Inquirer, thanks Tech L]