Intel Core 2 Extreme X6800

Intel announced its line of Core 2 Duo desktop CPUs today. If you're buying a new computer or you're building one of your own, you would be wise to see that it has one of Intel's new dual-core chips in it. The Core 2 Duo chips include not only the fastest desktop chips on the market, but also the most cost-effective and among the most power-efficient. About the only people these new chips aren't good news for are the folks at AMD, who can claim the desktop CPU crown no longer.

We've given the full review treatment to two the five Core 2 Duo chips. You can read about the price-performance champ, the $530 Core 2 Duo E6700 here and the entire Core 2 Duo series here. In this review we'll examine Intel's flagship, the $999 2.93GHz Core 2 Extreme X6800, which is now the fastest desktop CPU you can buy.

As we outlined in a blog post a month ago, the Core 2 Duo represents a new era for Intel. It's the first desktop chip family that doesn't use the NetBurst architecture, which has been the template for every design since the Pentium 4. Instead, the Core 2 Duo uses what's called the Core architecture (not to be confused with Intel's Core Duo and Core Solo laptop chips, released this past January). The advances in the Core architecture explain why even though the Core 2 Duo chips have lower clock speeds, they're faster than the older dual-core Pentium D 900 series chips. The Core 2 Extreme X6800 chip, the Core 2 Duo E6700, and the $316 Core 2 E6600 represent the top tier of Intel's new line, and in addition to the broader Core architecture similarities, they all have 4MB of unified L2 cache. The lower end of the Core 2 Duo line, comprised of the $224 E6400 and the $183 E6300, has a 2MB unified L2 cache.

We won't belabor each point here since the blog post already spells it out, but the key is that it's not simply one feature that gives the Core 2 Duo chips their strength, but rather a host of design improvements across the chip and the way it transports data that improves performance. And our test results bear this out.

The Core 2 Extreme X6800 made a clean sweep of all of our benchmarks. AMD's closest competition, the 2.6GHz Athlon 64 FX-62, came within 5 percent on our iTunes, multitasking, and Microsoft Office tests, but on our Half-Life 2 and our Adobe Photoshop CS2 tests, AMD lost badly, by as much as 28 percent on Half-Life 2. At $999, Intel's new flagship processor might not be as compelling a deal as the only slightly slower $530 Core 2 Duo E6700, but for enthusiasts and others with the passion and the wallet to ensure that they have the fastest chip out there, the Core 2 Extreme X6800 is now it.

CPU Limited custom Half-Life 2: Lost Coast demo (in fps)
(Longer bars indicate better performance)

Half-Life 2: Lost Coast 1,024x768 no AA, no AF

Intel Core 2 Extreme X6800

167.1 

Intel Core 2 Duo E6700

159.1 

AMD Athlon 64 FX-62

120.1 

AMD Athlon 64 X2 5000+

99.6 

Office productivity test (in seconds)
(Shorter bars indicate better performance)

Microsoft Office productivity test (Word, Excel, and Powerpoint)

Intel Core 2 Extreme X6800

535 

Intel Core 2 Duo E6700

536 

AMD Athlon 64 FX-62

556 

AMD Athlon 64 X2 5000+

591 

Photoshop CS2 image-processing test (in seconds)
(Shorter bars indicate better performance)

Adobe Photoshop CS2 image-processing test

Intel Core 2 Extreme X6800

215 

Intel Core 2 Duo E6700

219 

AMD Athlon 64 FX-62

258 

AMD Athlon 64 X2 5000+

264 

iTunes encoding test (in seconds)
(Shorter bars indicate better performance)

Apple iTunes encoding test

Intel Core 2 Extreme X6800

138 

AMD Athlon 64 FX-62

146 

Intel Core 2 Duo E6700

148 

AMD Athlon 64 X2 5000+

162