Intel Core i5-750 Processor

When it launched last year, the Core i7 platform redefined Intel's high-end processor segment. Unfortunately, the platform was also accompanied by high-end prices. As such, it has seen only a minimal share of the desktop market. Today, however, Intel is releasing a new platform that it claims will bring the performance of Nehalem to mainstream price points. Referred to as Lynnfield, the new platform shares its core microarchitecture with the i7-900 series, but introduces a completely new chipset and socket design. This means that not only will we see new processors, but new motherboards as well. Benchmark Reviews has been testing several of these new items and will be covering the launch in detail over the next few days. In this article, we examine the Intel Core i5-750 Quad Core Processor model BX80605I5750.

The Intel Core i5-750 is one of three processors launching today under the Lynnfield platform, the others being the Core i7-860 and Core i7-870. All three chips are based on the same die, feature 8 MB of share cache, and are packaged using the new LGA 1156 socket. They also feature a new version of Intel's Turbo Boost Technology that dynamically overclocks the individual processor cores depending on workload. As the naming scheme suggests, however, the Core i5-750 is the low end part out of the three. This is in part due to clock speed, as the i5-750 runs at only 2.66 GHz compared to 2.80 GHz for the i7-860 and 2.93 GHz for the i7-870. The key difference, though, is the lack of Hyper-Threading. According to Intel, all of the Core i5-700 series processors will be limited to one thread per core, while the Core i7-800 series, will be capable of two threads per core. We'll see how much of an impact this has on performance when we get to the benchmarks a little later on.

The Core i5-750 may be the underdog of the Lynnfield launch, but with a launch-MSRP of $199 for the BX80605I5750 kit, it's certainly not a budget processor. The good news is that the new P55 chipset from Intel should offer a considerable price break compared to the X58. Intel moved the bulk of the Northbridge functions to the processor and combined the rest with the Southbridge to deliver a single chip solution called Ibex Peak. The memory configuration has also been reduced, from triple-channel to only dual-channel support. We'll cover this in more detail in the P55 motherboard reviews. However, let it suffice to say that the new chipset should bring system prices down quite a bit. Whether or not they'll be the mainstream prices Intel claims remains to be seen.

About Intel Corporation

Intel Corporation is the world's largest semiconductor company founded by semiconductor pioneers Robert Noyce and Gordon Moore, and widely associated with the executive leadership and vision of Andrew Grove, Intel combines advanced chip design capability with a leading-edge manufacturing capability. Originally known primarily to engineers and technologists, Intel's successful "Intel Inside" advertising campaign of the 1990s made it and its Pentium processor household names.

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