A quick noob question about the i7's...

[MetallicaItalia]

Is a $1,000 core extreme even remotely worth paying the extra $700+ when you could get a i7 920 and easily overclock it to 3.2ghz with the right cooling? The only difference I see here besides the out of the box frequency is the Extreme has 6.4 GT/s QPI which is 1.6 GT/s over the 920 and 940's 4.8 GT/s. Now I'm a hardware nub so I'm not quite sure what all this means but I see these numbers and then look at the prices and it just seems like a marketing gimmick to me. Is there any reason a sane person who doesn't have a ton of money to waste and can OC their CPU without it frying should shell out the extra cash for a 940 let alone the extreme?

http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...82E16819115200

[jlreich]

I have never found any of the extreme editions worth it. Why pay $1000-$1500 for a CPU when they will come out with a new one that will beat it in six months for $300?

If I had absolutely everything I ever wanted, the entire world was fed clothed and sheltered, and I still had $1000 to waste I would still not buy an extreme edition CPU.

The 940? Yeah I can see some people paying for that. Not me, but it isn't outrageous like the extreme edition.

[MetallicaItalia]

Paying any more for a 940, even if it's still only half as expensive as an Extreme makes even less sense to me. Aren't the 920's and 940's identical chips with the exception that one has a higher factory frequency?

[saphalline]

Now that's a tricky question...

Is the i7 965 worth $1000 USD? No. Is it worth considerably more than its lesser brothers? Yes.

$800 would be well justified, as the OC'ing potential of the Extreme Edition is nigh endless. The unlocked core multiplier, the addition RAM ratio, the ability to disable throttling and thermal protection barriers, the added QPI bandwidth, the extra control over the uncore, etc. The list goes on and on.

Now keep in mind that the i7 965 is intended for extreme OC'ing. No one buys it and runs it at stock just to have a slightly faster Core i7! This sucker is meant to breeze past the OC'ing potential of the lesser 920 & 940, and to do be able to do it in less time! If ever there were an Extreme Edition Intel CPU that was even remotely worth its vaunted $1000 USD price tag, the i7 965 is it.

I still wouldn't buy it at $1000 USD even if I had the money and etc for jlreich's qualifications. But... if I had the money and it were offered to me for $800? Heck yeah!! I would love to get my hands on one!!