Exclusive: Nehalem at 2.9GHz and X58
Posted by RAID 0 on 07 July 2008 - 20:12 · 28 comments & 9325 views
Today, we have the exclusive look at a full fledged X58 system. The new chipset will be the foundation for Nehalem and Intel already indicated to us that the new platform will deliver a large boost in performance across all applications compared to currently available products.

Intel will launch the X58 chipset with the same ICH-10 family of southbridges currently used on its P45 platform. ICH-10 supplies up to four PCI Express x16 paths, of which two, are PCI Express 2.0 paths. Other possible combinations are: one x16 path, two x16 paths, four x8 paths, and one 16 path and two x8 paths. Because of QuickPath however, we’re able to realize far better performance with wide bandwidth and very low latency. According to Intel, Nehalem will initially come with a 20-bit wide 25.6 GB/sec. QuickPath link, which gives a theoretical 2x performance increase in bandwidth over the 1600MHz FSB currently available on the X48 platform.

View: Full Story at Tom's Hardware


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(8 replies) Quote this comment Reply to this comment #1 Posted by +Tikimotel on 07 Jul 2008 - 20:52
more info:
http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/intel...doc.aspx?i=3326
(that does have some benchmark test results)
Quote this comment #1.1 Posted by +Beastage on 07 Jul 2008 - 21:55
(Tikimotel said @ #1)
more info:
http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/intel...doc.aspx?i=3326
(that does have some benchmark test results)


Amazing benches! this is a huge leap if all this proves to be accurate at release.
Quote this comment #1.2 Posted by BrainDedd on 07 Jul 2008 - 23:40
This almost made me sad I just pulled the trigger on a Q9450 but the end of Q4 (December?) is sooooo very far away and I never was good at waiting
Quote this comment #1.3 Posted by RAID 0 on 08 Jul 2008 - 00:24
Thanks for that link; I've been looking for more info on Nehalem.
Quote this comment #1.4 Posted by Express on 08 Jul 2008 - 01:14
Very little single thread performance boost.
Multi-thread looks great though.
Quote this comment #1.5 Posted by MioTheGreat on 08 Jul 2008 - 02:36
(Express said @ #1.4)
Very little single thread performance boost.
Multi-thread looks great though.


There's really much more to be gained from looking into massive parallelism than focusing on single threads.
Quote this comment #1.6 Posted by -SHiFT- on 08 Jul 2008 - 06:42
(BrainDedd said @ #1.2)
This almost made me sad I just pulled the trigger on a Q9450 but the end of Q4 (December?) is sooooo very far away and I never was good at waiting


I doubt Nehalem is going to be released for mainstream by Q4 2008. Probably 2009 you'll see Extreme Edition Nehalem along with server chips. And then mainstream and finally budget.
Quote this comment #1.7 Posted by El Sid on 08 Jul 2008 - 11:48
(BrainDedd said @ #1.2)
This almost made me sad I just pulled the trigger on a Q9450 but the end of Q4 (December?) is sooooo very far away and I never was good at waiting


I wouldn't be sad. Nehalem for the consumer is a long way off yet, and it will cost a fortune.
Quote this comment #1.8 Posted by MioTheGreat on 08 Jul 2008 - 15:56
(El Sid said @ #1.7)
(BrainDedd said @ #1.2)
This almost made me sad I just pulled the trigger on a Q9450 but the end of Q4 (December?) is sooooo very far away and I never was good at waiting


I wouldn't be sad. Nehalem for the consumer is a long way off yet, and it will cost a fortune.


By the end of the year they'll have 3 desktop Nehalem processors. An extreme model, a performance model, and a mainstream model (According to wikipedia)

My guess is that the extreme one is going to be rediculously priced (Think $1000), but the other two might be relatively affordable. At least the mainstream one.
Quote this comment Reply to this comment #2 Posted by RAID 0 on 07 Jul 2008 - 21:13
I can't wait to snag one of these! Awesome!
(2 replies) Quote this comment Reply to this comment #3 Posted by Max™ on 07 Jul 2008 - 22:13
I just noticed the related article:

"10.20GHz Intel Nehalem slated for 2005". Oh how wrong they were. Here we are 3.5 years later with no Nehalem and click speeds are 1/3 of that.

Anyway - will be buying some of these to replace my Northwood P4.
Quote this comment #3.1 Posted by MioTheGreat on 07 Jul 2008 - 22:37
They rehashed the codename, but it's not the same chip they originally thought it would be.

That was a Netburst chip.
Quote this comment #3.2 Posted by Airlink on 08 Jul 2008 - 01:00
(Max™ said @ #3)
" click speeds are 1/3 of that.

No, my click speeds are very fast now, but has more to do with the quality of the mice we have now.
Quote this comment Reply to this comment #4 Posted by eilegz on 07 Jul 2008 - 22:15
so expensive and unique, p35 its still very used.....
Quote this comment Reply to this comment #5 Posted by kaiwai on 07 Jul 2008 - 22:50
Hmm, it'll be interesting to see what QuickPath (aka CSI) brings to the table when compared to AMD's hypertransport.

Its amazing how far IT has come, especially considering that years ago, these kinds of bandwidths were only possibly in big-ass SGI rendering boxes - now all of this power is available on the desktop for the average Joe.

Edit: Anyone see on the second to last page - 20% performance increase with only 10% power increase. Nice to see Intel has realised the value of efficiency

Last edited by kaiwai on 07 Jul 2008 - 22:57
Quote this comment Reply to this comment #6 Posted by nX07 on 07 Jul 2008 - 23:08
I figure it will become affordable for the general market by 2010??
Quote this comment Reply to this comment #7 Posted by Airlink on 08 Jul 2008 - 01:12
MMmmmmmm..... sweet. L3 cache, HT-Quads, eventual octo-cores, QuickPath, new LGAs..... it's a whole new era, folks.
(2 replies) Quote this comment Reply to this comment #8 Posted by +M2Ys4U on 08 Jul 2008 - 01:47
*DROOL*

Intel did it again. AMD are all but officially relegated to low-end procs now.
Quote this comment #8.1 Posted by nonick on 08 Jul 2008 - 06:54
(M2Ys4U said @ #
*DROOL*

Intel did it again. AMD are all but officially relegated to low-end procs now.


Grats on being able to predict the future
Quote this comment #8.2 Posted by shockz on 08 Jul 2008 - 14:40
(nonick said @ #8.1)
(M2Ys4U said @ #
*DROOL*

Intel did it again. AMD are all but officially relegated to low-end procs now.


Grats on being able to predict the future


But if you look at the trend... its not promising for AMD atm... but this cycle filp flops every few years.
(2 replies) Quote this comment Reply to this comment #9 Posted by Hak Foo on 08 Jul 2008 - 03:20
Intel can shoot themselves in the foot two ways with Nehalem IMO:

1) Memory. If they don't produce a DDR2 option, it will really mess up the price-performance ratio, particularly on large memory builds (4Gb of DDR3 is still not cheap) Yeah, it might be the right decision long-term, but it could leave an opening.

2) Musical Sockets. Everyone who got burned on a Socket 754 or 940 Athlon 64 knows the drill... right now, supposedly, the 1300-pin socket version is a high-end model, and a very different part will be available on a 1100-pin socket for mortals.

In a few months, if they move everything but the Xeon versions to a third "compromise" socket, I wouldn't be surprised, but would be annoyed.
Quote this comment #9.1 Posted by +DrDrrae on 08 Jul 2008 - 06:02
I suspect the prices of DDR3 will start dropping sharply as we get closer to the release of the high end Nehalem based processors at the end of this year and even moreso, Q3 of '09 when the mainstreem Nehalem based processors are released. Now, the prices probably won't be down to DDR2 levels but it's what most people call the early adopter's fee.
Quote this comment #9.2 Posted by MioTheGreat on 08 Jul 2008 - 15:54
(DrDrrae said @ #9.1)
I suspect the prices of DDR3 will start dropping sharply as we get closer to the release of the high end Nehalem based processors at the end of this year and even moreso, Q3 of '09 when the mainstreem Nehalem based processors are released. Now, the prices probably won't be down to DDR2 levels but it's what most people call the early adopter's fee.


Indeed. Once the memory manufacturers ramp up production in response to the imminent release of Nehalem, prices should plummet.
(1 reply) Quote this comment Reply to this comment #10 Posted by EnzoFX on 08 Jul 2008 - 03:54
100+ Watts when Idle? Isn't that Prescott High?
Quote this comment #10.1 Posted by biffzinker on 08 Jul 2008 - 04:34
That would be for the whole system (cpu, motherboard, ram etc.)
(1 reply) Quote this comment Reply to this comment #11 Posted by backdrifter on 08 Jul 2008 - 07:24
That's sweet!
Now all we have to do is to wait for current gen CPUs to drop on prices
Quote this comment #11.1 Posted by Skynetfuture on 08 Jul 2008 - 16:10
for me current gen is duh ! i went Next gen now !
Quote this comment Reply to this comment #12 Posted by ajua on 08 Jul 2008 - 21:52
I got burned when a year and half ago i bought Gigabyte P965-DQ6 and my first Core 2 Duo (E6400). My expensive and great motherboard doesn't support FSB1333, except when installing the top-of-the-line Core 2 Duos or Quads.

I almost bought an E6750, but i check my mobo's CPU support list only to be left with anger and frustrated.

I will wait until nehalem comes out, so i can upgrade Mobo, CPU and DDR3.

The DDR3 memory should be more affordable come Nehalem launch date.

This new architecture really looks promising. I loved the quote from anandtech: "What Intel did to AMD in 2006 is doing it to himself with Nehalem"...
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