Intel Introduces New Core i7, i5 Processors

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It's new hotness.

After months of whispers, Intel today officially introduced the next major platform for its processors with the introduction of the Core i5 and updates to the Core i7 and Xeon 3400 series for mainstream desktop and entry server markets.

Formerly codenamed "Lynnfield," these new chips are based on Intel's award-winning Nehalem microarchitecture and are designed for consumers who need high-end performance for digital media, productivity, gaming and other demanding applications. These processors, along with the new Intel P55 express chipset, are available today.

The new Core i7 and i5 processors are the first Intel processors to integrate both a 16-lane PCI Express 2 graphics port and two-channel memory controller, enabling all input/output and manageability functions to be handled by the single-chip Intel P55 Express Chipset. Previous Intel chipsets required two separate chips – a northbridge and a southbridge.

Check out our three feature articles today for the full scoop:

Also see the video below for a little primer of what's so great about the new platform and chips:

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Marcus Yam
Marcus Yam
Marcus Yam served as Tom's Hardware News Director during 2008-2014. He entered tech media in the late 90s and fondly remembers the days when an overclocked Celeron 300A and Voodoo2 SLI comprised a gaming rig with the ultimate street cred.
12 Comments Comment from the forums
  • rebel conquest
    Finally!!
    Reply
  • doomtomb
    You can see how he stumbles when he speaks... because Intel really made a mess with their naming convention. Core i7s on two different motherboard sockets is too confusing for mainstream.
    Reply
  • Woohoo!!! A new CPU that doesn't outperform the year-old Core i7, jacks up "mid-range" mobos up to price-points not seen in years, and features an on-die PCI-e controller, which apparently doesn't help and might actually hurt performance.


    Intel's marketing people are laughing at you right now, I'm sure some fanboys are going to "upgrade" their i7 920 to a newer i5 just to be part of the celebration...
    Reply
  • Hellbound
    Why spend $199 when you can spend $270 on the i7 920.
    Reply
  • C 64
    @Hellhound

    So you can save some 80 $ and then some more for MB and RAM....
    Reply
  • Microcenter still has i7 920s for $199 which is where I got mine, so I'm not exactly complaining about the price
    Reply
  • Ciuy
    why didnt AMD get a red Thread when new cpus come out ?
    Reply
  • christop
    Damn stop with the socket change....
    Reply
  • jgv115
    Actually, the socket change is not as bad. The P55 is much more cheaper than X58. The socket change was necessary.

    I think Intel have the upper hand now.
    Reply
  • christop: Intel kept LGA775 for years, but everytime a new CPU came out, it wouldn't run on the older chipsets, so you had to spend a day researching it to find out that you still couldn't use the newest CPU in your motherboard(figuring out what could run Conroe was a nightmare).
    Reply