Intel QUAD Core 2 Extreme QX9650 3GHz 12MB 1333MHz

They're are all pretty much right..! It's a bogus chip because it costs you a pretty good FULL system just to buy the thing, and yet has such good over clockig capabilities... I have it running at 4.2Ghz on my Air cooled sytem (though my heat sink is the size of my LEG).. It does reduce the life span, but who cares?? In a year or two, i'll be upgrading again so.

If you have the money, and you're botherd about pound per Ghz, then seriously... SERIOUSLY, this is for you! Good build, good quality, good over clock, good temperature... 5/5 for me!

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You must all lead very boring live's to dispute something thats pretty obvious to me. the next best thing. get it while its hot.

Overclocking is fine. if people want to take the risk thats fine. who cares you dont have to. but overclocking does reduce the lifespan but not enough to have to lead to replacements because by then the next best thing will be out again.

its pretty simple.

Oh and by the way. it works a treat its a whole new life to my machine

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Hafnium Oxide has replaced Silicon Dioxide in the 45nm chip. The QX9650 is a great overclocker, most overclockers don't care if the life of the chip is reduced by overclocking, it's the chance we take!! I have never had a CPU die on me from overclocking.

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You need to read the reviews on other websites which go into the detail but from someone who has bought one, this is a brilliant bit of hardware. In conjunction with 4Gb RAM, Vista Ultimate 64, and RAID1 2x 500Gb hard drives, it makes for one fast computer. £600, now £650, is a lot to spend on a processor but it will last for years, I have over clocked it to 3.3Ghz for now and it could easily go higher. It runs cool, my heat sink fan is barely ever running, even when playing call of duty 4, which makes for a very quiet computer.
I definitely would recommend this to anyone but you need the other hardware to be just as good to benefit from it.

(Also, my first Intel computer, AMD have lost it and I am glad to have moved to Intel for this processor.)

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"also you'd be better of buying a dual core for £90 than £600 for this and w8 for a gaming quad core to arrive."
Gaming quad core?
Cough.
Whats this then?
Idiot.

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Rubbish... if you have sufficient cooling, an overclocked cpu can last just as long, or EVEN longer than a standard cpu if the cooling is exceptional. Its all about heat... the more heat, the shorter the lifespan. If you are careful with voltage and keep the cpu very cool then you can have an overclocked cpu with a very long lifespan. For example, comparing a stock cooler to hi end watercooling, if the watercooled cpu is overclocked, yet remains the same tamperature as the stock cpu on stock cooler than the lifespan with be pretty much equal

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for those of you who overclock, overclocking may give extra performance but do you really want a £600 processor only lasting 6 months because you overclocked it to much. your warrenty is void if you overclock. be happy with the fact its already a fast processor. no matter how much cooling you have the parts wont last as long if you overclock them.also you'd be better of buying a dual core for £90 than £600 for this and w8 for a gaming quad core to arrive.

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Comparing this chip to that of the highest end dual core 65nm offering from intel, quite clearly shows that its power consumption is ~40W less at idle and ~80W less under full load.

This is amazing! 4 cores, and drws less power, overclocks well on stock voltages while remaining cool as the stock temperatures on a Q6600.

The price is the real killer, and could only afford this via the finance pay monthly options.

Capable of ~4ghz on air cooling, im planning on cooling with a 437W TEC so expect much larger gains ;-)

4 -cores, 4ghz+ each, multi-threaded games "just" starting to arrive. This will keep ya going for MANY years, as what games are even needing 4x4ghz cores??

Just make sure you got a graphics card to make good use of it

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This will overclock like a good 'un. However, default speed = 3GHz.

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Your wrong. An overclocked CPU will have a shorter lifespan even if the cooling is sufficient. When a CPU is overclocked, the silicon core produces more heat. Even if you have the best cooling in the world, the only thing you are doing is moving heat away from the core faster/better, but you are NOT stopping the temperature increase in the core. That is the simplest way to explain, but you have to dig in to the material analysis of silicon. There have been a few studies done to show an increase of heat at core level will shorten the silicon sc's lifespan. However, there is a saturation point, & if you overclock a CPU past that point, you will see the lifespan severely affected. In other words, there is room for safe overclocking depending on the CPU design. I can tell your basis was wikipedia. 3/4 European universities have banned wikipedia from being cited simply because it is flawed. Do real research.

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