 Great processor, could be packaged better |
| Review Date: March 3, 2010 |
| Reviewer: D. Orders, |
| I rebuilt my 6 year old Alienware using this processor as the heart. On the Asus A6T with a Diamond ATI 5870 and 6 gigs of Corsair 1600 ram, it is blindingly fast. If I had to be critical, there are two minor negatives, neither of which has to do with the processor itself. When I first opened the box, which is filled by the OEM heat sink and fan, the processor fell out on the table. Fortunately it didn't fall far, and it was in it's own little clam-shell case, but it is just sandwiched between the two halves of the plastic packaging for the fan and heat sink, not taped in and not at all secure. The second negative is the OEM heat sink and fan, which may be fine, but attaches to the motherboard by some funky plastic cam/screw devices, that look like they would break if you tried to install them more than once. I opted for the CoolerMaster V8, and am very happy with it. |
Disappointment Turned To Satisfaction
|
| Review Date: March 26, 2010 |
| Reviewer: PMTCLEVE1206, Dover, Ohio |
I ordered the Intel i7 975 Extreme 3.33GHZ processor from Amazon.com for use in my BYOPC project. Since I had purchased other items in the past from Amazon, I didn't have any reservations about this nearly $1,000 online transaction.
I ordered on a Saturday evening and the product arrived the following Friday. The outer box was packaged in a neat, secure manner. However, when I opened it, I was not only disappointed...I was rather unhappy at what I found inside.
The box that was supposed to include the Intel processor (which I'll explain in a minute) was dirty and wrinkled, appearing as though it had been thrown from a vehicle and then stepped on with a dirty shoe. The box wasn't factory packaged--no cellophane and no seal at the boxtop. When I opened the INTEL box, I found inside, an old AMD PROCESSOR, which had been inserted into an Intel processor sleeve, along with the processor heat sink/fan assembly. I couldn't believe that Amazon shipped this out.
I immediately phoned Amazon.com and was able to speak with a customer service rep named Anna. She was very accomodating and listened calmly to what I'm sure was a somewhat angry tone, while I described what I'd received from Amazon. She gave me return instructions and said a new shipment would be sent. I received the new unit the following Tuesday, built the new system the next day and am happy to report, is running great. Yes, it's an expensive computer component at $989.00 but I most always buy the biggest and best available.
I have it slightly overclocked at 3.46GHZ and it performs very well.
In closing, this Intel processor works as promised and a thank you to Amazon customer service rep Anna for the manner in which she handled my situation.
|
Amazing product
|
| Review Date: August 13, 2010 |
| Reviewer: Abdullah M. Binghunaim, Cleveland, OH US |
| I switched from AMD to this Intel processor and all i'm going to say "Worth every penny!" |
Excellent - ordered it and then it arrived as expected
|
| Review Date: February 23, 2010 |
| Reviewer: doubleM, Huntington Beach, CA USA |
| I build my own computers so I know what equipment is in them rather than what Dell or HP want to put in them as far as components. I ordered all the parts from Amazon.com. They arrived as expected and I put the computer together without a hitch. My only issue with the entire process was the motherboard ordered from Amazon.com did not have the back plate where the sockets are located for peripherals. |
Guaranteed Quality, But For That Price It Better Be!
|
| Review Date: February 13, 2010 |
| Reviewer: Scott Showalter, Ohio, USA |
Question is, can you get something nearly as good for much less? Indeed, it's possible.
Contrary to popular belief, CPU chip fabrication is really an imprecise art, and manufacturing perfection cannot be found in this industry. The same series of chips, in this case the i7 900 series, are all manufactured from the same wafer. Whether or not they get the extreme designation and specified number is based on testing done on each chip after the fabrication process is complete. However not every chip is tested for a specific range in the series (e.g. 975).
Like any company, Intel has manufacturing quotas, so a certain number of 975s have to be produced each month, but beyond that, they don't run the harder tests involved with the 975s. So in reality, you could technically get a 965 or a 975 in the 950 mix, assuming all quotas were met for any chips above 950 in that particular month of fabrication. The main reason for this is due to the limited demand on the 965s and 975s. In the end, it's more-or-less the luck of the draw.
Technically, this means you could by chance end up with a 920 that matches the quality of a 950 or higher. However, the chances are more likely that you could get a 975-quality from a 950 batch, since both would come from the same vicinity on the wafer (that vicinity being the area that consistently yields the best chips) whereas the 920s are coming from a known lesser-quality area of the wafer. The 920s typically are the bottom of the barrel in the series.
So if you're absolutely picky and you must have top-of-the-line equipment, definitely go with the 975 or one of the other extreme edition CPUs, because you're guaranteed to receive a chip of the highest quality (assuming you can afford it).
However, if price is any concern at all, but absolute top performance is certainly not an issue, go with a 950 (http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B002A6G3V2?tag=a52-20&ie=UTF8) and take your chances on getting something better, especially if you're considering overclocking. It really all depends on your cooling solution, settings and the chances of drawing something better than the label suggests, but from what I've seen the chances are actually pretty decent.
I've benchmarked the 975, 965 and 950, all overclocked. The 975 ran only 1.8% faster than the 950, but the 950 ran even better than the "extreme" 965. In the end, I was certainly satisfied with the results of the 950 for the price. For anyone on the fence with price vs performance, you certainly won't be dissatisfied with the 950. Even if you have the extra cash to plop down on the 975, save your money and get an SSD with the extra cash flow. That's where the real bottleneck is in computing these days, and you shouldn't ever run such a top-of-the-line system without having a high-speed hard drive!
For those who are curious, here is what I chose for my machine's final configuration:
Mobo: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001KA9PZK?tag=a52-20&ie=UTF8
CPU: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B002A6G3V2?tag=a52-20&ie=UTF8
Memory: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001VNLDN8?tag=a52-20&ie=UTF8
Hard Drive (SSD): http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B002IGT7IU?tag=a52-20&ie=UTF8
PSU: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B001M3G42W?tag=a52-20&ie=UTF8
|
|
No video reviews found for this product.
