Intel's new top-dog desktop 'Extreme' CPU fails to excite
Intel has announced the latest in its 10-year line of "Extreme" desktop processors, and the consensus view from the geekerati who have put it through its paces in prerelease testing is a collective "Meh."
As ExtremeTech, Joel Hruska's review of the new chip was headlined, "Core i7-4960X Ivy Bridge-E review: Intel's Great Limp Forward."
AnandTech's conclusion was a bit more diplomatic. "My biggest complaint about IVB-E isn't that it's bad," Anand Lal Shimpi wrote; "it's just that it could be so much more." Over at Tom's Hardware, Chris Angelini duly noted the i7-4960's mild improvements over its top-of-the-desktop-line's predecesssor, the Sandy Bridge–based Core i7-3960X, but concluded, "Does Intel's Core i7-4960X, specifically, get me all revved up about upgrading? Well, no. Not really. But then again, those thousand-dollar CPUs rarely do."
