September 7, 2009, 9:00 pm
Intel put itself far ahead of AMD technically last year with its Core i7 desktop CPUs, but the high-end prices for the Core i7 900-series made Intel’s most advanced chip architecture more of a luxury than an industry standard. Monday’s announcement of Intel’s new, more affordable Core i7 800-series chips, as well as an even cheaper Core i5 CPU, will likely lead to Intel’s most advanced chip penetrating the mainstream retail market.
Intel has three new chips to announce, as well as the new Intel P55 Express motherboard chipset to support them. The new Core i7’s include the $562 2.93GHz Core i7 870, the $284 Core i7 860 at 2.8GHz, as well as the $196 2.6GHz Core i5 750 chip. Each is essentially a stripped-down version of its counterpart from the Core i7 900-series, the most affordable of which, the 2.66GHz Core i7 920, starts at about $280…
