Intel's Core i7 Processors
By Stephen Bucaro
Core i7 is a family of Intel quad core processors, that is, they have four
processors on a single silicon chip. Released in November 2008, the Core i7 is
based on the "nehalem" microarchitecture, which uses a 45 nanometer manufacturing
process code-named "Penryn".
All four processor cores and all memory caches, including a 64K L1 cache, a 256K
L2 cache, and a shared L3 cache are located on one chip. Previous processors had
the memory controller located a separate chip, with Core i7, it's located on the
same chip as the processor. The memory controller supports three channels, so instead
of installing two or four DIMMs, you need to install three or six. It doesn't support
DDR2 memory, it only supports DDR3 memory.
The Core i7 is supported by Intel's X58 chipset which eliminates the front side
bus (FSB), instead it uses the Intel QuickPath Interconnect (QPI). QPI was developed
to compete with AMD's Hypertransport. QPI is used to connect the X58 chipset to the
Core i7 processor. A QPI comprises two 20-bit point-to-point links, one in each
direction, with a separate clock in each direction, for a total of 42 signals. The
bandwidth for QuickPath is reported to be 24.0 to 32.0 GB/s.
Overclocking isn’t officially supported by Intel, however, one special feature of
the Core i7 Extreme Edition is an unlocked multiplier, which simplifies overclocking
The Core i7 also has its own overclocking called Turbo Boost that, depending on the
processor load and temperature, automatically runs the clock of one or more of the
four cores at higher-than-rated speeds. This can boost the performance for multi-threaded
applications.
The Core i7 uses hyper-threading technology, a method that runs multiple sections
of code in parallel. Each core can run two threads simultaneously, resulting in higher
processing throughput. Core i7 chips use the new LGA 1366 socket (Land Grid Array
with 1366 Contacts).
Core i7 versions
| Identifier | Clock Speed |
| Core i7-920 | 2.66 GHz |
| Core i7-940 | 2.92 GHz |
| Core i7-965 Extreme Edition | 3.20 GHz |
| Core i7-975 Extreme Edition | 3.33 GHz |
Intel DX58SO LGA 1366 Motherboard
The Intel DX58SO motherboard supports Intel’s Core i7 Processors as well as both
SLI and CrossFireX! Six SATA ports with RAID 0, 1, 5, and 10. Memory support includes
up to 16GB of Triple Channel DDR3 memory.
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