Product Reviews

Intel's Core 2 Extreme QX6850 is the latest addition to the company's quad-core processor range. As with previous processors, it's best to think of the QX6850 as two Core 2 Duo processors on the same chip for a total of four cores. Each pair of cores has 4MB of shared L2 cache. This memory is intelligent, so if one core isn't doing anything, the other core has full access

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to it. Both cores can also share the data in the cache, so if they're both after the same bit of information, it only needs to be loaded into the cache once.

As with other processors in the Extreme range, the QX6850 is not multiplier locked, so it's simple to overclock without having to adjust bus speeds. The big difference between the QX6850 and previous quad-core processors is its clock speed: it has a 1,333MHz frontside bus (FSB) and clock speed of 3GHz, making it the fastest Core 2 processor available. It stormed through our benchmark tests, achieving the highest score we've ever seen.

The QX6850 is expensive but, incredibly, it costs the same as the current Core 2 Extreme QX6700 processor, although you'll need to include the price of a new motherboard that supports the faster FSB speed. If you're building a new PC and want the absolute best, then this is it. Those on a more realistic budget should opt for the Core 2 Duo E6750.