The launch of the Intel Core 2 Extreme X6800, Core 2 Duo E6300, E6400, E6600 and E6700 processors, which were originally expected to arrive on July 23, will be postponed to July 27, according to a recent review of Intel"s product roadmap by sources at Taiwan motherboard makers. In addition, the entry-level Celeron D 360 CPU, which will be the last part offered under the Pentium 4 NetBurst microarchitecture, will be introduced on September 1, indicated the sources.
Meanwhile, graphics core chipsets to support those processors - the G965 and entry-level Q963 - will also be introduced on July 27, the sources noted. In addition, the high-end Q965, which supports the Intel vPro business PC platform, will be released on September 7, the sources added. Launch of Intel"s Core 2 Duo E4200, which features a core speed of 1.6GHz, 2MB of cache memory and support for an 800MHz FSB, and is compliant with the 946GZ/PL chipset family, is expected in the fourth quarter of 2006, according to the sources. The new CPU is intended to compete with AMD"s Socket-AM2 Athlon 64 X2 3600+, rated for a clock speed of 2GHz and fitted with 512KB of L2 cache, which reportedly is scheduled for launch during the fourth quarter.