Intel Core 2 Duo E7200 CPU Review - Baby Wolfdale

Wed 2008-04-09 - Posted by Patrick "MACMAC" MacMillan

Is the Intel Core 2 Duo E8000 series too expensive for your tastes? Well you will glad to know that Legit Reviews has just tested the lower end Intel Core 2 Duo E7200 processor, which is effectively a cut-down Wolfdale processor with half the L2 cache, a 1066Mhz front side bus, and a much reduced price.

Here’s what they had to say:

“The upcoming Intel Core 2 Duo E7200 looks to be a price versus performance winner from what we can tell from the time spent with our early sample. If the rumored price of $133 is correct and the retail versions overclock like ours did then this will be hands down one of the hottest dual-core processors this summer. Intel has perfected the 45nm process and every new processor series they release based on it exceeds our expectations. The Intel Core 2 Duo E7200 is one of those processors.

When it came to performance, the Intel Core 2 Duo E7200 at default clock speeds was not hands down faster than the Intel Core 2 Duo E6750, but we'd pick the E7200 over it any day since it can be overclocked up to a 1333MHz FSB with just a single BIOS setting adjustment. Factor in overclocking beyond that and you have a price versus performance winner as overclocks over 50 percent are hard to ignore.”

I suspect that the E7000 series is made of ‘failed’ E8000 series processors with the defective bits of L2 cache disabled, hence why Intel can sell them so cheaply, and that’s fine with me! This chip offers terrific Bang for the Buck, especially when you take overclocking into consideration. If the E7200 does end up retailing in the $130-140 range, AMD is going to have some major competition for its triple-core Phenom X3 processors. By the way, Intel will also be offering the E7300, which sports a 2.67Ghz clock speed and 10x multiplier.

Click here to read the full review.

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