Clive Webster

Reviews - The Intel awards issue

Posted at: 30th July 2007

OMG, I feel like a Chelsea fan. I've never owned an Intel chip, and always give a lot of respect to plucky underdogs who try to beat huge corporations at their own game. However, in my first month in charge of Reviews, I've bestowed an award on all four Intel CPUs, as well as Intel motherboards. I feel as though I've switched allegiance from Charlton to Chelski; talk about a glory supporter.

Don't worry though; my taking over this section hasn't coincided with truckloads of brown envelopes from Intel. James and I agonised over handing out so many awards, to the point where we were going to deny the 3GHz Core 2 Duo E6850 an award just because each of the other CPUs received one. But with a price of £168, it would be harsh of us not to recommend it simply because the new £116 2.66GHz Core 2 Duo E6750 and 1,333MHz FSB quad-core CPU are so good.

The fourth award-winning Intel CPU this month is a Pentium. Yes, that's right; Intel has resurrected the Pentium name. However, it isn't some NetBurst monstrosity, but a £50 Core 2 Duo that overclocks to around 3GHz. With a price-to-performance ratio like this, we had to give it an award. We also have three motherboards that will natively handle a 1,333MHz FSB, one of which is the latest in the Asus Republic of Gamers series - the Blitz Extreme - with a waterblock on the Northbridge and DDR3 support as standard.

Despite its high price, it still deserved an award, and two other Asus products also received honours. The first of these is the P35-based P5K3 Deluxe WiFi-AP, which continues the long line of top-quality Asus P5-series boards. The second Asus prize winner is a wireless router with a built-in hard disk that can handle Bit Torrent files, act as a media streamer and host a website. Priced at £156, it's a bargain. Alas, however, there were no brown envelopes and shady meetings in parks with Asus head honchos either. It looks as though we'll all have to keep our day jobs and start work on the next issue.

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