Why are core 2 extremes so expensive?

[awesomesoccerfan]

Why are core 2 extremes so expensive? I've seen some core 2 extremes which are even more expensive than the most powerful ones(Core i7).Extremes were out in like 2007 if i am not wrong,which is almost 5 years ago.Still why are the prices so high?which one(i7 or xtreme) would be better(e.g gaming) if they were to combat face-to-face? Thanks!


Awesomesoccerfan.

 

[hunter315]

They were very expensive when they were released, and now they are rare specialty parts. Computer parts are cheap shortly after they stop being current but then they get more expensive than they started as they become repair parts for people who really want to keep their old systems up and running and are willing to pay a bit extra to do so.

Most i7s would be any of the Core 2 Quad Extremes, the i7 920 and 930 come close on some cases but the 2600K and 960 beat them easily.

 

[jaguarskx]

They were very expensive to begin with.

Since they are no longer produced that means they become rarer and causes the price to go up.

 

[loneninja]

Intel releases their extreme editions at $1000+, they never really loose their value despite being out performed by the next generation of hard ware.

 

[Wish I Was Wealthy]

Why are core 2 extremes so expensive? I've seen some core 2 extremes which are even more expensive than the most powerful ones(Core i7).Extremes were out in like 2007 if i am not wrong,which is almost 5 years ago.Still why are the prices so high?which one(i7 or xtreme) would be better(e.g gaming) if they were to combat face-to-face? Thanks!


Awesomesoccerfan.

Hi awesomesocc . These are the old front side bus technology cpus e.g.:- 1600 MHz,1066 MHz,etc. They cost a lot to make & design also,while the more recent Core i7 series cpus do not cost as much & they do not need that front side bus to be placed in the North Bridge area no more,which means that it has a speedier thinking process 😉 . Have a nice day .

 

[IntelEnthusiast]

You know it is funny right now you can spend a $1000 on a new Intel® Core™ i7-990X Extreme Edition processor and unless you are doing something that is very heavily multi-threaded (Adobe CS) the Intel Core i5-2500K and Intel Core i7-2600K are both going to outperform it for 1/3 or less of the cost.

Christian Wood
Intel Enthusiast Team

 

[MU_Engineer]

Why are core 2 extremes so expensive? I've seen some core 2 extremes which are even more expensive than the most powerful ones(Core i7).Extremes were out in like 2007 if i am not wrong,which is almost 5 years ago.Still why are the prices so high?which one(i7 or xtreme) would be better(e.g gaming) if they were to combat face-to-face? Thanks!


Awesomesoccerfan.

Just about ALL Intel Extreme Edition CPUs are still very expensive. There is no very good reason to explain why they are still so expensive. There is often a *moderate* price increase in the fastest CPU available for a particular motherboard, and an Extreme Edition usually is the fastest CPU available for a particular motherboard. However, you would expect the Extremes to cost say, $50 when the slower CPUs in that line cost $10-20, not the Extreme selling for $300 and the others selling for $10-20. The older Extreme Edition CPUs are certainly outpaced by newer CPUs, and sometimes they were even outpaced by "normal" CPUs in their own product line! The 3.73 GHz Pentium 4 Extreme Edition was superseded by the 3.80 GHz P4 570/571/670 and the Core 2 X6800 was superseded by the Core 2 Duo E6850. Yet the E6850 sells for a lot less than the X6800 and the E6850 is the fastest Conroe CPU made. Also, something like the i5-2500 Sandy Bridge would absolutely demolish the old P4- and Core 2-based Extreme Editions, yet most Extreme Editions sell for more (sometimes a lot more) than an i5-2500. Some also cite the initial entry price of the Extremes at $999+ for why they sell for so much today. But you see one-bin-down CPUs that once sold for $700-800 selling for a pittance, plus hugely expensive server chips that once listed for $2000+ can be had for peanuts as well. I think the only reason the Extreme Editions have a high price tag is because they are rare, they were once a real bragging-rights part that a lot of people wish they had, and the sellers try to capitalize on that. I also bet that very few of those chips actually sell at those prices.

 

[EnderWiggin]

Which is why I was thrilled to get an i7-2600k for $300 and a compatible MB (ASUS P8P67 PRO) for less than $180... the i7-2600k runs at just under 4 GHz with the default Intel heatrsink and fan so you can easily do better with a premium heatsink and fan...

 

[MU_Engineer]

They were very expensive when they were released, and now they are rare specialty parts. Computer parts are cheap shortly after they stop being current but then they get more expensive than they started as they become repair parts for people who really want to keep their old systems up and running and are willing to pay a bit extra to do so.

Yes and no. The only parts that become more expensive on the used market after initially becoming less expensive are ones where there is sort of a captive market. This is generally NOT true for home users and desktop parts. If your old desktop breaks, you'll go out and buy an entirely new one. You won't pay $300 for a new old stock CPU when you can get an entire new computer for a few hundred more that's far faster. The captive markets generally only exist for server motherboards and certain expansion cards (especially RAID cards) and peripherals used in business production environments. For example, if you have 50 servers that are all identical and one server's motherboard dies, you essentially WILL have to get an identical board to replace it. Otherwise your stock image you use for all servers for ease of management won't work on your one oddball new server, you might have to use a new OS, and you'll end with more trouble than NOT paying $500 for a board that's really worth about $30 is worth.

They were very expensive to begin with.

Since they are no longer produced that means they become rarer and causes the price to go up.

The "captive market" as well as collector's value really determines the price of parts. Take for example the Pentium 4 HT 3.06 for Socket 478. That was an *extremely* expensive chip when it first came out- they cost well over a grand. It was the immediate successor to the first P4EE. Intel also hasn't made them for a long, long time. Now you can find them on eBay for $13 a pop. The first P4EE's Xeon equivalent, the SL7AE Xeon DP 3.20/2M, sells for about $20, compared to $70+ for the Socket 478 P4EE. The Xeon uses the *exact same silicon* as the P4EE and actually cost more at launch, but the P4EE was the part that has the cachet of being the Extreme Edition CPU. The Gallatin Xeon is just another old 32-bit hot-running single-core server CPU.

 

[Terry1212]

The law of diminishing returns.

 

[awesomesoccerfan]

Best answer selected by awesomesoccerfan.