Six-core Intel Core i9 Gulftown Processor tests shows Boost in Performance

Intel's six-core Gulftown processors got delayed to second quarter of 2010 and was tested by Polish site PC Lab. This six-core Intel Gulftown processor is from the 32nm Westmere family flagship with 12MB shared L3 cache and compatible with Intel Socket LGA1366 based motherboards. As per the tests, this multi-core Gulftown chip showed 50 percent boost in the performance. These Gulftown lines up CPUs are likely to be dubbed as Core i9 chips.

PC Labs found that 2.86GHz clocked 32nm Core i9 'Gulftown' CPU showed about 50 percent faster video encoding and 3D modeling than the Core i7 with the same clock speed. Other multicore core tests didn't show large gains for the non-optimized tasks. Only when more multi-core utilization friendly applications will be released, the maximum would be made off the six cores. The memory speed and performance may not be as high as anticipated. Though BIOS for the available motherboards didn't offer any support, PC Labs guys managed to over clock the chip to 4.3GHz on the air cooling.

The 32nm die shrink brought significant reduction in power consumption and used less power as compared with its Core i7 and Core 2 Quad counterparts. The current engineering sample was able to carry maximum load at a temperature lower than the Core i7 chip. More efficient transistors are packed in the smaller 32nm die shrink so they will give power efficient performance as compared with the other Socket LGA1366 chips.

It's the additional two cores and hyperthreading support backed by appropriate power consumption that will prove true prowess of Gulftown chip. Intel is rumored to release this hexa-core chip in first quarter of 2010 and might get delayed to early second quarter.