Intel has formalized a wide range of price cuts and changes for processor models from across various segments and platforms. The most noteworthy of these include addition of new SKUs, and repositioning (price-cuts) of certain SKUs. To begin with, Intel formally introduced the Core i7 970 six-core desktop processor. This "non-XE" model comes with a clock speed of 3.20 GHz, and Turbo speeds of 3.43 GHz, and is based on the 32 nm Gulftown die. Earlier expected to be in the $500~$600 range by sections of the press, the SKU is positioned at $885, a mere $115 cheaper than the Core i7 980X Extreme Edition (which is priced at $999).

Most of the action lies in the LGA1156 platform, with the Core i7 870 getting a massive 47.6% price cut, sending its price plummeting down to $294, from $562. This cut may have been influenced by the Core i7 875K, which is a multiplier-unlocked SKU which is priced just a little under $350, with the same clock speeds as the i7 870. Interestingly, no price changes for the i7 860 were noted. An energy-efficient variant of the i7 870, the 870s, was introduced, it is priced at $351.

With a small but sizable, and growing number of PC cases with front-panel USB 3.0 ports, it is making sense for motherboard vendors to reciprocate with motherboards that have USB 3.0 front-panel headers. Spearheading this is ASUS, with its new mainstream socket LGA1156 motherboard based on the Intel P55 chipset, the P7P55/USB3. USB 3.0 has a different front-panel header layout from USB 2.0/1.1, and on ASUS' motherboard, there are two NEC-made 2-port USB 3.0 controllers, one for the two rear USB 3.0 ports, and one for the 2-port USB 3.0 header. The header can connect to front-panel ports, or simply provide two rear ports using an expansion bracket.

Apart from that, the P7P55/USB3 is a fairly standard offering with 4+2 phase CPU VRM, one PCI-Express 2.0 x16 slot, a PCI-Express x16 (electrical x4) slot, and two each of PCI-E x1 and PCI. The P55 PCH provides six SATA 3 Gb/s ports, connectivity features include 8-channel HD audio with optical SPDIF output, gigabit Ethernet, and USB 3.0. ASUS did not give out a price, though one can expect this model to be on the lower side, we expect under $150.

SilverStone is ready with a Nitrogon NT07 series CPU cooler compatible with the LGA1156 socket. Like the NT07-775 (made for LGA775), the NT07-1156 from SilverStone is a low-profile CPU cooler that is positioned to be a Intel reference HSF replacement. It bears resemblance with the Intel HSF, using essentially the same design, with its own additions of a base made entirely of copper, and manual speed control. The base conveys heat to a heatsink with spirally-projecting, forked, aluminum fins. A 90 mm fan circulates air, it measures 90mm (W) x 90mm (H) x 16mm (D), with two speed modes selectable by a tiny switch on the fan-frame: 1200~3000rpm ± 10% and 1200~1800rpm ± 10%; pushing 12~40 CFM / 12~23 CFM on the two modes, respectively.

The cooler measures 93mm (W) x 36.5mm (H) x 93mm (D), weighing 310 g. With LGA1156 push-pins, the cooler is easy to install and remove. It supports CPUs with TDP of up to 95W, which means that it should be able to run dual-core Core i3, Core i5 processors with mild overclocking, or quad-core Core i5, Core i7 within default speeds. The cooler will reach stores soon, it will be moderately priced around US $20.

ASRock is readying a new high-end socket LGA1156 motherboard based on the Intel P55 chipset, the P55 Extreme4. Designed to be a notch above the P55 Deluxe3, which packs two SATA 6 Gb/s and two USB 3.0 ports, the Extreme4 uses two 2-port controllers to drive four SATA 6 Gb/s ports, and two USB 3.0 controllers to drive two USB 3.0 ports on the rear panel, and two ports by internal headers (for the latest cases that come with USB 3.0 front-panel ports, or simply by USB 3.0 expansion brackets). Connections to these four controllers is conveniently handled by configuring the PCI-Express x4 port from the P55 PCH to work as four x1 ports, apart from the four x1 ports it gives apart from the x4 port. This way, the board is also able to provide three x1 expansion slots and drive the PCI-E GbE controller.

The other expansion slots are two PCI-Express 2.0 x16 (electrical x8/x8, when both are populated), supporting SLI and CrossFire, and two PCI. Apart from the four SATA 6 Gb/s ports (color-coded white), the six SATA 3 Gb/s ports (color-coded blue) are present internally. The CPU socket seems to be powered by an 8+2 phase VRM. The four DDR3 memory slots can take DDR3 modules with frequencies of over 2600 MHz with overclocking. Other connectivity features include 8-channel HD audio and gigabit Ethernet. ASRock will introduce the P55 Extreme4 in a few weeks' time.

MSI rolled out two of its performance Lucid Hydra based motherboards it's been working on, the socket LGA1156 P55A Fuzion and socket AM3 870A Fuzion. The P55A Fuzion uses a 10-phase CPU VRM that makes use of high-C capacitors, Lotes-made socket, two-phase VRM for the memory, and expansion slots which include two PCI-E 2.0 x16 (full-bandwidth), two PCI-E x1, and two PCI. The PCI-E x16 slots are wired to the Lucid Hydra 200 chip that gives each graphics card full interface bandwidth, and offers vendor-neutral multi-GPU pairing. Users can pair NVIDIA graphics cards with ATI, and can also mix and match different GPUs. Connectivity features include two SATA 6 Gb/s ports, six SATA 3 Gb/s, USB 3.0, 8-channel audio, and gigabit Ethernet.

The 870A Fuzion is based on the AMD 870 chipset with SB850 southbridge. It supports socket AM3 CPUs, including six-core Phenom II X6. The CPU is powered by a 4+1 phase VRM. Expansion slots include two PCI-E 2.0 x16, two PCI-E x1, and one PCI. Apart from the CPU architecture, this board has all the features of P55A Fuzion, except that it has eight SATA 6 Gb/s ports. Connectivity here, too, includes USB 3.0, 8-channel audio, Lucid Hydra multi-GPU technology, and gigabit Ethernet. The 870A Fuzion is expected to be priced around US $160, while the P55A Fuzion is expected to go for $190.

A recent report by HKEPC shows that Intel will be cutting the prices of certain key SKUs to make them and the price-point they're targeting, more competitive. For instance, until now available for over US $500, and replaced by the Core i7 960, the Core i7 950 (LGA1366, 3.06 GHz, quad-core) chip will be placed at the $294 price-point, displacing the Core i7 930 2.80 GHz chip.

With the value segment, the socket LGA1156 Core i3 500 series chips will have a new SKU, the Core i3 560. This dual-core chip is clocked at 3.33 GHz, and priced at $138. Intel has recently released its new $200 LGA1156 quad-core chip, the Core i5 760 2.80 GHz. The new pricing will be effective from August 29.

Thermalright is ready with a Black variant of its Venomous X CPU cooler. It uses essentially the same materials as the standard model, except for its black nickel-plating, which makes it suit aesthetics of certain builds. It uses Thermalright's standard tower design, with six heatpipes. It has provision to hold a 140 mm fan on either side. The unit measures 127 x 63 x 160 mm, weighing 755 g. It supports all current sockets, including LGA1366, LGA1156, AM3/AM2(+), and LGA775. The Venomous X comes with a tube of Chill Factor III TIM bundled. It will be priced around the 55 EUR mark.

Intel today rolled out two new high-performance processors aimed at the enthusiast community, which is sure to please users of LGA1156 platform. The release includes the quad-core Core i7 875K, and dual-core Core i5 655K. Based on the 45 nm Lynnfield die, the Core i7 875K is clocked at 2.93 GHz, with a maximum Turbo Boost speed of 3.60 GHz. While having identical clock speeds to the Core i7 870, the 875K comes with a fully unlocked BClk multiplier, which is featured in Extreme Edition processors.

The unlocked multiplier helps with overclocking. Also featured is that the core and DRAM ratios are unlocked so memory bus speeds can be kept independent of the core speed to an extant. The processor retains the TDP rating of 95W, which other Lynnfield-based processors have. It has a monolithic die which houses the processor and northbridge, dual-channel DDR3 memory controller, and PCI-Express root complex. Intel HyperThreading Technology enables 8 logical CPUs for the OS to deal with.

Intel introduced two new dual-core processors, the high-end Core i5 680, and the value-segment Pentium Dual-Core E5500. The former is an LGA1156 chip that runs on Intel P55, H55, H57, Q55, Q57 chipsets, while the latter is an LGA775 chip that works on most recent LGA775 motherboards. The Core i5 680 uses the 32 nm based Clarkdale core. At 3.60 GHz (27 x 133 MHz) with a Turbo Boost speed of 3.86 GHz, the i5 680 is expected to be the fastest dual-core processor ever made. Its embedded Intel HD Graphics controller is clocked at 733 MHz. It has L2 caches of 256 KB per core, and a shared L3 cache of 4 MB. It supports two channels of DDR3 memory. With HyperThreading enabled, the chip gives the OS four logical CPUs to deal with. It has a TDP of 73W.

The Pentium Dual-Core E5500 is based on the 45 nm Wolfdale-2M core, it has a clock speed of 2.80 GHz (14 x 200 MHz), and FSB speed of 800 MHz. It has a shared L2 cache of 2 MB, and TDP of 65W. While the Core i5 680 is priced at US $294, the E5500 goes for $75. All prices are per-piece in 1000 unit tray quantities.

MSI is working on its third motherboard that makes use of Lucid Hydra multi-GPU technology, this one aimed to be a more affordable model than the Big Bang Fuzion, for the socket LGA-1156 platform. Lucid Hydra technology allows users to mix and match graphics cards from across brands and models to upscale performance. A newly-release driver (1.5.106) for Hydra is said to increase functionality by adding full support for DirectX multi-GPU scaling, as well as expects significantly higher performance upscaling compared to older drivers. The new motherboard from MSI is the P55-GD88 Hydra, also to be known as P55A Hydra.

Built on a PCB that's different from that of the Big Bang Fuzion, the P55A Hydra uses High-C capacitors only for the CPU VRM, with normal solid-state capacitors for the rest of the board. Unlike the Big Bang Fuzion it has only two PCI-Express 2.0 x16 slots, but these slots work at x16 speeds. Perhaps the only selling point for Hydra on this setup (since Intel P55 platform already supports both SLI and CrossFire, and tests have shown performance hit between x16 and x8 to be insignificant for even high-end GPUs), is the ability to mix and match different kinds of graphics cards, including mixing an ATI Radeon card with an NVIDIA GeForce card.

Thermaltake, leading DIY thermal solutions brand, launch their all-new low profile CPU especially targeting Home Theater PC users, the Thermaltake SlimX3. Since for Home Theater PCs usually small and mini size cases are used, the CPU cooler performance is of utmost importance, it has to come with a very small footprint in order to fit into the case, but at the same time offer sufficient cooling capacity in a silent environment.

The SlimX3 adopts two Φ6 mm Copper heat-pipes with an aluminum fins/base combination to provide a highly effective cooling performance for multimedia oriented CPUs. Through the heat-pipe design better heat conductivity is achieved to accelerate heat dissipation. With its slim design with a total height of only 36 mm the SlimX3 is optimized and ideal for use in most mini cases.

Intel carved out high-end socket LGA1156 processors such as the Core i7 800 series, just so people opting for the LGA1156 also have the headroom to upgrade to high-end parts without having to switch to the more powerful LGA1366 platform with its Core i7 900 series processors. There are four parts in the performance-enthusiast (>$250) segment: Core i5 670 dual-core, Core i7 860 and Core i7 870 quad-core. With the possible advent of more powerful socket AM3 processors from AMD, notably the Phenom II X6 series with its overclocker-friendly Black Edition parts, Intel seems to be finding a need to expand its LGA1156 series a little.

In the works are the Core i7 875K quad-core, and Core i5 655K dual-core. Being careful as to not label them "Extreme Edition" chips (since the "Extreme Edition" moniker seems to be clearly demarcated for the LGA1366 platform and the market segment by that name), Intel gave these chips the "K" brand identifier. Last summer, Intel released the Pentium Dual-Core E6500K to select markets. Similar to that, the Core i7 875K and Core i5 655K are overclocker-friendly chips that come with unlocked BClk multipliers (much like the Extreme Edition chips).

Gigabyte is readying a new motherboard in the mini-ITX form-factor which is bound to surprise some with its feature-set. The GA-H55N-USB3 is a socket LGA1156 motherboard based on the Intel H55 chipset, supporting the entire range of LGA1156 processors with a powerful 4+2 phase VRM. The socket is wired to two DDR3 DIMM slots for dual-channel memory, which is powered by its own 2-phase circuit. Gigabyte was able to accommodate five SATA channels by the chipset, making space for one eSATA, and four internal SATA 3 Gb/s ports with RAID support.

Its lone expansion slot is a full-bandwidth PCI-Express 2.0 x16, while being based on the H55 chipset, it also supports Intel Flexible Display Interface for processors with embedded graphics. On its connectivity front it doesn't make many compromises either, with 8+2 channel HD audio with optical SPDIF connector, a two-port USB 3.0 controller giving out two USB SuperSpeed ports, gigabit Ethernet, Keyboard/Mouse combo PS/2, four USB 2.0 ports on the rear-panel + four by internal headers, and display connectivity which includes DVI, D-Sub, and HDMI. The GA-H55N-USB3 is expected to be out in April.

Scythe announces its newest high-end CPU cooler, named "Yasya" to the market. Yasya CPU Cooler is the first cooler from Scythe equipped with the newly developed T.M.L.F. (Trident Multi Layer Fin) structure. This special design maximizes the cooling surface to provide the best cooling result of the heatsink. By placing the heatsink fins as well as total of 6 copper heatpipes in unparallel design, static pressure loss is minimized and heat transfer is maximized. New 120 mm "Slip Stream 120 Adjustable PWM" case fan is supplied for optimized airflow. Although the fan supports the PWM feature user can manually adjust the speed between 470 to 1,370 rpm and 740 to 1,900 rpm.

Easy mounting is available by the famous V.T.M.S. (Versatile Tool-Free Multiplatform System) which requires no motherboard removal for the heatsink mounting. Yasya CPU Cooler is compatible to all current sockets, including the new socket LGA 1156. Scythe Yasya will be available worldwide from early March 2010 at the price of 57 US$ (excl. Tax) / 35,90 Euro (Excl. VAT).

ASUS today announced the launch of the new ASUS P7F7-E WS SuperComputer motherboard which maximizes transmission speeds by integrating the industry's latest I/O technologies such as USB 3.0, SATA 6G storage interface, and IEEE 1394b FireWire standard. Additionally, the ASUS P7F7-E WS SuperComputer is equipped with the LGA1156 socket and the latest Intel 3450 chipset with onboard graphics. For extreme gaming enjoyment, up to four ATI CrossFireX cards or 3-way/2-way NVIDIA SLI cards can be accommodated to generate smoother and sharper visuals. It also leverages NVIDIA CUDA parallel computing architecture to support up to four NVIDIA Tesla cards with Clarkdale Processors for intensive high-performance computing.

The ASUS P7F7-E WS SuperComputer is the best choice for providing comprehensive I/O support. It includes USB 3.0 ports-the latest connectivity standard with 4.8Gb/s speeds-to support next-generation components and peripherals. USB 3.0 transfers data ten times faster and is backward compatible with USB 2.0 components. Additionally, the ASUS P7F7-E WS SuperComputer includes Serial ATA (SATA) 6Gb/s storage interfaces for 6.0Gbps data throughput, thus enhancing scalability, accelerating data retrieval, and doubling the bandwidth of current bus systems. To support FireWire-enabled digital video recorders and computers, the ASUS P7F7-E WS SuperComputer also includes two IEEE 1394b ports supporting up to 800 Mb/s speeds-doubling the previous IEEE 1394a speeds.

Mushkin Enhanced, a global leader in high-performance computer products, announced today the release of an incredibly fast DDR3-2000 Channel Blackline Kit for Intel's LGA1156 platform.

Offering CL7 performance at DDR3-2000, the 996829 memory kit provides an elegant solution for the PC3-16000 specification while simultaneously boasting Mushkin Enhanced's unparalled quality level.

"Our newest DDR3-2000 kit is a real accomplishment for us. It offers the best of both worlds: top-tier performance with the reliability and stability our customers expect." - Brian Flood, director of product development.

ASRock has updated the BIOS of its H55M Pro socket LGA1156 motherboard to include a "Turbo 100" feature. The feature is designed to run with the entry-level Pentium Dual-Core G6950 processor, which overclocks it from 2.80 GHz to 4.20 GHz, with a turbo ratio of 100%. This, the company claims, provides a significant graphics performance boost (tabled below). The new BIOS can be downloaded from ASRock Forums' Intel section.

Coolink today introduced its new Corator DS CPU-Cooler. Featuring Coolink's exclusive Gapless Direct Touch (GDT) technology that allows for an all copper contact area, the Corator DS brings the concept of direct contact cooling to the next level by further improving heat transfer. Four large 8mm heatpipes, a dual fin stack design and a PWM controlled SWiF2 120mm fan are among the features that enable the Corator DS to achieve an optimal balance between outstanding cooling performance and quiet operation.

"True to our vision of innovating instead of following, we worked hard to strengthen the advantages of direct contact cooling and to eliminate its drawbacks", explains Timothy Chu, Coolink CEO. "Thus we're proud to introduce the Corator DS today, which is our first product based on Coolink's exclusive GDT-technology. Its innovative contact surface in combination with the other features allows us to offer a complete high-performance cooling solution at an attractive price point".

World renowned mainboard and graphic card manufacturer, Micro-Star International Co., Ltd. again presents its P55-GD85 mainboard, and is officially supporting the Intel latest 32nm process and LGA1156 packaged Core i3 / i5 / i7 series CPU. In addition, the mainboard is built-in with SATA 6Gb/s and SuperSpeed USB 3.0 protocols and each has 2X and 10X ultra-high data transmission bandwidths respectively than their predecessors. OC Genie, SuperPipe and DrMOS, the 3 excellent design inherited from Xtreme Speed P55 series mainboard, are incorporated providing P55-GD85 mainboard with best compatibility and can offer outstanding performance.

Scythe is announcing today a new High-End TOP-Flow CPU Cooler by the name "Grand Kama Cross", which is the successor of former Kama Cross CPU Cooler. Grand Kama Cross is based on an X Structure layout using total of four 8 mm copper heatpipes for fast transfer of heat from the copper base to the aluminum fins. Thanks to the X Structure Design, easier mounting on CPU sockets as well as higher compatibility to tall RAM and Northbridge coolers are accomplished. By using the angled fin shape, airflow is redirected to allow additional cooling of surrounding components such as RAM, Northbridge and Voltage Regulators. For the optimum airflow, new Slip Stream 140 mm fan is first introduced with Grand Kama Cross CPU Cooler. PWM support allows flexible fan speed in a range between 500 and 1,300 rpm, automatically controlled by the motherboard creating airflow from 46 to 119 m³/h and accordingly 27.2 to 69.93 CFM. Both Slip Stream 140 mm fan and Grand Kama Cross CPU Cooler are using standard 120 mm fan mounting holes which allow the use of common aftermarkets 120 mm case fans as a replacement.