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Comment by sz4kerto | Hacker News Reader

Intel has just priced it's 18-core i9-7900X at 2K.

You do realise Xeons are a completely different range with different price points right?

Yes, I have Xeons in my WS. The reason why many people ended up buying Xeons for the desktop is core count -- i7 had 6, then 8 cores until recently, so a 10-18 core workstation could only be built with Xeons. The other difference is ECC, which most of the people don't necessarily want (let's not talk about whether they need it or not).

If a developer/pro/etc. need 18 cores, most of the time they'll be OK with a top-end i7 -- I think. Therefore it is fair to compare Xeons with i7s, they're not the same but yes, they have overlapping target audience when it comes to desktops.

> If a developer/pro/etc. need 18 cores, most of the time they'll be OK with a top-end i7 -- I think.

Not if they need ECC RAM - and if you've got enough professional stuff to fill 128GB of RAM, you really, really need ECC RAM.

Especially if you're routinely moving terabytes between the workstation and NAS.

Ryzen 7: eight cores, ECC support, unbeatable pricing.

(No 128 GB RAM but you're not getting that with a desktop i7 either. Oh and the new HEDT platform that also has "i7"s… not all chips will support quad channel RAM!)

In context, I'm not sure I understand your point.

for all we know at this point the new intel lines are rebranded xeons (plus a few consumer features), the hastily put together response to AMD seems to suggest this.

relevant for people who don't know: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TWFzWRoVNnE

the funnier version: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Xah84cJwdxE

http://i.imgur.com/EZ6LyI1.png

http://i.imgur.com/tbwNbdh.png

EDIT: by mistake I originally linked this video I had in my clipboard: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5scez5dqtAc

While this is true, the i9 18-core part is the first they've launched after AMD made their big move with their new 8 and 16 core parts.

It's possible that Intel might have to claw back Xeon pricing accordingly to defend their market share.

Not sure why people are burying you, because that's 100% accurate.

8 core for $600. 10 core for $1k, 18 core for $2k. With 12, 14, and 16 core increments available in-between.

https://www.pcper.com/reviews/Processors/Intel-Core-i9-Annou...

Because it's Xeons which is a different line.

No, they are not. All extreme edition CPU's from Intel are cut down Xeons with deactivated features (like ECC support), and the need to buy hardware dongles to make RAID 5 and RAID 10 work.

EDIT: read the children posts. I mistakenly read "chip" instead of "line". Of course Xeons are a different line compared to Intels extreme line. The above about the extreme series CPU's being cut down Xeons is still true but in this context wrong and irrelevant.

So they're the same apart from all the features they don't have. What a deeply insightful observation.

They're the same chip, but one of them has ‎artificially deactivated features and is a different line, yes. Misread the line part as chip.

It's a different part and it has different features. Not having ECC memory support is a big deal for some people, so it's misleading to suggest they're basically the same.

They bin things for a reason. If you're happy using a less expensive part with fewer features, great, you can save money. If you're making a top-tier "Pro" product you'll want to avoid cutting corners like that.

It's a different "part" in the stores, but it starts off as the same "chip" in the factory.

I don't understand your point. People are comparing prices. The process of binning chips is essentially "some of these are broken, but can be salvaged for other less taxing uses by running them slower or disabling features". You just can't compare the prices of the different lines. I just don't understand what you are trying or argue here or why :/.

Levi's sells many different kinds of jeans made from the same material, buttons and zippers, yet they have different price points.

The materials involved are only one factor.

What is misleading about that? I merely stated that they are the same chip at the start, but Intel deactivates features on the extreme series to segregate the market (nothing wrong with that).

Also see my edit of my original post where I mistakenly misread "line" as "chip" as stated.

> They bin things for a reason.

Yes, of course, so that the extreme series doesn't cut into the margins of the server market. If you could run RAID 5 and 10 without hardware dongles and ECC on the extreme series some smaller companies would probably prefer the i9 18 core for 2000$ to the 3000-4000$ 18 core Xeons. Again, this is fine, but Xeons and extreme series start of as the same chip. That's all I wanted to say on top of my correction of my original post.

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