New Core i7 Mobile CPUs introduced

Today Intel updated CPU price list, adding three new Core i7 Mobile microprocessors. The launch date matched our expectations, that were based on new notebook release dates, as was explained in the last week's "New Intel Mobile CPUs to launch next week?" story.

The fastest launched microprocessor, and the fastest overall Core-branded Intel Mobile CPU, is a Core i7-940XM Extreme Edition. While this quad-core processor is clocked at 2.13 GHz, its frequency can be temporarily increased due to Turbo Boost feature. Public specifications for this CPU are not released yet, but we suspect that frequency boost, provided by this feature, will be identical to Core i7-920XM, i.e. 266 MHz when 3 or 4 cores are active, 1067 MHz for 2 active cores, and 1200 MHz when only 1 core is active. The i7-940XM has large 8MB level 3 cache, and supports all features available in Nehalem micro-architecture: 64-bit, SIMD instructions up to SSE4, HyperThreading, Virtualization VT-x and VT-d, and Trusted Execution Technology. Thermal Design power of this CPU is 55 Watt. Lastly, the Core i7-940XM has unlocked core multiplier. The processor is priced at $1096, that is $42 more expensive than the introduction price of Core i7-920XM Extreme.

New Core i7-8xx model, i7-840QM, is clocked at 1.86 GHz, which is 133 MHz faster than Core i7-820QM. Many features of this CPU are the same as on the Core i7-940XM with the following exceptions. This is not an extreme processor, so clock multiplier is locked. Frequency increase, provided on this model by Turbo Boost feature, is 133 MHz higher for single-threaded applications than on the i7-940XM. The CPU has 45 Watt Thermal Design Power. This is lower than on the Core i7 Extreme, but still higher than 35 TDP on Core i3 / i5 Mobile microprocessors. Official CPU price is $568, or $22 higher than the Core i7-820QM.

The last introduced processor is a Core i7-740QM. This CPU has 133 MHz higher core frequency than the i7-720QM. There are no other differences between the Core i7-720QM and the i7-740QM. Compared to more powerful i7-840QM and i7-940XM models, the i7-740QM has smaller size of L3 cache - 6 MB vs 8 MB on i7-8xx / i7-9xx mmicroprocessors, and smaller frequency boost in Turbo Boost mode. Like the i7-840QM, the i7-740QM fits 45 Watt thermal envelope. Processor's price is $378, or $14 higher than the price of Core i7-720QM.

Update: The price list also shows three new ultra-low voltage processors, Core i7-660UM, Core i5-540UM, and Celeron U3400. While the processors were just added to the list, they were released quite some time ago, on May 24th. We posted a news story about these CPUs three weeks ago.