Intel sent over a reviewer’s kit, which included a Nehalem CPU (the $999 Core i7-965), an Intel DX58S0 Motherboard (Smackover chipset) and an Intel SSDA2MHO80G solid state hard drive. We added four gigabytes of Corsair DDR3 RAM (four 1GB Modules), a NVidia Quadro  FX1700 display adapter and a NZXT high performance PSU. To test performance, we installed Windows Vista Ultimate 64 bit and used PassMark Performance Test (64Bit).

On our first test pass, with everything set to factory defaults, the system scored a passmark rating of 2412.2, which is quite impressive. For reference, we compared the performance to a recently tested HP XW6600 Dual Xeon workstation , which scored a 2892.6 Passmark rating. The HP system used the same video card, but had 8 Gbytes of RAM. That shows the Nehalem and Smackover combo comes within 17 percent of the performance offered by a dual Xeon setup.

Next we decided to experiment with overclocking the Nehalem and pushed the CPU from the factory rated 3.2Ghz clock speed to 3.6Ghz. That brought our score up to a respectable 2701.3, narrowing the performance gap between a dual Xeon workstation and Nehalem to just about 7 percent. Pretty impressive, when one considers we were comparing a single Core i7 quad core CPU to a pair of quad core Xeons. At 3.6Ghz, the system remained stable. We encountered no lockups or system failures, and the supplied Intel CPU fan was able to keep everything within operating temperatures. Any attempts to go beyond 3.6Ghz were met with lockups, blue screens and boot failures.

One thing is certain, Nehalem shows that Intel is able to crank up the performance of the 45 nanometer architecture, while proving to still be affordable. But, some wonder how anyone could consider a $999 CPU to be affordable. Simply put, a single Nehalem can do the work of a pair of Xeons. Those Xeons currently cost more and all of the supporting hardware, such as a dual CPU motherboard board, higher wattage PSU and so on all add to the cost .

For solution providers, Nehalem should become the CPU of choice for high performance systems and should bring higher margins to system builders, thanks to the new Intel Chipsets and the use of DDR3 RAM.