Today, Intel launched its first ever six-core processor: the Xeon 7400. While the name might not be as complex as the name Sony is giving to their new line of laptops, it certainly should be. Everything about this processor is “no joke” as it is geared towards high-end computing, like those used by the scientists working on the Large Hadron Collider.

An estimated 50-percent speed boost over its predecessor is possible as this processor peaks around 2.66GHz with 130W of power.  The new Xeons are going to be the last of their kind before Intel makes the jump to the new Core i7 architecture. Things are certainly looking fast for the computing world.

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In the wake of the Commodore 64 LAN party comes a new breed of laptop. Commodore is pulling a Steve Jobs, as in: you heard it was dead, but it was all lies. It’s making a comeback with a netbook, go figure, it’s the UMMD 8010/F. Compared to the Commodore 64, it’s loaded. The UMMD 8010/F has a 10″ screen and comes with a processing power of 1.6GHZ, 80GB of hard drive space and 1GB of RAM.

It’s half the price of the Dell E Mini Notebook, with half the RAM. At $600 dollars, it comes packed with a 1.3-megapixel camera and 802.11b/g Wi-Fi capability. But you know the only reason you’d buy it is because it says “Commodore” right below the monitor.

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Late last year Intel released the Q6700, their brand new baby that was a Core 2 Quad (not duo) and had a clock speed of 2.66 GHz. So what is the difference between the Q6700 and the brand new Q6600, well, other than 100, there is a difference in clock speed of .26Ghz. The new Q6600 runs at 2.4Ghz intsead of 2.66. Also, the Q6600 is locked, meaning there is no option of overclocking this quad core monster.

The talk that quad cores are essentially two duos placed on the same chip is true, and the Q6600 is just two Core 2 Duo E6600 cores on a single socket with a pair of 4MB L2 caches and a 1066MHz frontside bus. So other than the locked state of the Q6600 and its clock speed, there is no difference between the two CPUs. So why is this new processor significant? It is really the first quad-core CPU to hit and be aimed at the mainstream market. While no solid price has been released by Intel yet, it will probably be priced a bit under the Q6700’s $999 price point.

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