Both CPU’s are monsters in their own class, top of the line from Intel. Xeon 5160 is Intel’s top of the line server CPU and Core 2 Extreme X6800 is its desktop counterpart. The two CPU’s does however have some major differences, like the Xeon 5160 higher clock frequency (3.0GHz vs. Core 2 Extremes 2.93GHz) and its higher bus rate (1333MHz vs 1066MHz). If that wasn’t enough Xeon 5160 also has the support for two CPU’s (note, another physical CPU containing several cores) whereas the Core 2 Extreme X6800 has fully unlocked multipliers. So by looking at the specifications we see that Xeon 5160 does indeed have some advantages over Core 2 Extreme X6800, yet it is cheaper than the Core 2 Extreme X6800.
This information has led a lot of people to question which platform is the best and most fitting for heavy applications. Over at GamePC they decided to take matters into their own hands and did a comparison between the two CPU’s and their platforms. The two CPU’s that does have a lot in common does however have different conditions, which is explained in this article. Even though the Xeon CPU is cheaper, the platform costs more and isn’t always faster. The whole article is available at GamePC.com.
