After years of easy domination over AMD Intel is feeling the pinch and have responded much faster than usual. This probably means that there was/is performance to spare in their existing designs. This is good for fast response, but not the best thing to show to consumers and loyal fans.

The new CPUs are all going to be Kaby Lake and Skylake, with only two quad core variants being Kaby Lake. So far, all will fit in the LGA2066 socket. Core counts will range from four all the way up to 18 (with 36 threads possible). You will get some “new” features to go along with all of those cores including Turbo Max 3.0, which allows you to boost two cores for best performance versus just one in the current CPUs. This should be interesting to try out, as there are certainly more multi-core aware applications than in the past.
Model numbers are going to be consistent with what is already in the lineup except now Intel has added in a new “I” we will have the core i5, i7 and now the i9 (this one goes to 11). The core i9-7980XE will be the new flagship (and will set you back around $2,000) with other models falling in line below:

i9-7960X $1699 (16 Cores)
i9-7940X $1399 (14 Cores)
i9-7920X $1199 (12 Cores)
i9-7900X $999 (10 Cores)
i7-7820X $599 (8 Cores)
i7-7800X $389 (6 Cores)
i5-7740X $339 (4 Cores)

Overall the new lineup and pricing look like they are very consumer friendly (ok relatively) and might be able to put a damper on some of AMD’s momentum. That is… if AMD does not already have a response planned. I simply love it when two companies compete like this.