Though no real advantage in gaming is apparent at all, it would be nice to know what if anything the duel QPI and 2 extra cores and larger L3 cache do for holding FSX steady and smooth.Speaking of the larger cache:"The added cache does come at the expense of higher access latency. Nehalem and Lynnfield had a 42-cycle 8MB L3, Gulftown has a 48 cycle 12MB L3. A 14% higher latency for a 50% increase in size. Not an insignificant penalty, but a tradeoff that makes sense."-Anand shimpiNot too unexpectedly so far I have not seen any FSX benchmarks.However I requested Anand to again throw up some suggested FSX benches, we will just have to wait to see if he can oblige. http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=3763http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/core-i...ftown,2573.htmlhttp://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/cpus/2010...dition-review/1http://www.guru3d.com/article/core-i7-980x-review/http://techreport.com/articles.x/18581/1http://www.overclockersclub.com/reviews/intel__core_i7_980x/http://benchmarkreviews.com/index.php?opti...5&Itemid=63http://www.hardwaresecrets.com/article/944http://www.maximumpc.com/article/features/intel_rolls_six

LOL, funny the NDA should expire the day after my stating the NDA has not yet expired in another Gulftown thread. Now we just have to wait for some brave soul to buy one for FSX and report the results.

Yeah I'm still waiting for my F1 Mustang VC, NYC, UT2 50% traffic, FEX, UTX/GEX with very dense autogen-capable rig at 30fpsHopefully this will be the one.

Yeah I'm still waiting for my F1 Mustang VC, NYC, UT2 50% traffic, FEX, UTX/GEX with very dense autogen-capable rig at 30fpsHopefully this will be the one.

I think you'll be waiting a long time.I'm still waiting for CPU/GPU that will run FSX with decent settings and perform (not a measly 30 FPS) as good as what I expect out of the rest of my 20 of so sims/games, some how I don't think it's going to happen. The 980X along with the GTX 480 was supposed to be my next upgrade, replacing my old Q9650 based machine. Between the questionable latency with the added cache and the less than stellar reported overclocking potential I might skip the 980X and go for the new 970 with locked multiplier and 3.2GHz clock instead. This combined with some of the reports of not so impressive performance out of the new GTX 480 makes me wonder if this might be a uneventful year for CPU/GPU upgrading. The money might be better spent on storage improvements with the new SATA III spec SSD's and motherboards. On the bright side it looks like the predictions many of us were making three+ years ago about Microsoft abandoning FS on the PC and moving to the console just might be coming true -http://forums.gamesforwindows.com/t/11153.aspxMaybe we'll get a new flight sim that will be properly optimized to perform great on a $200-300.00 next gen XBOX360.Again I'm still not holding my breath with this one but there was also some talk today that hints that Aerosoft might have found an investor for their proposed flight sim. ASUS Rampage II Extreme (1802 BIOS)Intel Core i7-975 Extreme Edition w/Thermalright Ultra-120 eXtreme 1366 RTMushkin Redline Ascent 6GB (3 x 2GB) DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) (6-7-6-18-1N)Asus/ATI 5870 (Catalyst 10.2)Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1tyWD VelociRaptor 150GB

Flight Sim Live.... oh boy!FS on a console would not be fun imhoAnyway someone brave please step up to the challenge with the 980 hehe

Flight Sim Live.... oh boy!FS on a console would not be fun imhoAnyway someone brave please step up to the challenge with the 980 hehe

You'll have to explain to us why it

"less than stellar reported overclocking potential" did you actually read any of the reviews? 4GHz+ on *stock* cooling is nothing short of extraordinary.

"less than stellar reported overclocking potential" did you actually read any of the reviews? 4GHz+ on *stock* cooling is nothing short of extraordinary.

Yes I did, and 4GHz on stock cooling is nothing extraordinary when we've already had that with the 45 nm i7 for a while now. ASUS Rampage II Extreme (1802 BIOS)Intel Core i7-975 Extreme Edition w/Thermalright Ultra-120 eXtreme 1366 RTMushkin Redline Ascent 6GB (3 x 2GB) DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) (6-7-6-18-1N)Asus/ATI 5870 (Catalyst 10.2)Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1tyWD VelociRaptor 150GB

LOL, funny the NDA should expire the day after my stating the NDA has not yet expired in another Gulftown thread. Now we just have to wait for some brave soul to buy one for FSX and report the results.

yeah, same here, I think we both posted at the exact same time on that thread.Still havent heard back from Anand, hope we get some FSX 975 vs 980 benches.On O/C the 980, one of the sites posted 4.7Ghz easily on liquid, I'll bet 5 is with in reach in the 2nd stepping.More good stuff on over clocking from has me a bit interested:http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/cpus/2010...dition-review/3However, while the i7-975 was merely a very good overclocker - it only overclocked by 200-300MHz more than a standard Core i7 - the i7-980X has an ace up its sleeve: its 32nm transistors. These smaller, faster transistors allowed us not only to overclock the i7-980X to a much higher frequency than the i7-975, but also to use less voltage to do so. The lower the voltage required for an overclock the better, as more voltage means more power to dissipate from the CPU (in the form of heat), and more stress on the motherboard's VRMs.With the Titan Fenrir air cooler, the i7-975 topped out at 4.27GHz with a CPU multiplier of 24x, QPI of 178MHz and a vcore of 1.45V. While this is a good overclock, and boosted the overall Media Benchmarks score from 1,896 to 2,326, the i7-980X overclocked to 4.4GHz with a CPU multiplier of 22x, QPI of 200MHz and a vcore of just 1.38125V. This monster overclock raised the score considerably from 2,002 to 2,581. At 4.4GHz, the i7-980X was also much faster than the pair of W5580s in Cinebench, scoring 35,004 compared to 28,980.As the i7-980X proved to be such a sterling overclocker with air cooling, we decided that it would be criminal not to give it a shot with water cooling. Using a Swiftech Apogee XT waterblock and Blastflow quad 120mm radiator, we were able to push the i7-980X to 4.72GHz by using a CPU multiplier of 23x, QPI of 205MHz and a vcore of 1.45V. This is the same vcore that the i7-975 needed to hit just 4.27GHz, which is nearly half a gigahertz slower. At 4.72GHz, the i7-980X returned a ludicrously high overall score of 2,715 in our Media Benchmarks and 36,222 in Cinebench.Paul

the i7-980X has an ace up its sleeve: its 32nm transistors. These smaller, faster transistors allowed us not only to overclock the i7-980X to a much higher frequency than the i7-975, but also to use less voltage to do so. The lower the voltage required for an overclock the better, as more voltage means more power to dissipate from the CPU (in the form of heat), and more stress on the motherboard's VRMs.

That's what I thought also. I knew the two extra cores weren't going to do squat with the sims/games I run, but I at least thought the added cache and better overclock ability via the 32nm manufacturing process would make a positive difference but it doesn't seem to be. http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showd...i=3763&p=15Anandtech had a better run at overclocking with this update, but not without stepping up the voltage -http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=3764http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,2845,2361198,00.aspFrom what I've read the two extra cores seem to be holding Gulftown back as far as the overclocking goes, which is what we saw a few years back with the first Core 2 Quad CPU's. Future refinements by way of another die shrink will probably help but from looking at Intel's road map , that's not going to happen until well into 2011. ASUS Rampage II Extreme (1802 BIOS)Intel Core i7-975 Extreme Edition w/Thermalright Ultra-120 eXtreme 1366 RTMushkin Redline Ascent 6GB (3 x 2GB) DDR3 1600 (PC3 12800) (6-7-6-18-1N)Asus/ATI 5870 (Catalyst 10.2)Creative Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1tyWD VelociRaptor 150GB

I'm not totally sure, but isn't GFWL (Games for windows - live) for PCs?http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Games_for_Windows_-_Live I guess it could be ported to consoles, but I think (and hope) that the next flight sim will be for the PC.

I'm not totally sure, but isn't GFWL (Games for windows - live) for PCs?

Take a look at the heading at the upper left hand side of of the job posting -

Well let's see.... consoles.... ickAnd I have two of them...Flightsimming is better on a PC because you're next to the keyboard, and it's the way we've been doing it for 20 years. My PC also has a desk so I have extra space for my peripherals. (And writing space for vatsim flight plans) . If I can get my joystick, throttle, Track IR, keyboard, and internet stable on my PS3 I'll work with it I guess.

Hi,The reason why I am hoping the new flight sim is based on the PC (again, these are my assumptions) are:a. with todays faster videocards, the graphics on a pc could look better than what could be offered on a console.b. with todays faster hard drives, we could have more storage space for add-ons, etc than a console.c. a pc is much more upgradeable, and would be able to take advantage of newer and faster pc parts that are always coming out every 6 months or so, instead of waiting for a new version of a console to come out.d. I like the idea of running more than one monitor. I don't know if a console is able to run three monitors. It seems to me, a pc can offer many more features than a console.Plus, the biggest reason: I am using a 3 year old pc, and I am itching to build a costly, new pc and running it with a three monitors set up :( I haven't owned a console game in over 20 years. The pros of a console I would assume is: easy set up; no worries about part compatibilities; driver issues; less expensive, etc. But I am still a "pc" type of guy--so far, but I am willing to change to console type of guy depending on what the next flight sim offers. :(

Flightsimming is better on a PC because you're next to the keyboard, and it's the way we've been doing it for 20 years.

Lol, this is your reasoning behind not wanting a FS on a console?For 20 years the majority of flight sim enthusiasts have been oblivious to doing things