Intel Core 2 Duo E6320/6420: The Long Awaited Low-End

As a whole, new processors are somewhat disappointing. At that it is quite logical to assume, that since 6320 turned out to be not much faster than 6300, 6420 will be insignificantly faster than 6400 (although we do not have any results obtained with the new methods for the latter). On the other hand, this disappointment is mostly predetermined – we expected too much, but lo and behold - it didn't happen. In reality, all is apparently plain here: Intel has debugged its production and lowered the yield of units with partially faulty L2 cache, so that brought about the idea to give 63xx and 64xx series a complete cache practically for nothing (price comparison between 6300 and 6320 supports this thesis, they are virtually the same). Add to that improved power consumption characteristics (although, 6400/6300 with new stepping had them too). In fact, only gamers, who also happen to be staunch supporters of Intel platform, have a reason to rejoice: in games new Core2 Duo E6320 is quite comparable to Athlon 64 X2 5000+ not only in performance, but also in price/performance ratio.