AMD is allegedly getting ready to launch the Phenom processor on November 19th. Some pricing for a few of the processors have already began leaking online.
The AMD Phenom X4 9500 which has a 95-watt thermal envelope and a 2.2GHz operating frequency should be priced at $280 (retail). The Phenom X4 9600 which runs at 2.3GHz with 512KB of L2 cache per core will be priced at $320 (retail). The final offering is the AMD Phenom X4 9700 will be priced at $330 and has an operating frequency of 2.4GHz and has a 125-watt thermal envelope.
The 9700 was originally going to be clocked at 2.6GHz and before you get worried about how stable the chip is, DailyTech suggests that the sudden decrease may have something to do with “creative marketing plans.”
AMD has also shown off 3.0GHz Phenom processors in the past but according to the roadmap we won’t be seeing Phenom processors with that kind of operating frequency until 2008.
UPDATE: DigiTimes suggests that the reason for the lack of 2.6GHz at launch may be to do with problems transitioning from 90nm to 65nm and that we may only see two Phenom CPUs at launch, those being the 2.2GHz and 2.3GHz models.
DigiTimes also goes on to say that the 2.4GHz 9700 model won’t be coming out until December.