Dell Adds Intel Core 2 Quad, AMD Athlon 64 X2s to Lineup

By Scott M. Fulton, III, BetaNews

November 8, 2006, 6:36 PM

While it's clear Dell is no longer exclusively supplying Intel CPUs to its customers in the server, mobile, or desktop segments, it's just as clear today its former lockstep partner won't be counted completely out. This afternoon, Dell confirmed it's readying Core 2 Quad-based desktop systems and quad-core Xeon-based server systems.

The news comes just hours after the official announcement of the addition of AMD Athlon 64 X2s to the company's OptiPlex mainstream business desktop line, completing the permeation of AMD processors throughout the Dell product catalog.

On Dell's online "configurator" this afternoon, the basic OptiPlex 740 at $533 can be boosted to the lowest-price dual-core configuration -- with an Athlon 64 X2 3800+ -- for an extra $57. The highest-performing 5000+ model sells for $749, though businesses will probably be looking for a more full-featured package.

To make this 5000+ system truly "Vista-capable," we added the Vista upgrade coupon, boosted the hard drive from 80 GB to 250 GB, added a CD burner/DVD reader combo (a DVD burner was not available), added a 256 MB ATI Radeon X1300 Pro card to substitute for the integrated nVidia graphics, and threw in a Dell 19" monitor.

That brought us up to $1,574. Estimated shipment date is about two and a half weeks, which while not bad, is not exactly as quick as Dell has been in the past.

Dell's delivery dates have been a problem -- nay, a real headache -- for the company in recent months. What might have been a stellar year for the company, especially with the acquisition of Alienware, was marred this year by a series of delayed shipments of its top-of-the-line gaming system, the XPS 700, which now comes equipped with Intel Core 2 Duo and Core 2 Extreme processors.

Systems purchased and ordered as early as this May were only shipped last month, after delays in the "ramping up" of production, which Dell finally attributed last August to a fault in the cooling assembly that took time to detect.

It's worth noting that today's revelations of Core 2 Quad systems forthcoming from Dell do not yet include the XPS brand name, even though Intel has specifically targeted that processor for the gaming community.

Last Spring, Dell announced the forthcoming production of XPS systems including processors whose names Intel had yet to formally announce itself, which may have caused some friction; this time, it's Intel doing the rushing, with Core 2 Quad processors being produced ahead of their original timetable.