Six-core Intel CPU will be called Core i9

After the launch of a whole new range of Core i7 CPUs that are incompatible in every way with the current range of Core i7 CPUs, there was a lot of head-scratching in the office. Even more so because Intel was adamant that this new branding actually made sense. Come on, Intel, you could’ve at least called the Hyper-Threaded Lynnfield CPUs Core i6s – or do odd numbers just sound cooler?

Anyway, with Intel’s insistence that the LGA1156 Core i7 branding makes perfect sense, and the news that there’s a six-core LGA1366 CPU, codenamed Gulftown, on the way most people were assuming that the new CPUs will be branded Core i9. Even we’ll admit that Core i8 is too much of a mouthful. Asked explicitly whether the new CPUs will be Core i9, Intel has always told us that it can’t comment about forthcoming products.

But it seems Gigabyte can.

As part of it’s latest competition – Beat Me If You Dare – Gigabyte explicitly forbids the use of ‘Gulftown (Core i9)’. This is nothing new, as Intel denied that any Lynnfield CPU would be called Core i5 despite months of (entirely accurate) rumours circulating for months.


If the new CPU is to be a Core i9, at least that makes things slightly easier for anyone upgrading, whether it’s to LGA1156 or LGA1366. Let us know your thoughts about whether this all makes sense or not in the forums.