Core i7-965

It’s been said that recessions come and go but life goes on at Sim Lim Square, that six-storey techie haunt in Singapore, for those unfamilar.

The best evidence comes from the way PC buffs snapped up Intel’s new Core i7s, as they hit the stores late last week.

So popular are these Core i7s that the supporting high-end DDR3 modules are near sold out. Popular retailer Cybermind, for example, now has stocks for only 3 x 1GB DDR3s from Corsair (S$255 with bundle). The 3 x 2GB packs (S$499 with bundle) are already sold out.

The official word’s out – the next big leap in Intel CPUs will come next month, when the chipmaker launches its much-awaited Core i7 chips, also known as the “Nehalem”.

An Intel blog written by its PR folks confirm that the new chip will be out in November, just as supporting motherboards featuring the new X58 chipset start appearing.

These Core i7 babies are the biggest shift in CPU technology since the successful Core and Core2 series of chips started dominating the market in the past couple of years.

If you have been holding out for a new top-end graphics card, here’s a little bit of good news.

Sim Lim Square stores like Cybermind and Bell and online retailers like Potterhouse are (finally) selling some Nvidia GTX 280 cards for S$699 this weekend (down from S$799), reflecting the price drop that gamers in the US have been enjoying for weeks.