Why is the Core 2 Duo E8400 still $169?

[Russ88765]

The E8400 is no slouch, and was one of the most powerful mainstream CPUs in it's day.
Passmark = 2243
Phenom II X2 555 = 1957

Still, benches mean little, and the 555 offers far more bang-for-buck.
I guess intel just haven't got round to reducing the MSRP just yet. Even the lowest-end i3 scores over 2700 in passmark, however. On the plus side for system builders, 775 Mobos cost less than 1156 Mobos, if that's any consolation. (775) Sales are going down of high end C2Ds and are going more in favour of 775 quads (Q6600 in particular, Q83/400. Still...

Not exactly a fair comparison, considering the wide price differences. Cool thing about amd though is the backwards compatibility they got going for them.

 

[2048Megabytes]

I just looked at NewEgg. They must still be selling a lot of the Core 2 Duo E8400 processors. They have at least 99 of them in stock presently.