Enhanced Intel SpeedStep Technology: Yes
Extended HALT State (C1E) Enabled Yes
Execute Disable Bit (XD) Enabled Yes
Intel 64 Technology Yes
Virtualization Technology
Package/Socket FC-LGA-775
Intel Wide Dynamic Execution
Intel Advanced Smart Cache
Intel Advanced Digital Media Boost

Intel’s Wide Dynamic Execution allows each core to complete up to four full 128-bit instructions per clock cycle. This is a vast improvement over the earlier CPUs that could do at most three full instructions per clock cycle. The Core 2 CPU can also do something called a Macro-Fusion instruction which allows each core to combine certain x86 instructions into a single instruction, freeing up resources for the other cores to work on.

Intel’s Smart Cache is their trademarked name for their new unified cache for each pair of processors on the Quad Core CPU. Each pair shares their 4MB L2 cache dynamically based on what processor core requires more cache. This increases the probability that each core can access data from fast L2 cache, reducing latency and improving performance.

Execute Disable Bit enhances the virus protection for a system with a supported operating system like Windows XP 32-bit or 64-bit. XD allows memory to be marked as executable or non-executable.  If malicious code like a memory-resident virus tries to run on non-executable memory, the processor can raise an error preventing the code from infecting the system.

Most modern motherboards support 4GB of memory or more. Unfortunately, Windows XP is a 32-bit operating system, meaning that only 4GB of memory can be addressed, even if 8GB or even 16GB of memory is installed in the system. The advent of the AMD Athlon 64 processor meant that more memory could be addressed. Intel’s 64-bit processor support started with the 6xx series and can address more than 4GB of memory with an appropriate OS.

Intel’s Speedstep technology was first introduced with their mobile CPUs to conserve energy when high performance is not required, like when the system is in idle, or when Word is being used. SpeedStep lowers the clock speed of the processor, conserving energy, lowering heat and improving battery life on a notebook. The Green initiative in saving the environment has taken hold on processors, meaning that SpeedStep is a good thing.

The instruction sets for the Core2 Extreme QX6700 include the standard x86 instructions, Intel’s SSE, SSE2, SSE3, SSE4, MMX and x86-64 instruction sets. The Core2 series of CPUs also support Intel’s Advanced Digital Media Boost which accelerates the SSE instructions so that a 128-bit SSE instruction can be issued at a rate of one per clock cycle instead of the two per clock cycle in earlier Intel CPUs.