Will core 2 quads go up or down in price?

I might consider a quad for my M860TU in the future, and I was wondering if the price of the Q9000, Q9100, Q9200,QX9300 (OEM or ES) will go up or down in maybe 6 months,or a year or two. With the new i7 mobile cpus coming out, I guess the core 2 quads are done..

So I am asking you experienced NBR members that have seen the different generations of intel cpus, what will happen with core 2 quad prices?

 

well I'm not that ^^^ but here is my view:
the prices should go down but the CPUs might get harder to find.

 

The prices will stay the same for some time but there are not going to go down massively after a year. The main reason is that even if the new CPUs come out, first, there are gonna be much more expensive and second there are not compatible with the old chipsets. So the market for the current quad core will remain the same even in one year, I presume. The people who want to buy the quad cores will still want to buy them after a half year unless Intel make some new ones compatible with old chipsets but I doubt. After all, the new CPUs might be applicable only for big laptops as they have high TDP already (considering you will want a discrete GPU as well). Thus it might take a while to go mainstream and replace the Core 2 Duo generation. Having said that, the new mobile AMD CPUs are all dual cores as they are now but higher clocked (as far as I know). Remember the laptop market is different to the desktop. In desktop if you want to get a new CPU, you might need to change the mainboard at least, in laptops you want a totally new one. Numerous times, when Intel produces new CPUs, it will reduce the price of the old ones, but this is true as far as concerns the desktop CPUs. For the notebook CPUs the prices remain virtually the same.
Well after one or two years, yes, probably the price will fall because by that time people would be able/want to buy a new laptop but who knows. But if the CPUs become rare to find, the prices will definitely go up. So if you want to buy a quad core buy it now, there is no better time unless Intel makes some new ones compatible with the current generation. However, I don't have any info for that. Another thing to consider also is how many people would want to upgrade to the current generation quad cores after the new CPUs, which are mostly quad core, come out. Again it is difficult to predict.
After two years you might want to buy a new laptop as I said.
Take for example the T9300/T9500 CPUs, they came in 2006 and their prices are still high if you buy them high street. Now for ebay prices, the trend will stay the same but it is difficult to predict. For example, I bought my T9300 from Ebay new 4-5 months ago and it cost me £120. If you have a look now the prices are still the same £10 more or less.
One thing or another, quad core is the future but most of the market have dual core and dual core is more than enough so the applications will be designed with that in mind. Take a look at the Steam's survey 2009. 56% of Steam's users have dual core and only 18% quad core and 25% (!!!!) single core. I would imagine also that most of them are desktop users. Therefore, you can easily say that the quad core users in laptops are much much less. Take in mind that the credit crunch as well as the ultraportable laptops will slow down the quad core laptop market. After all, the i7 CPUs didn't go down well for Intel as they would expected.
So there you are, I am sorry for the long reply.

EDIT: Well, what do you know, I just found out that the first AMD mobile quad cores will come out in one year (a bit less). They are expected in June 2010. But their platform will also support the new AMD dual cores. So I think it will take a while to proceed to a mainstream laptop's quad core market.

 

The price of CPU's always goes down eventually as the technology ages.

 

Really you don't say! We all know that and I am pretty sure L4d_Groopie knows that as well.
But he is asking if it's worth to buy one now or later in case the prices decreased significantly with the i7 arrival.
Yes, the prices will always go down (except in extreme conditions) but his question is when and how much since he is considering to buy one.

 

Well, I would guess that in a year or two, (as the OP asked) that yes they will be cheaper than they are today.

They will also be outdated.

 

Won't the high-end quads become rare and go up in price.. Like some top of the line CPUs for old chipsets that you can see when people look for upgrades in the forums? I'm thinking about q9200 and qx9300. Or does this happen like 3-4 years after? And won't the eBay sellers run out of ES CPUs sometime?

 

yea im kind of worried about the same thing. cos as it is they are quite rare. was hoping to get a quad core (QX9300) and an SSD for my precision's 2nd birthday.

 

Usually the highest end CPU and the highest end extreme models will stay the same price. Just look at the T7800 and other similar high end older generation models. The Q9000 and Q9100 will drop, but the former won't drop a lot. The Q9000 is pretty cheap now as it is...

 

Mobile Core 2 quads havent even reached the mainstream yet. They are only available for an elite group of laptops. Once the mainstream HP, Gateway, and Dell lines start putting them in, you will see a tremendous drop in price

As sgogeta mentioned, the higher end processors will remain expensive, since you pay a premium for them. For example, the T7600, X9000, etc


K-TRON