166-MHz Pentium price is right
By Jim Davis
January 29, 1997, 5:30 p.m. PT
Intel (INTC) today unfurled its February pricing
sheet, setting up the 166-MHz Pentium as the
new mainstream low-end processor.
Price cuts reached as high as 35 percent. The
166-MHz Pentium received one of the biggest
reductions, to $295 from $402.
"They're moving the [classic, non-MMX] 166
Pentium to the really high-volume market.
They're setting this up as the new low-end
processor," said Dean McCarron, a principal at
Scottsdale, Arizona-based Mercury Research, a
marketing consultancy.
Systems using the 166-MHz processor from
top-tier vendors should now sink well below
$2,000 or even $1,500. But the classic
133-MHz Pentium received the most dramatic
cut, from $204 to $134.
The MMX version of the 166-MHz processor
got a slight price reduction from $407 to $356.
A version of the low-powered 166-MHz MMX
Pentium for notebook computers was $550 but
is now $539. A 133-MHz Pentium for notebook
computers was priced at $244 but now costs
$174.
Recently introduced Pentium processors with
MMX received the smallest of the price cuts. A
200-MHz Pentium with MMX was $550; it will
now cost $539. A 166-MHz MMX for mobile
computers was priced at $550 and is now $539.
Those purchasing systems can expect these
price reductions to translate into PC price
reductions in as little as two weeks or as much
as two months depending on the PC vendor,
said McCarron. Gateway 2000, for one, might
be able to roll the new chip pricing into system
pricing in less than a month, McCarron said.
Intel is an investor in CNET: The Computer
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