The Tech Report reviews the new P4-600 series of processors. With 64-bit support, and double th eon-board cache, how does it stack up against the Prescott line and processors from AMD? Depends on what you want to do with it. Check out its side-by-side review, published Sunday.

“Today, in the dead of early Sunday morning, Intel is meekly unveiling another new Pentium 4 processor core, and it may be just as consequential. The Pentium 4 600 series is a new tier of performance-oriented Pentium 4 processors that will be sold alongside the existing P4 500 series. Based on the Prescott design, the 600-series core adds key features intended to pep up Prescott’s performance and curb its power consumption. Not only that, but these are 64-bit CPUs. With the introduction of a 64-bit version of Windows approaching, Intel has finally turned on Prescott’s dormant support for the 64-bit extensions to the x86 instruction set pioneered by AMD.”

The verdict in the end seems to be that these new processors hold their own, but offer nothing Earth shattering in the 32-bit world over the 500-series Prescott line of P4 processors. However, for an extra $5 or $10, you get true 64-bit capability that’s not part of the Prescott procs, so all in all, it’s a pretty good deal.