Contrary to previous word I’d picked up, Intel has made very sure that it’s the first to field a dual-core CPU. Given that the previous word I’d seen was that the chip wouldn’t hit shelves until late this year, one has to guess that supplies aren’t going to be huge until later on. In any case, Intel has given the first batch to Dell, who wasted no time in using it to power a killer-fast top of the line system.

How top of the line? $4000 US. If that doesn’t scare you, you’ll get a full Windows XP Media Center Edition machine that has dual TV tuner cards and can handle any kind of multimedia job you care to throw at it. As Joel Santo Domingo of PC Magazine writes:

The Dell Dimension XPS series is the company’s answer to the high-end boutique systems from builders like Alienware, Falcon Northwest, and VoodooPC. Though the XPS isn’t obscenely overclocked like its boutique brethren, it is wickedly fast and pretty distinctive in its own right. And this time around, it’s equipped with a new processor: In fact, the Dimension XPS Gen 5 ($3,999 direct with monitor using Dell e-value code 6V411-XPS5PC) is the first system to hit the streets with the dual-core Pentium Extreme Edition 840 (Pentium EE 840) processor. (Read “Test-Driving the Dual Core Pentium EE 840″ for more on what dual-core processing means for your computing experience.) With the addition of Microsoft Windows XP Media Center 2005, the XPS Gen 5 is more than just a gaming system, it’s Dell’s top-of-the-line gaming/multimedia machine and our latest Editors’ Choice.

[Continue reading Dell XPS Gen 5]