Intel Core i7-980X Extreme Edition Processor 3.33 GHz 12 MB Cache Socket LGA1366

Well, I too fell victim to receiving the box with only the cooler, sticker, and thermal paste inside. My first order was placed on December 30, along with a motherboard, shipped out of Arizona and arrived on January 3. The shipping box was fine, but once I opened the box, I noticed right away that there was packing tape over the Intel box, which was torn, and a nice hole where the processor should have been. So, contacted Amazon, shipped back the box with the fan inside, and ordered another 980X so I didn't have to wait another week to get my system going. This time it shipped from Nevada (no idea if this helped me or not) and actually got my CPU. Hopefully they catch the jerks that are stealing these (not sure if it's happening after they receive the product in inventory or during shipping to customers) as it sure is disheartening opening your new toy to find nothing there!I got everything set up pretty quickly and this thing screams! I went from a i7-860 with 8 GB of RAM and an Intel 160 GB SSD, to the 980X with 12 GB of RAM and the same Intel SSD. I was worried at first that there wouldn't be that much difference, but this thing is just so crazy fast I don't really think you can throw enough at it to actually slow it down. I haven't had a chance to do any video encoding yet (I used Handbrake on the i7-860 and on my iMac) but I can't wait to see how it does. I also haven't yet had a chance to see how much of difference this beast makes in games, but I don't really expect a huge difference on that front as I already had, and still have, an ATI 5870, which works great. I mainly went for this to help boost my encoding and try to get more into photo and video editing. Everything I've seen and read about this CPU is that it is pretty much the best consumer level processor you can get to do this type of work.

This processor was on the Asus list as a supported CPU. I installed the CPU and the computer would not post. I tried several times to get the computer to post. It would not. The DRAM (Crucial) and Video card (EVGA) are brand new. I was merely doing a CPU upgrade. I reinstalled my old CPU and the computer booted up with no issues like it always does. Since this system is my primary home desktop I really don't have the time to troubleshoot the no boot issue further. I am not sure if the CPU is at fault or my system. I am only giving one star since the computer didn't work with this particular CPU.

I bought this processor to replace 920 CPU and pep up old x58 system. Although it has more horsepower and 6 cores, I lost 8 GB of installed RAM that the windows system shows missing 8 GB of ram included as "system memory" not installed RAM. I use machine as host for virtual machines and for editing audio and video, so lost ram very important. Processor does not support power administration so with this CPU, system cannot put to sleep mode. Although it pepped my system a bit, because of these issues I take back stars from review.

I have also received my order today from Amazon. And low and behold, the bottom seal was cut on the Intel i7 980x box with no processor included. I have the booklet and heatsink and thermal paste bag. I called Amazon customer service immediately after opening my package today and they are sending me out a new shipment today. On the side window of the box, I only had the booklet with the sticker showing for the i7 Extreme processor. I think Amazon has a thief somewere in there Warehouse to shipping department. I hope my replacement shipment has the processer showing in that side window when I get it. I told the customer service rep to please verify this before shipment to me. But if the problem is in the shipment department, that wont help either. Wish me luck.Amazon if you are reading this, please check your stock on these. There seems to be an inside job going on in your warehouse and someone is removing the processor from the box before shipment to your customers.Update 02/11/2011: I have received my replacement shipment from Amazon from their Kansas Warehouse and the CPU is not missing in this Intel i7 980X Extreme box. I have noticed that the replacemnt box was redesigned by Intel and is smaller in size and the CPU location is still on the side of the box but is secured better which will take more time for someone to remove the CPU chip. I am very happy with Amazon's customer support. I am a longtime customer of Amazon and have purchased many products from them. This is the first time I have missed something from a vendor's box. This CPU is very expensive and Amazon needs to catch the people stealing theseIntel Core i7 980X Extreme Edition 3.33GHz 12 MB L3 Cache LGA1366 Desktop Processor BX80613i7980X - Retail from there stock.NEW SYSTEM:CPU Intel i7 980X ExtremeMOBO Asus Ramge III ExtremeWater Cooling System - Zalman Reserator XT Hybrid Cooling System (Black)RAM 12 Gb Corsair Dominator GT @ 2000 Mhz (4gb x 3 sticks Kit)PSU 1250W Enermax sGalaxy EvoHDD 600GB 2X WD VelociRaptor WDBACN6000ANC in RAID 0CASE NZXT Crafted Series ATX Full Tower (Phantom White)Video ASUS ARES Dual Radeon 5870-4 GB GDDR5 Graphics CardSOUND 7.1 PCI Express Sound Blaster X-Fi Titanium Fatal1ty Champion SeriesDISPLAY Dell UltraSharp U2711OS Windows 7 Ultimate 64bit

The seller Mustang717 has shipped product on time as promised and the condition of the retail box was good, no damage. I would recommend others to buy items from this seller.I have not installed the CPU into my Gigabyte X58OC motherboard yet but I will do this soon. I will have another review on this CPU performance after installation. I hope it will exceed my expectation.Update on Sept. 2013This I7-980X CPU was installed in Asus ROG X58 motherboard and performed as advertised by Intel. Very fast and running about 30% cooler than I7-975 CPU.