A week seems a long time in IT as was shown by Intel, which after posting a healthy profit last week has now decided to seriously slash the prices of its server and desktop processors.

The company has listed pricing details for three Xeon chips, three Core 2 Duo models, and one Core 2 Quad.

What stood out the most was the 3.1GHZ E8500 which went from $US266 to $US183, amounting to a 31 per cent drop.

The E8400 received an 11 per cent drop from $US183 to $US163 and the three Xeon chips: 2.40GHz X3220 went down 12 per cent, the 2.13GHz X3210 also dropped 12 per cent in price and the 3GHZ E3110 scored an 11 per cent drop.