Advanced Micro Devices (AMD)  will introduce its 45 nanometre "Shanghai" microprocessors on the 13th or 14th of November, mere days ahead of Intel's official launch of its i7 "Nehalem" cores, we understand. AMD is Intel's fierce competitor in the X86 space.

We understand that many hardware sites have been supplied with "Shanghai" 45 nanometre versions of AMD CPUs, and that the results in performance terms are somewhat impressive.

AMD has lagged behind Intel on process technology - it is something of a tradition for AMD to do this "lagging". After its "Barcelona" debacle 18 months ago, AMD has everything to prove. Initial benchmarks look interesting enough, according to informed sources. The reviewers will compare Intel's "Nehalem" processors to AMD's "Shanghai" processors, directly.