Digitimes is reporting that Intel is backing off of its introduction of the lower clocked 45 nm quad core parts.  These would have included the Q9300, Q9450, and Q9550.  The official story is that Intel does not feel the need to release these due to all of the issues AMD is having getting their quad cores out.  Since Intel feels there is no real competition in this space, they can let their current 65 nm quad core parts handle the demand.

Several weeks back it was also reported that Intel has a little “errata” of its own with the 45 nm quad cores, but these issues were never really specifically detailed by Intel.  Considering that the high end QX9650 is already shipping, obviously this errata was nothing of great importance or just a rumor .

I will be curious to see how this plays out though, and if Intel is in fact not releasing these products due to a lack of competition.  Intel has been very aggressive in reaching the 45 nm node, and there could be a few more kinks to work out.  Giving engineers a few more months to optimize a line is probably an easy decision considering the straights that AMD is in.

The Digitimes Article