Phoronix tested this Core i7 Extreme chip in Linux.
"For those willing to spend $999 USD on a new processor, Intel
has a new Core i7 part out that is stunningly fast. The Core i7 990X is
the $999 successor to the previously reviewed Core i7 970 that ups the
core frequency to 3.46GHz and provides a 3.73GHz Turbo Boost frequency.
This six-core CPU with Hyper Threading works wonderful with Linux."