Intel 65nm-to-45nm crossover coming in 2008
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45nm CPUs to raise clock frequencies once again? Intel expects to begin shipping more 45nm processors than 65nm chips - the so-called 'crossover point' - in 2008, a company staffer revealed this week.â¦
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Socket AM2+ may be key to AM3 backwards compatibility AMD looks set to implement a Socket AM2 revision spanning the processor interconnect's current specification and the upcoming Socket AM3 due in 2008. That at least is what reports coming out of Taiwan citing local motherboard-maker sources claim.â¦
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Both GPUs built on TSMC's 110nm process, reportedly
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Foundry partner gears up for second-generation 90nm Efficeons
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October unveiling alongside AMD dualie Athlon 64 FX
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Graphics chip maker Nvidia on Friday made public plans to create a version of its nForce chipset for Intel processor PCs. That&#39;s something Nvidia couldn&#39;t legally do in the past, but can now, thanks to a broad patent swap with Intel.
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How about an embedded processor that&#39;s designed to deliver a quantum leap in performance and system bandwidth while keeping power in check?
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SAN FRANCISCO -- Intel continued its charge into its wireless future with news of its next generation Pentium M processor. Based on the 65-nanometer process technology, Intel is working on its &quot;Napa&quot; platform
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Chip plant to go into production H2 2008 Intel is to spend $1-1.5bn upgrading its Rio Rancho, New Mexico plant, Fab 11X, to produce 45nm processors, the chip giant said yesterday. Output will commence in H2 2008.â¦
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Intel is on track to introduce work-sharing dual-core processors across all its product lines by the end of next year. The technology is part of a strategy shift at Intel away from processor speed and toward performance.
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A new type of memory could soon be available to device makers.
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Intel's presentation at a conference next week appears set to confirm many rumored details of the chip's architecture and characteristics.
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Intel has confirmed it will not release a 4GHz version of its flagship Pentium 4 product. Instead it will transfer its engineers to the company&#39;s new design priorities.
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SANTA CLARA, CALIFORNIA -- Intel is drawing the curtain on some of its future research projects to continue making transistors smaller, faster, and less power-hungry out as far as 2020.
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(InfoWorld) - Advanced Micro Devices is undaunted by rival Intelâs recent headline-grabbing announcements of 45-nm (nanometer) processing technology and a deal to supply Xeon chips to Sun Microsystems. Interviewed at the DesignCon 2007 conference in Santa Clara, Calif., last week, Steve Polzin, chief platform architect in the Computation Products Group at AMD, said his company would, in time, also use 45-nm manufacturing technology through its alliances with Sony, Toshiba, and IBM. âWe have access to very similar technology that weâll be able to use in 45-nm,â Polzin said. âItâs a weapon in our arsenal.â Intel sent tremors through the hypercompetitive chip market last week when it made good on promises to begin producing 45-nm chips by the second half of this year. More concerning for AMD, Intel said the new chips would consume less energy and generate less heat than existing chips, thanks to a new material dubbed âhigh-kâ that is used in the insulating material for transistors. Polzin would not commit on a time frame for when AMD would use 45-nm, except to say that the company would do so âwhen it makes sense.â AMD currently uses 65-nm processing technology in its Opteron CPU line. âPushing technology for technologyâs sake is not what we do,â Polzin said. The 45-nm technology will be applicable from systems ranging from laptops to datacenters, he said. Intel does not have a big jump on AMD, said analyst Mary Olsson of Gary Smith EDA, and 45-nm systems will not be heavily used for three to four years. As for Sunâs deal to use Intel CPUs after having relied on only AMD for x86 chips, Polzin said the arrangement was not unexpected, with Intel now leveraging AMD-championed technology in Xeon. âWe knew that one of the key factors that attracted Sun to AMD was the 64-bit extensions to x86,â Polzin said. âAMD64 is great technology. Intel decided to copy it, so what the heck.â Sun, as an AMD customer, is free to choose whichever suppliers it wants, Polzin said, adding that Sun is one of its âvery valued customersâ and that the companies still work closely. At the conference, Polzin cited the evolution of processors, which have grown from 16-bit to 32-bit and 64-bit units. Multicore processors also have arrived, he noted. The company plans its quad-processor Opteron offerings for a midyear release. Eight-core chips are on the drawing board as well. In 2009, the company plans to offer graphics processors and CPUs on the same chip as part of its Fusion initiative. This technology will be offered in the mobile Turion chip, Polzin said.
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The recent word from The Inquirer that Apple may be hoarding all of Intel's new 45nm Penryn processors -- and possibly paying for the privilege -- has prompted a lot of speculation about the future of Apple's Mac Pro desktop lineup. Apple's professional machines, which now use Intel Xeon Cloverton chips topping out at 3GHz, are called workstations by Apple and offer quad- and eight-core configurations. They're fast, and they sport professional prices to match with top-of-the-line eight-core units starting at $3,997.The latest generation of Mac Pros, although radically restyled on the inside when Apple jumped to Intel chips in 2006, look pretty much the same on the outside as they did when they sported PowerPC chips. But the expected move to Penryn -- at or before the next Macworld show in January -- could mean the first major change in Mac Pro design in years.Penryn is Intel's first chip under 45nm (compared with the 65nm processors now used) and offers a faster front-side bus, larger Level 2 caches, better energy efficiency, and a new instruction set (SSE4) aimed at boosting media, gaming, and graphics uses.As important for Mac fans, the new chip architecture allows some new possibilities in case design -- namely because the motherboard and cooling system could take up less space. The new chips could also mean the incorporation of new technologies such as scalable-link interface (used for linking two or more video cards) and a faster front-side bus.With that in mind, let's go through some of the things Mac users -- especially this Mac user -- would like to see in the next Mac Pro:1. A new enclosure Rumors abound that the now-familiar all-aluminum Mac Pro box -- brought over part and parcel from the original Power Mac G5 -- will finally be shrinking. Of course, I still expect Apple to house all of the latest goodies, so whatever Apple comes up with isn't going to rival the Mac Mini for portability either.I'm looking for more audio/USB/Firewire ports up front with space for four 3.5-in. internal drive slots and two 5.25-in. optical drives -- which are now offered on the current crop of Mac Pros. An easier-to-open case more like that found way back on the Power Mac G4 desktops would certainly be appreciated by systems administrators, along with a reduced weight and better handles for lugging around.2. A Blu-ray option not just for movie editing but also for storing 50GB of data on a single disc -- perfect for sending off major quantities of files (high-definition movies, anyone?) to a client or user. Although I never thought I'd say it, DVDs -- even double-sided ones that can hold up to 8GB of information -- are too small. It's time for Apple to get on board with the next level of optical drives.As for using a Blu-ray drive for movies, the digital rights management associated with them might be too much to ask for. But they'd look pretty darn nice on Apple's 30-inch Cinema Display, now, wouldn't they?3. Cooler but quieter systems Those fans on current Mac Pros can sometimes be loud and annoying. Liquid-cooled enclosures, while more expensive, are a much more elegant solution. Heck, Apple even used that with late-generation Power Mac G5s, although there were some reports of leaks.If Apple doesn't want to go back to that option, then it should turn the whole case into a heat sink. Whether it's on purpose or not, my MacBook Pro sometimes feels like one well-designed heat sink.4. Less energy use I love power, but I also love clean air and Middle East peace and all of that, so Apple, while you're at it, cut down our energy usage! It's nice not to have the lights dim when I turn on the computer. This should be doable, and former Vice President Al Gore, who's on your board of directors, will no doubt approve.5. Penryn I know what The Inquirer reported, and yes, it makes perfect sense that you'd want to offer the latest and greatest from Intel to your top-end customers. What better way to run cool and cut power consumption than with a 45nm Penryn chip? These babies are fast and efficient. The first widely distributed 45nm processors, nothing comes close to them in terms of speed per watt -- the main reason Apple moved to Intel in the first place.And let's get there sooner rather than later. The Mac Pro has been out since August 2006 with only the addition of faster chips in April to update the line.6. eSATA external storage Firewire 800, first introduced in 2003, just doesn't do it anymore for high-speed external storage and is beginning to become outdated. I need more options. 3GB eSATA is coming out of the woodwork now as the new standard for super-high-speed drives even as external drives and arrays that use it are coming down in price dramatically. Fiber is nice, too, but overkill for workstations. USB3 fiber isn't ready yet; eSATA is.7. Strong video support: HDMI out How about letting users present stuff on an HDTV without having to use an adapter? This feature would cost very little, but the coolness factor would be huge, right Steve? Besides, HDMI is already available on Apple TV, so we know it can be done.In fact, while I'm wishing, why not add two HDMI out ports? Running two hi-def TVs from a Mac Pro over HDMI would be absurdly cool. This, of course, could be part of an extremely high-end video card option. I know Apple likes to have options when it comes to processors. Well, users like options when it comes to video cards. Some of us want a solid video card, while others want the absolute fastest thing money can buy. I happen to want both.8. 10GB Ethernet If not now, when? If not Apple, who? 10GB Ethernet cards are coming down in price by around $100 a pop -- and they're even cheaper when integrated on the motherboard. The prices for switches that utilize them are also coming down. Maybe Apple doesn't have to put them on all new Mac Pro models, but wouldn't they be perfectly appropriate for top-of-the-line HD video rigs? How about Xgrid? The speed certainly helps.Now, I know the question will arise: Who needs 10GB Ethernet? Something along those same lines was asked five years ago when Apple released the G4 models with 1GB Ethernet. Time flies.9. Hardware RAID standard A few months ago, Apple introduced a $1,000 add-on card that turns mild-mannered SATA ports on the Mac Pro into a hard-core RAID configuration. Now it's time to build it in.And with the ZFS file system expected to be part of the upcoming Leopard OS, RAID configurations should work even better. (ZFS, if you aren't familiar with it, offers a whole new way to handle storage, allowing large capacity, storage pooling, fast data snapshots, and copy-on-write.)10. Affordability I'm not talking $399.99 Dell affordable, but drop the barrier to entry a bit. Perhaps you can offer something under $2,000 at the low end. No doubt, some additional PC gamers and tinkerers will come into the Apple fold if you have the fastest processor and a solid video card.Oh, just one more thing: Let's not wait for Macworld San Francisco to get the next Mac Pro on store shelves. The holidays are coming, and I know of at least one computer geek who'd like to see something like this wrapped up with a bow on top.Seth Weintraub is a global IT management consultant specializing in the technology needs of creative organizations, including The Paris Times, Omnicom and WPP Group. He has set up and managed cross-platform networks on four continents and is an expert in Active Directory/Open Directory PC and Macintosh integration. Computerworld is an InfoWorld affiliate.
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(InfoWorld) - Following theÂ launch of Intel's quad-core Xeon 7300 processorÂ on Wednesday, the company's efforts are now focused on preparations for the rollout of its first Penryn chips later this year. And there are signs the company is planning an early 2008 release of its Silverthorne chip for ultramobile PCs and handheld devices. Intel confirmed plans to release a server version of Penryn before the end of this year, but the company is releasing little information about its plans for mobile and desktop versions of the chip. Penryn will offer better performance than Intel's current processors, and the company is counting on them to hold off any gains rival Advanced Micro DevicesÂ makes with theÂ release of its quad-core Barcelona chipsÂ next week. "So far what we've said is that we intend to ship a broad family of 45-nanometer processors by the end of the year," said Nick Jacobs, an Intel spokesman in Singapore, referring to the technology used to produce theÂ Penryn chips. Penryn is the code name given to the 45-nanometer "shrink" of Intel's current chip designs, which are now produced using a 65-nanometer process. These numbers refer to the average size of the features that can be created on a silicon chip, and smaller is considered better for several reasons, including cost. Making the size of features smaller allows chip makers to reduce the chip's overall size, which reduces unit manufacturing costs since more chips can be made on a single silicon wafer. Chips made using a more advanced manufacturing process can also consume less power and run faster than those made using an older process. In the case of Penryn, Intel will take advantage of the ability to shrink the features of a chip to cram more memory cells into its processors, increasing the on-chip cache size and further boosting performance. The first Penryn processors are widely expected to come in November, but Intel has yet to announce exactly when the launch will happen. In addition to the release of Penryn chips for servers later this year, Intel is expected to release the Yorkfield and Wolfdale desktop variants of Penryn in early 2008, with some speculating that high-end versions of these desktop chips could arrive before the end of this year. Intel is holding off on the release of mobile Penryn chips until early next year, when the company plans to update its Centrino platform for notebooks. Dunnington, a chip designed for servers with four or more processors, will round out Intel's Penryn lineup. Set for release in late 2008, Dunnington will replace the Xeon 7300 chips that Intel announced Wednesday. Intel is also readying Silverthorne for launch next year. Produced using a 45-nanometer process, the dual-core Silverthorne chip is very small, allowing 2,500 chips to be produced on a single wafer to help keep costs low. The chip is designed for low power consumption and comes bundled with a single-chip chipset called Poulsbo. Intel originally planned to release Silverthorne during the second half of next year. But the company moved the chip's release date to the "first half of 2008." That timeframe could mean anything from January until the end of June, but one Intel source said the chip is likely to come sooner rather than later within that timeframe. Asked about an early 2008 release date for Silverthorne, Jacobs would only confirm the chip's planned release is on track for the first half of the year. Â