Intel's first quad-core chips to arrive this year
Intel Corp. this week said it's bumping up the release of its quad-core desktop and server chips to the fourth quarter of this year from their previous target date of early 2007.
The chips, code-named Kentsfield (desktop) and Clovertown (server), were announced by Intel execs at dates earlier this year and are candidates to appear in future revisions of Apple's Mac product lines.
In February, Intel chief technology officer Justin Rattner said the company planned to roll out Clovertown — its first quad-core chip — by early 2007. Kentsfield was announced with a similar roll-out date during the company's semiannual developers conference the following month.
Also on Wednesday, Otellini confirmed reports that Intel is pushing ahead the release of another chip, its Core 2 Duo notebook processor formerly code-named Merom.
According to Otellini, Merom is due to launch in a few weeks. The chip is expected to closely follow the release of its desktop counterpart, Conroe, which is currently in production ahead of its July 27th launch.
According to DigiTimes, Intel plans for over 50 percent of its notebook processor shipments in the first quarter of 2007 to be Merom chips, making its 64-bit dual-core model the mainstream for the notebook market.
56 Comments
"Introducing the new Mac Pro OCTO shipping January 2007"
I guess we will find out in a couple of weeks which chips are going into which computers. I can see the XServe getting "Clovertown", the iMac getting "Conroe", the MacBook Pro getting "Merom", and the MacBook and Mac mini keeping "Yonah". Power Macs are a little tougher to guess because it seems like "Woodcrest" and "Kentsfield" will be coming out at the same time instead of about 6 months apart.
I guess we will find out in a couple of weeks which chips are going into which computers. I can see the XServe getting "Clovertown", the iMac getting "Conroe", the MacBook Pro getting "Merom", and the MacBook and Mac mini keeping "Yonah". Power Macs are a little tougher to guess because it seems like "Woodcrest" and "Kentsfield" will be coming out at the same time instead of about 6 months apart.
Yeah, I think you're right. But I only see the Kentsfield in the very top of the line Mac Pro system because of a price per chip deal. Think boards and chips, and to put two chips in, that thing would be very very expensive. Projections on the dual-Woodcrest system already put it at around $3000, I would assume the Kentsfield up that price another $1000.
I really hope we don't see Apple go for Core 2 Quad over two Xeons, though I guess time will tell. If they go with 2 Quad Xeons, then we'll likely see more liquid cooling, which I'm also not bullish on (plus ye gads the cost).
If anything I hope this will just drive the cost of Xeon 7xxx down for Apple.
The quad Xeon is better off than the Quad Core (I don't have the codenames memorized if you haven't noticed by now) memory wise, but I don't think either near will live up to the potential of 4 core on one die or a 4 core package with adequate memory bandwidth. The very apps that would be most likely to actually use 4-8 cores will be the same ones that will be likely to be starved for data.
, then we'll likely see more liquid cooling, which I'm also not bullish on (plus ye gads the cost).
Aren't we heading in this direction anyway? Hard to believe that quad and octo core chips will arrive with tdp of 35 watts.