KZ,
<That's a real yawner since no one, not even Dell, would intro a Rambus PC if they didn't have a more powerful micro to go with it.>
According to the Dell web pages that were accidentally posted last month, the new GX200 and GX300 RDRAM-based products will have 533Mhz and 600Mhz PIII's with 133Mhz FSBs.
These are not Coppermine processors. The following article from PC Week provides a couple of relevant data points:
1) The Coppermine-based PIIIs will start at 600Mhz.
2) Celerons will move to the PIII-Coppermine core next October, starting at 600Mhz. [Sounds like RDRAM support in Celerons by October 2000 at the latest, then.]
3) Current PIII FSB speed will be increased from 100Mhz to 133Mhz with the introduction of Camino.
Dave
--------------------------------
Celeron to pack more punch :Intel plans to move the low-end CPU to a Coppermine Pentium III core.
(Company Business and Marketing)
PC Week, August 30, 1999 p35
Author
Spooner, John G.
Full Text
Intel Corp. is planning next year to significantly improve the performance of low-cost desktop PCs by moving its Celeron chip to a new processor core.
The Santa Clara, Calif., chip maker will move Celeron from the Pentium II processor core to the Pentium III core based on its Coppermine technology, sources said. Coppermine is the code name for Pentium III chips manufactured using Intel's 0.18-micron manufacturing process. The first chips to use Coppermine 600MHz and faster Pentium IIIs are due in late October, sources said.
The Coppermine technology improves clock speed by reducing power consumption and heat produced by the chip compared with the current 0.25-micron manufacturing process. It also allows space to add on-die, or integrated, Level 2 cache. Integrated cache runs at full processor clock speed, as opposed to the current half-speed, 512KB off-die cache, Intel officials said.
With the new features and higher clock speeds, users who purchase low-end PCs in the first half of next year will have machines that perform as well as or faster than the high-end Pentium III PCs in the market now.
The transition of Celeron to the new processor core keeps with Intel's strategy of introducing technology, in this case Coppermine, at the high end and then driving it down into the low end. It also keeps with Intel's marketing strategy, which aims to address several marketing segments with a single processor core, sources said. Pentium III Xeons will follow Celeron to Coppermine, sources said.
Celeron will receive a performance increase, thanks to features that are now reserved for high-end Pentium IIIs. The list includes Streaming Single Instruction Multiple Data Extensions (a set of instructions for processing multimedia) and support for a 100MHz system bus, sources said.
Celeron will also adopt a new packaging design called "flip chip," a PGA (pin grid array) for the 370-pin Socket 370. Flip chip packaging moves the pins that attach the chip to the motherboard from its edges to its center, shortening the electrical path and the thermal path, increasing performance and heat dissipation, sources said.
The current Celeron is based on the 0.25-micron Pentium II core, supports a 66MHz system bus and incorporates 128KB of Level 2 cache. Intel will release another chip based on this design, a 533MHz Celeron, before the end of the year, sources said.
The new Celerons will debut at about 550MHz, sources said.
But Pentium III on Coppermine won't stand still, coming in at 600MHz or faster. Celeron will remain about one clock-speed grade behind, sources said.
Intel will also differentiate between Pentium IIIs and Celerons based on Coppermine in ways other than clock speed. They include chip set technology, memory bus speed and packaging, sources said.
The Pentium III is now available with a 100MHz bus, and Intel will increase that to 133MHz at the end of next month, when it introduces the 820 chip set, sources said. The Coppermine-based Pentium III will have twice as much integrated Level 2 cache?256KB?as the Celeron and be available in twice as many packages. The Pentium III offers the single-edge contact cartridge package along with the lower-cost flip chip PGA, sources said.
While the Celeron will offer much- improved performance for low prices in the first half of next year, Intel will still face competition for design wins from companies making low-end and consumer PCs.
Advanced Micro Devices Inc., in Sunnyvale, Calif., is trying to develop low- end PC platforms to go with future low-priced versions of its Athlon chip. AMD is working on new technologies, such as integrated chip sets, that will allow it to reduce the cost of desktop PCs based on Athlon. And with Athlon at their core, those PCs should rival Celeron-based PCs in performance.
Intel officials would not comment on the company's plans for Celeron. "Currently, our plan is to support the current [Celeron] processor core throughout the end of this year," said Intel spokesman Seth Walker. Generally, "new technology that is introduced [by Intel] at the high end of the performance spectrum migrates to the lower end," Walker said. He offered no further comment.
Celeron was first introduced in April of last year as a 266MHz, cacheless chip.
Celeron-based systems got another performance boost last week in a separate announcement from Future Power Inc. The Santa Clara company introduced two Dual Millennium PCs, the first dual-Celeron systems. The PCs, one for graphics professionals and the other a server for home-office users, start at $1,399.
The systems achieve their dual-processor status by using a specialized motherboard developed by Abit Computer Corp., of Taipei, Taiwan. The motherboard, called the Abit BP6, integrates two 370-pin sockets for PGA Celerons. The motherboard also includes hardware that makes the dual Celeron setup possible. Celerons, Intelofficials said, are not designed to be used in multiprocessor computers. |
