Discussion Intel current and future Lakes & Rapids thread

[clemsyn]

No they don't. Just wait for Tiger Lake U reviews.

Magic of "more cores" doesn't work on most consumers. Thankfully.

Much touted? You mean: much discussed by enthusiasts on forums like this one where most people stay on desktops anyway?

Intel's most important client for high-end -H chips is Apple.
If Apple really plans to replace Macbook Pro with an ARM system (which Intel surely knows by now), they'll have even less reason to invest in the -H lineup.
I mean, 20 years from now, they'll probably sell just server processors and -U SoCs. So budgets for developing high-power mobile and desktop chips will probably be decimated over the next decade anyway.

If Intel isn't able to make an 8-core mobile competitor for Zen2 out of Tiger Lake, they may just sacrifice this market altogether.
An even if they can, it might not be an interesting niche.
They've already given up on HEDT - a move that was expected already before 2017 - when the main treat from AMD was that it'll collapse and US gov will force Intel to split.

I agree with your multicore comment. I'm not swayed by more cores in a laptop and patiently waiting for Anandtech review on Tigerlake. Looking at leaks, it looks impressive (great single core and multicore comes close to an 8c by AMD) but I am waiting on power consumption and how hot it gets. If it gets hot quick and sucks power, I'm getting a Renoir laptop, if not then it will be Tigerlake.

 

[IntelUser2000]

Actually cooling didn't improve that much.
Check if the laptops you think are passively cooler really don't have fans. People tend to think that slim ultrabooks (say: Macbook Air or Asus Zenbook) are passively cooled. And most of them aren't.

I am not those "people" you are talking about. I actually take time to read up on stuff. Yes those devices are very much actively cooled.

The Dell XPS 2-in-1 prior to Icelake is at 9W. The Surface lineup is passively cooled for i5 15W. The one I just linked you will have discrete graphics passively cooled along with the 15W CPU.

 

[DrMrLordX]

No they don't. Just wait for Tiger Lake U reviews.

It'll be good, but Intel isn't growing in all the dimensions where they need to see performance growth. History has shown us you only get to hit ~5 GHz once, and then it stops. Still on 4c in 2020? They're stuck.

Magic of "more cores" doesn't work on most consumers. Thankfully.

There is no magic. But hey, keep putting your head in the sand. Phones have more cores than that, for a reason . . .

Much touted? You mean: much discussed by enthusiasts on forums like this one where most people stay on desktops anyway?

I've been promised over and over again, 10nm desktop from Intel in 2020. Where is it? Until Intel can actually produce a credible 10nm desktop CPU, they're locked to mobile while the rest of their markets slip into decline.

 

[mikk]

I've been promised over and over again, 10nm desktop from Intel in 2020. Where is it?

Who had promised you 10nm desktop in 2020 over and over again?

 

[SAAA]

The problem there is that, at least at this point, Intel can't get (or won't try to get) Tiger Lake to yield at anything higher than 4c. Which is troubling. It's like the "SuperFETs" are helping them with the power/clockspeed problems but not with yields? Maybe by next year they can have 8c Tiger Lake-H finally ready, but if they can do that, why not Alder Lake?

It's all really confusing.

Honestly I can't believe they can yield 150mm^2 or so dies and not 8 core parts maybe 175-180 mm^2 large. It makes no sense, heck even 6 cores would be fine!
All I can say is those designs were perfect 2-2.5 years ago, say if 10 nm and Tiger released on time so 4 cores this fast would have been phenomenal (1165 g7 is faster than any quad core desktop Kabylake FFS!).

I'm somehow starting to think they themselves got surprised by the improved 10nm and didn't plan for good CPU designs to match its potential, like they have had those 4 cores tops planned for so long they didn't bother making something better sooner.

If Tiger-H delivers they could as well sell those as desktop parts, surely would be much better than any Rocket lake on 14 nm or 10 core Skylake +0.2 GHz again. I mean look at this:

Notebook NV4XMB,ME,MZ - Geekbench

Benchmark results for a Notebook NV4XMB,ME,MZ with a 11th Gen Intel Core i7-1165G7 processor.

browser.geekbench.com

Yes I know this is geekbench but... it's on the first page along 5.5-6 GHz overclocked desktops!

Geekbench 5 Results - Geekbench

browser.geekbench.com

The one right above is running 5.6GHz, not really your daily clocks...

Other sources? Well take a look at who's fastest on the whole PassMark site:

PassMark - Intel Core i7-1165G7 @ 2.80GHz - Price performance comparison

www.cpubenchmark.net

PassMark CPU Benchmarks - Single Thread Performance

Benchmarks of the single thread performance of CPUs. This chart comparing CPUs single thread performance is made using thousands of PerformanceTest benchmark results and is updated daily.

www.cpubenchmark.net

Tops all desktops there, I can't imagine what Alder Lake will look like with new arch and clocks, let alone Ocean or any future design. This whole 7-10 nm mess has to end or we'll miss some huge gains.

Not ignoring AMD here, they'll have surely great designs with Zen 3-4 and definitely very competitive on price, but I think at a certain point 16 or 32 cores are pointless for desktop and some 50% gains in single thread could make up for fewer cores.

 

[clemsyn]

intel-tiger-lake-superfin-ishes-amd-ryzen-4000-in-latest-benchmarks

Was watching this tigerlake video and then realized it was made by Intel..

Cherry Picking benchmarks?

 

[Markfw]

intel-tiger-lake-superfin-ishes-amd-ryzen-4000-in-latest-benchmarks

Was watching this tigerlake video and then realized it was made by Intel..

Cherry Picking benchmarks?

I won't even read that, since its not by a trusted source.

 

[piokos]

It'll be good, but Intel isn't growing in all the dimensions where they need to see performance growth. History has shown us you only get to hit ~5 GHz once, and then it stops. Still on 4c in 2020? They're stuck.

Funny how when Zen launched AMD fans were praising IPC gains over clocks.
Now, when Intel starts to show some pretty decent IPC leaps, it's suddenly meh because just 4 cores.

Intel will increase core count when they hit a wall with their architecture efforts (so probably next year). I wonder what you'll make up then.

Simple fact is: for vast majority of consumers fast 4 cores give better user experience than 8 or 16. And that's it. Intel is not really targeting enthusiasts. They're a huge, mass-market chip supplier.

Now, I'm sure - absolutely independent of how the actual CPUs perform - you're more attracted to how AMD does and sells things. And it's OK. That's what they wanted.
But from time to time these discussions approach a level of 12-year-olds thinking that Ferrari is better than VW. It must be. Their cars are so much faster.

As long as most PC users are fine with 4 cores, Intel will keep making 4 cores. Simple as that. They have the position and the market share (even if slightly dropping lately) - they focus on profits.
If they need to make 6-core Tiger Lake, they will. It's surely within their reach right now.
But as long as they don't have to, they won't.

The main battlefield for Intel right now is in servers, not PCs. They have to focus on that. PCs are OK.

There is no magic. But hey, keep putting your head in the sand. Phones have more cores than that, for a reason . . .

But why would I care how much cores my CPU has if it does what I need? What's the point?

I've been promised over and over again, 10nm desktop from Intel in 2020. Where is it? Until Intel can actually produce a credible 10nm desktop CPU, they're locked to mobile while the rest of their markets slip into decline.

Time travelling much lately? Because "locked to mobile" looks like a comment from 2000.

intel-tiger-lake-superfin-ishes-amd-ryzen-4000-in-latest-benchmarks

Was watching this tigerlake video and then realized it was made by Intel..

Cherry Picking benchmarks?

I wonder if you have the same doubts when watching slides about performance on AMD presentations.

 

[DrMrLordX]

Who had promised you 10nm desktop in 2020 over and over again?

Oh it'll come to me soon, just give me a minute . . .

Funny how when Zen launched AMD fans were praising IPC gains over clocks.

I thought most of the performance gains from IceLake -> TigerLake came from higher sustained boost clocks? Willow Cove's IPC isn't that much higher than Sunny Cove.

Honestly I can't believe they can yield 150mm^2 or so dies and not 8 core parts maybe 175-180 mm^2 large. It makes no sense, heck even 6 cores would be fine!

That kinda confuses me as well. Looking back at Cannonlake, they couldn't yield anything over 2c and all the iGPUs were broken. That was the "original" 10nm, before we got 10nm+ (IceLake) and SuperFETs (TigerLake), so make of it what you will.

 

[Nereus77]

Simple fact is: for vast majority of consumers fast 4 cores give better user experience than 8 or 16. And that's it.

What the hell are you smoking, man? Give those same people an 8-core CPU, then switch it back to 4-core after a month. See how much they like their PCs then...

But why would I care how much cores my CPU has if it does what I need? What's the point?

This is the part where I point out that most smartphones have 8 cores since like 2012, probably before. Even the budget ones. Yet Intel stubbornly thinks 4 is fine for PC. They only added cores after a certain 3-letter-acronym company released a mainstream CPU with 8 cores and it proved more than capable in both MT and ST workloads.

I wonder if you have the same doubts when watching slides about performance on AMD presentations.

Same suspicions bro

 

[uzzi38]

Funny how when Zen launched AMD fans were praising IPC gains over clocks.
Now, when Intel starts to show some pretty decent IPC leaps, it's suddenly meh because just 4 cores.

Intel will increase core count when they hit a wall with their architecture efforts (so probably next year). I wonder what you'll make up then.

What will I say then?

"You're late, Cezanne was _ months ago"

 

[LightningZ71]

Proposing that smartphones have had 8 cores for years is the equivalent of a PC having 8 cores is stretching the truth to a very severe degree. Does ANY smartphone that runs Android or iOS have a single core that can do multi-threading? No! Almost every smartphone out there has up to 4 faster cores of varrying clock speed limits and four much slower, low power cores. In essence, they are EFFECTIVELY quad core processors with SMT as it is a well established fact that the SMT threads are roughly equivalent to having a 25-30% capability extra core.

The truth is, the absolute VAST majority of compute devices out in the market are quad core w/ SMT or 8 core big.LITTLE designs OR LESS. For so very much of the market, that's more than they need to do what they need to do. If you look at the few reviews that are out there for the 10th gen i3s or the Ryzen 3100/3300x, you find that they are more than competent for non-professional level gaming and doing everything else that most users do. We can sit here as computer geeks and grind our axes away into nothingness by bagging on Intel over having just quad cores on the market, but, the fact of the matter is, a good quad core that has excellent single core performance can be a perfectly adequate computer experience for most people. Heck, as I've spoken of in other threads, my daughter's Ice Lake i3 laptop is perfectly fine to browse the web with, use Google Docs with, watch videos on, and even play roblocks and minecraft. It doesn't skip a beat. That's a 2 core/4 thread processor.

I don't have a problem with Tiger Lake having only four cores, especially if each of those cores is at least as capable as Ice Lakes while clocking higher and running a bit cooler. I think that Intel's biggest contribution to the market will be to mainstream a capable iGPU in their mobile processors. If they can help push iGPU performance along, they will force AMD to make their APUs better as well to stay competitive. This will only help us as consumers as it will give developers a more capable target to create games and other programs for AND it will help relieve casual gamers of the Nvidia/AMD dGPU tax that many systems have to pay, as in the cost of MX series or the really low end RX video cards is rarely in line with the actual performance benefit that they deliver. While I realize that the iGPU performance won't be free, it'll be less expensive overall per level of performance because the cooling system and boards will be simpler.

 

[clemsyn]

Same suspicions bro
[/QUOTE]

Same for any company. Can't wait for anandtech review on Tigerlake.

 

[piokos]

What the hell are you smoking, man? Give those same people an 8-core CPU, then switch it back to 4-core after a month. See how much they like their PCs then...

I'm not sure if you don't know how CPUs work or how most people use their PCs.

But generally: no, they wouldn't care. A 4-core i5 is plenty for most people. And I know this because I actually talk to people who don't run benchmarks. Try it.
And being totally honest, if benchmarks didn't exist, some people on forums like this one may change their view as well.

This is the part where I point out that most smartphones have 8 cores since like 2012, probably before. Even the budget ones. Yet Intel stubbornly thinks 4 is fine for PC. They only added cores after a certain 3-letter-acronym company released a mainstream CPU with 8 cores and it proved more than capable in both MT and ST workloads.

But why is this even remotely important? Totally different machines, totally different use case.

Also, it's not that hard to make chips with more cores.
But it is hard to make many cores make sense.

 

[jpiniero]

About the 4 cores, you don't know when Tiger Lake was finished. For all we know, it could have been completed 2 years ago and they've been sitting on it while the fab team tries to fix the 10 nm yield.

 

[mikk]

intel-tiger-lake-superfin-ishes-amd-ryzen-4000-in-latest-benchmarks

Was watching this tigerlake video and then realized it was made by Intel..

Cherry Picking benchmarks?

Even if they are cherry picked (and by using VRS in some of them they are cherry picked), the difference is so big it seems likely Intel will dethrone AMD in real word gaming on iGPU. Who would have thought that 2 years ago, not many.

 

[uzzi38]

Even if they are cherry picked (and by using VRS in some of them they are cherry picked), the difference is so big it seems likely Intel will dethrone AMD in real word gaming on iGPU. Who would have thought that 2 years ago, not many.

Who would have thought two years ago AMD would even be relevant in mobile?

Actually no, make that 10 months ago.

 

[coercitiv]

Intel's marketing slides on TGL

 

[jpiniero]

Intel's marketing slides on TGL

AI will solve everything!

 

[IntelUser2000]

Intel's marketing slides on TGL

The GPU frequency seems low considering,


Might bode well for the 7-15W parts.

 

[coercitiv]

Some fun before serious talk begins.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1301164967895461891

 

[tamz_msc]

Now the question is whether the 1185G7 would be MIA for the most part, much like the 4800U was initially at launch.

 

[IntelUser2000]

Now the question is whether the 1185G7 would be MIA for the most part, much like the 4800U was initially at launch.

Might not be MIA but a $100 option on top of 1165G7 like they did it countless previous times. At least its a small upgrade.

2637 vs 2617
3617 vs 3517
4600 vs 4500
5600 vs 5500

And on and on. The 3517U is what my Dell XPS 12 has. Never had an option for 3617U. Not everyone offers them.

 

[IntelUser2000]

I'm listening/watching the 11th Gen presentation right now. I can't bear watching what they presented back in August 13, and AGAIN in August 17 with Hot Chips. Unlike most presentations, the Hot Chips presentation had almost nothing new.

Today is the THIRD time this is happening. No I don't want to see laptops spinning with some techno music on the background, or endless "testimonials" by random people and laptop advertisements. No, today should have been about them sending laptops to reviewers. Heck, even SDP systems would have worked like with Icelake!

Are they not freaking ready? "Holiday" launch?!?

Marketing, YOU SUCK!!

 

[mikk]

I thought this is supposed to be a launch, why is there no full SKU list, there is nothing on Intel ark either, what the hell? There is absolutely no product specification. A launch should reveal all of this immediately, otherwise it's a marketing show.

edit: https://newsroom.intel.com/news-releases/11th-gen-tiger-lake-evo/

Nevertheless, it should be available immediately on Intel ark.