Pentium 4 to be replaced by dual core processors

Xinhua said Intel will start rolling out Pentium D & Extreme Edition processors to replace Pentium 4 processor, the move seeking to give Intel a lion's share of the dual core processor market.

Now that Intel has almost reached the economic limit of technology in terms of increasing core speeds, the only way for it to deliver increased performance at an acceptable cost is to increase the number of cores per processor package.

Dual-core chips offer two cores on a single silicon die, offering users more performance without significantly ramping up energy consumption or heat gneeration. In his keynote speech, outgoing CEO Craig Barrett said dual-core technology offered Intel, of Santa Clara, Calif., a way of continuing Moore' Law without having to increase the chip's frequency.

Pentium D & Extreme Edition are the first in line of nearly 15 dual- and multicore projects under way at Intel's R & D. The difference between the two is that the Pentium D's twin cores don't have Hyperthreading enabled, so a Pentium D will appear to the operating system as two processors. Pentium Extreme Edition, however, does have Hyperthreading and so will appear as four processors. The new Extreme Edition will appear in the second quarter of this year.

The Pentium 4 will move to 65nm fabrication in 2006 when it will be used as the basis for the 'Presler' multi-chip package. Intel said that the processor would continue to be available in its present form for the next two years. Intel expects Multicore products to eventually permeate its entire range, from notebook CPUs to the Itanium server chip.

John Dvorak said Intel nearly put all its eggs in a new architectural basket some years back when it announced the roadmap for the Itanium processor and nearly lost control of the industry it invented. This time it's not trying to reinvent the wheel in such a drastic manner. It simply decided to make a better wheel, not a newer wheel.

What makes it so important at this juncture is that clock speeds have peaked and until now increasing clock speeds has been the primary methodology for improving performance. Despite the fact that the chip makers would promote all sorts of important design changes, it was always clock speed that seemed to matter. If you could double the clock speed you'd make everything inside the chip do things at double speed thus doubling the performance. It was that simple.

Dual core changes the model for doubling the performance. You keep the clock speed the same and double the CPU itself. Put two of them within the chip. This will, of course, become four then eight in the years ahead.

Information Week said Intel anticipates about three-quarters of all its shipments by the end of 2006 will be dual-core versions.

Intel has more than 15 dual and multicore projects under way.

Slashdot said Tom's Hardware reports that AMD is planning to release both it's dual-core desktop and mobile chips at the same time.