Intel fails to keep new chip under wraps
Details of Intel's latest processor, codenamed Tualatin, have slipped out six months before the chip is due to be released.
Details of Intel's latest processor, codenamed Tualatin, have slipped out six months before the chip is due to be released.
Named after a river in the US, Tualatin will be used to fill the gap between Intel's existing Pentium III and Pentium 4 chips.
While the Pentium 4 is expected to reach clock speeds of more than 2Ghz by the middle of this year, Pentium III will remain at 1Ghz because of limitations in its aluminium manufacturing process. Tualatin is set to fill this gap, with the first version expected to enter the market at 1.2Ghz.
The processor itself is based on Intel's new socket 370 FC-PGA2 design, and will be based on a variant of the existing Pentium III 815 chipset. Unlike Pentium 4, this motherboard will not be contractually forced to use Rambus memory.
Although the chipset will support PC133Mhz memory, it is not known at this stage whether Intel will provide further Rambus or double data rate support.
However, an innovation of Tualatin is its Integrated Heat Spreader (IHS) which protects the processor core from damage that can result during the fitting or removal of a heat sink. IHS does this by increasing the contact area between processor and heat sink to create more efficient cooling.
Most heat sinks will not fit the Tualatin chip because ISH is 1.5mm in height, but this problem can be overcome by lengthening the processor attachment clips on the sides of a heat sink, so it should not prove a major problem for fan vendors.
Tualatin will be fabbed under the 0.13 micron manufacturing process and work off a 1.2v core voltage. Price details are still unknown, but it us expected to compete with similar clock speed chips from rival AMD.
Separately, AMD has made its debut in the server market by including its Athlon chips in a Sun Internet appliance server. Following industry rumours, Sun has launched a low-end version of its Cobalt server and confirmed that the range will use Athlon chips.