Leaked roadmap suggests Intel wants to catch up with Apple chips by 2024

[nanoguy]

Something to look forward to: Intel's most recent technology roadmap seems to suggest Team Blue is increasing the cadence of CPU releases and process technologies. A leaked document suggests the company is prioritizing mobile processors in an attempt to compete with energy-efficient Arm chips such as Apple's M1 Pro and M1 Max.

With Alder Lake, Intel made its first step in a long journey to regain the leadership position in terms of performance against years of increasingly improved AMD Ryzen designs. However, the end goal is to make x86 hardware that is also capable of competing on a performance-per-watt basis with Arm-based solutions.

Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger promised as much during interviews, and he's generally seen as the right person to turn Intel around, even though some in the industry have their doubts. TSMC founder Morris Chang believes Gelsinger is too old for what will surely be a long-term battle that could last beyond his retirement age.

Even so, Gelsinger seems determined to work on the fundamentals of Intel’s business to speed up the process as much as possible. And according to a leaked roadmap shared by AdoredTV, Intel is already working on a new CPU lineup that is designed to compete with Apple’s M1 Pro and M1 Max chipsets.

Specifically, Team Blue wants to have its 15th generation Arrow Lake processors ready to ship by late 2023 or early 2024, and the main focus is on delivering comparable or better performance-per-watt when compared to Apple Silicon.

The roadmap suggests Intel will use TSMC’s 3nm process node to maximize energy-efficiency. Last week, Intel said it would use a combination of its Intel 4 and Intel 20A process nodes alongside TSMC’s N3. Meteor Lake and Arrow Lake CPUs will have a chiplet design with different tiles for the CPU, integrated graphics engine, and IO/SoC. The company might use TSMC’s N3 for the iGPU, which is expected to feature 384 execution units, but this could change throughout the development process.

It’s worth noting Intel’s Core i7-12700H (Alder Lake) CPU already performs quite well against Apple’s M1 Pro, especially in multi-threaded workloads. The M1 Pro still wins in terms of efficiency, but Intel may be able to get close to that with Arrow Lake, which will be built on a combination of smaller process nodes and feature several architectural improvements over Alder Lake.

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https://www.techspot.com/news/93541-leaked-roadmap-suggests-intel-wants-catch-up-apple.html

 

[Squid Surprise]

Will it be comparable to what Apple releases NOW... or comparable to what Apple will be releasing THEN?

 

[George Keech]

How can they no what apple will have out in 2 years?

 

[Squid Surprise]

How can they no what apple will have out in 2 years?

Well... they can't know EXACTLY what Apple will have... but they certainly have a pretty good idea.

The same way Intel is projecting what they will have in 2 years (and beyond), Apple does the same... No company stands still - well, they don't if they expect to stay profitable...

 

[Michael7]

Well, if they make it by 2024, then they will be about 3 years behind Apple and 3 years is a long time especially in a mobie CPU.

 

[hahahanoobs]

Intel has big bets on 20A and 18A (sub 3nm).
I think they can do it. People just need to acknowledge Intel struggled with 10nm, instead of foolishly thinking they held back because of lack of competition. Intel wants their lead back and they are coming for it. I'll be watching.

The M1 comments above are quite funny.
Intel is aiming to get the EFFICIENCY of M1 in an x86 CPU. It's literally what "techies" were asking for when M1 came out that fueled the "end of x86" talk. You guys just like to complain. It's that simple. lol

An Interview with Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger

An interview with Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger about IDM 2.0, the acquisition of Tower Semiconductor, and the choices Intel did not make.

stratechery.com

 

[dangh]

I think with last info on AMD 6900H which is quite close to current M chip, they still have more to catch up.

 

[defaultluser]

I think with last info on AMD 6900H which is quite close to current M chip, they still have more to catch up.

Yeah, the only way Intel got efficiency us or Alder Lake is thanks to those ecores (and it disappears the moment you stress the P-cores!)

 

[Irata]

Sounds like a solid plan - have a competitor in 2024 for a processor that was released in 2021. Do they think they can send some MDF Apple‘s way to make them stop developing new processors ?

 

[wiyosaya]

To me, this sounds like more sIntel PR BS.

 

[Shadowboxer]

This is desperate. The writing is on the wall for X86 and I think they know it, the shareholders are applying pressure. MS and Apple are in the process of moving their OS and software to ARM. Intel and AMD will fight tooth and nail but they wont be able to match a competent ARM based design. X86 is extremely old and never designed to be run off a battery. There will still be customers for Intel and AMD however as once we are all using ARM personal devices we will still need X86 servers to run all that legacy software for years to come.

Oh the irony of Intel turning Apple down on making the iphone CPU back in 2006 or whenever it was. I bet they regret that now!

 

[kiwigraeme]

This is desperate. The writing is on the wall for X86 and I think they know it, the shareholders are applying pressure. MS and Apple are in the process of moving their OS and software to ARM. Intel and AMD will fight tooth and nail but they wont be able to match a competent ARM based design. X86 is extremely old and never designed to be run off a battery. There will still be customers for Intel and AMD however as once we are all using ARM personal devices we will still need X86 servers to run all that legacy software for years to come.

Oh the irony of Intel turning Apple down on making the iphone CPU back in 2006 or whenever it was. I bet they regret that now!

Intel , AMD, NVidia, Qualcomm , MediaTek will all do fine - uses for chips will just grow and grow - but the middle ground like you said will be a battleground . Plus unless carbon taxes become big - all these devices will be efficient - most people don't care too much now . Quite a bit of Apples efficiency is the 5nm vs 7nm .
Plus Battery Tech will improve as well - so my laptop lasts 3 days , so my laptop charges in 15 minutes 80% wirelessly on the charging station in Starbucks in 15 minutes . My car charges it automatically from just being inside it ( with right settings and permissions )- same as my home , office or the battery pack in my pocket /backpack

 

[Shadowboxer]

Intel , AMD, NVidia, Qualcomm , MediaTek will all do fine - uses for chips will just grow and grow - but the middle ground like you said will be a battleground . Plus unless carbon taxes become big - all these devices will be efficient - most people don't care too much now . Quite a bit of Apples efficiency is the 5nm vs 7nm .
Plus Battery Tech will improve as well - so my laptop lasts 3 days , so my laptop charges in 15 minutes 80% wirelessly on the charging station in Starbucks in 15 minutes . My car charges it automatically from just being inside it ( with right settings and permissions )- same as my home , office or the battery pack in my pocket /backpack

Its not just the battery life, the devices that use ARM will be much slimmer and need far less cooling. Intel and AMD will eventually die out in the personal computing space but they wont die. They will continue to sell enterprise grade, datacenter etc and they both also offer products that are not X86 CPUs.

But X86 will never be as efficient as ARM in the long run. Maybe when maxed out it might be as efficient in some tasks but when idling or in light use it just wont give you the power savings that ARM can. Theres a good reason Apple decided to invest hundreds of billions into developing their own silicon. The M1 isnt some kind of fad, its the first of a new generation of ARM CPUs that WILL replace X86 sooner or later. It is going to go down in history as the first desktop capable mobile (ARM) CPU. Note how many companies are scrambling to develop their own ARM parts now like Google and MS.

Microsoft reportedly designing its own ARM-based chips for servers and Surface PCs

Custom chips will reportedly power Microsoft’s cloud services.

www.theverge.com

Google reportedly plans to put its own chips in Chromebook laptops from 2023

Google is edging closer to rolling out its own central processing units for its Chromebook laptops, according to a report from Nikkei Asia.

www.cnbc.com

Im quite certain these statements from Mr Gelsinger at Intel etc are purely designed to settle the shareholders nerves. The man is an accomplished engineer, he knows exactly whats coming and the future isnt X86.

 

[quadibloc]

In order to get the amount of efficiency of Apple's chips, the overhead of decoding complex X86 instructions will have to go. Didn't Intel already have a RISC-like architecture of its own? Oh, wait, no; I don't think the Itanium was ever considered energy-efficient, and it was also tied to a particular level of technology, so it's obsolete now. But maybe Intel could come up with something, like a chip with an x86 part that can turn itself off when not in use.

 

[Watzupken]

To me, the only way Intel can improve their chip efficiency is to rely on x64 cores, such as the RISC V chips. Not that they will use RISC V chips completely, but as some sort of e-core. 2024 is actually not that far off, and it will be interesting to see if Intel can indeed close the gap between them and Apple’s SOC. In any case, if Intel just wants to make a point for Apple to consider using their chip again, I suspect it may not happen since it’s clear that Apple would like to be in control of their own hardware. Intel can poach experienced people away from other firms, but likewise if Apple needs talent, they have even deeper pockets for hiring.

 

[Fastturtle]

Intel has big bets on 20A and 18A (sub 3nm).
I think they can do it. People just need to acknowledge Intel struggled with 10nm, instead of foolishly thinking they held back because of lack of competition. Intel wants their lead back and they are coming for it. I'll be watching.

The M1 comments above are quite funny.
Intel is aiming to get the EFFICIENCY of M1 in an x86 CPU. It's literally what "techies" were asking for when M1 came out that fueled the "end of x86" talk. You guys just like to complain. It's that simple. lol

An Interview with Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger

An interview with Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger about IDM 2.0, the acquisition of Tower Semiconductor, and the choices Intel did not make.

stratechery.com

My Biggest complaint is that they're not carving the chips in Marble instead of Glass.

 

[Fastturtle]

The big issue for Intel is Perf/Watt metrics. Even a change in node doesn't improve their CPU's enough to beat AMD/Apple/ARM. What they'll need to do is completely rethink/redesign to meet that metric, just like AMD and Apple both did.

All those saying x86 is dead are *****s as the only OS's that can move to a new Arch are Apple (they've already done it) and Linux. Windows is to beholdened to Intel and actually driving some of the design decisions on performance yet even they have the perf/watt issue to face as it will bite them pretty soon in the backside.

In regards to Win11, I feel they didn't go far enough on the hardware requirements with the biggest being the Memory. That should have been at least 8GB minimum though 16GB would have been better. On the CPU front, they could have said 12Gen Intel and Zen3 for AMD. Forget anything else as they still have 3 years for folks to get new hardware to meet it.

 

[hahahanoobs]

The big issue for Intel is Perf/Watt metrics. Even a change in node doesn't improve their CPU's enough to beat AMD/Apple/ARM. What they'll need to do is completely rethink/redesign to meet that metric, just like AMD and Apple both did.

All those saying x86 is dead are *****s as the only OS's that can move to a new Arch are Apple (they've already done it) and Linux. Windows is to beholdened to Intel and actually driving some of the design decisions on performance yet even they have the perf/watt issue to face as it will bite them pretty soon in the backside.

In regards to Win11, I feel they didn't go far enough on the hardware requirements with the biggest being the Memory. That should have been at least 8GB minimum though 16GB would have been better. On the CPU front, they could have said 12Gen Intel and Zen3 for AMD. Forget anything else as they still have 3 years for folks to get new hardware to meet it.

Last I checked M1 only works with Apples OS, and Windows is the dominate OS globally, and Intel has already beat them in performance where it counts. Once you add in GPU acceleration and HPC, you start to see how far Apple, not Intel has to go.

No one is flocking to Apple just to get Apple silicon to run an OS they've never used before. lol