Conclusion

There you have it, a summary of the key features and technologies in the upcoming Intel Larrabee architecture. Simplicity is the keyword. Instead of making ever-more-complex processing cores, this Intel team decided to update the simple Intel Pentium execution pipeline with some new features and use it to create processors that are made up of many, many small processing cores. The general idea is to boost throughput by using large numbers of processing cores in a processor.

With the Larrabee, Intel is going beyond just quad-core or even octa-core processors. Unlike the Nehalem and Bloomfield processors, the Larrabee was intentionally designed to support a tremendous number of processing cores. While this is merely a technological preview with no mention of actual product specifications, their preliminary test results show the use of 8 to 48 cores. Hence, Intel's use of the term "many core", instead of "multi-core" when describing the Larrabee.

The biggest and most obvious use of so many processing cores is, of course, 3D graphics. Larrabee promises to combine both a CPU and a GPU into a single package. All made and sold by Intel, of course.

Should ATI and NVIDIA be afraid? Well, not really, at least not at first. ATI-AMD would certainly be working on a similar processor. Even when Larrabee-based processors are launched, they are more likely to target the budget and mainstream gamers first, rather than the enthusiasts. Even NVIDIA would still have some room to wiggle in. Then again, isn't the budget and mainstream market where the big money is?

Let us know what you think about the Intel Larrabee!

Other Intel-Related Articles

• Pre-Launch Details Of The Intel Bloomfield (Nehalem Desktop) Processor
• Intel Desktop CPU Roadmap @ June 2008
• Intel Desktop Chipset Roadmap @ June 2008
• Counterfeit Intel Boxed Processors
• Intel Core 2 Extreme QX9650 Quad-Core Processor Review
• Intel Core 2 Duo E7200 Dual-Core Processor Review

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