Get ready for Calpella and Pineview.
From Intel roadmaps we know that there will be new platforms hitting notebooks this year, and now OEMs are confirming products based on the new technologies.
According to Digitimes, notebook OEMs including Quanta Computer, Compal Electronics, MSI, ECS and others, are gearing up for production of Nehalem-based laptops in the third quarter of this year.
Specifically, the new notebooks will be based off the next-generation Intel platform codenamed Calpella, which inherits all the Nehalem-based advancements such as the on-die memory controller and on-chip graphics.
Rumors suggest the platform will initially launch with three 45-nanometer quad-core “Clarksfield” chips: a 1.6GHz Core 2 Quad P1, a 1.73GHz Core 2 Quad P2, and a 2.0GHz Core 2 Extreme XE. The chips are expected to retail in lots of 1000 for $364, $546, and $1,054, respectively. Each is expected to sport an 8MB Level 3 cache except the 1.6GHz model, which will reportedly have a 6MB Level 3 cache.
Based on what Apple is believed to pay Intel for chips in its current MacBook Pros, the Mac maker would be most likely to adopt the 1.6GHz and 1.73GHz variants for its professional notebook line if it were to use any of the quad-core chips. Intel will follow up the release of Clarksfield with “Arrandale” 32-nm dual-core chips sometime in the first half of 2010, which will sport higher clock speeds and could play to the 13-inch MacBook line. Arrandale chips could also be used in the MacBook Pro line if Apple forgoes adoption of the first round of quad-core Clarksfield chips.
Arriving a few months ahead of Calpella and Clarksfield will be a refresh to Intel’s current Montevina notebook platform that will introduce a T9900 3.06GHz chip and P8800 2.66GHz chip alongside price cuts to existing models.
Smaller form factor notebooks will continue to use Montevina technology with the CULV chips that Intel plans to roll out. This will include 12- and 13-inch notebooks in the under $1,100 category.
Netbooks will be getting their own overhaul this fall with the introduction of the new Atom Pineview chip with on-chip graphics and Tiger Point chipset, which will replace the presently ubiquitous Atom N270 and 945GSE combination we have now.
The Atom N270 and 945GSE will continue to live on, however, in the low-cost segment of 8.9-inch netbooks running Intel’s Linux-based Moblin OS.
THANK GOD the slower-than-a-snail N270 is going away! It’s already more than an year old. Come on Intel, get some faster processors in there!