Among a number of completely different updates tucked into Intel’s Q2’2020 earnings report, the corporate included a quick replace on a few of their future merchandise. While the majority of the corporate’s focus is at the moment on their next-generation Tiger Lake CPUs, that are launching this quarter, the corporate can be what comes after Tiger Lake, in addition to the way forward for their extremely worthwhile server enterprise.
First off, Alder Lake has lastly been formally outed. The successor to Tiger Lake now has an official launch window of the second-half of 2021. The 10nm chip will probably be for each cell and desktops, making it the primary 10nm chip that Intel has confirmed will come to desktops. Very little is in any other case formally recognized in regards to the chip, however Intel’s ISA paperwork have beforehand revealed that there will probably be some new directions present in that chip.
Otherwise the six-month window for kicking off manufacturing shipments is a reasonably vast one for a chip that doesn’t depend on a brand new course of node. Intel product cycles are not often beneath a yr lengthy, so at first blush we’d be stunned if this was something sooner than a late 2021 product. But with Intel’s current 7nm delay and deliberate ramp-up of their 10nm course of, it could be that Intel will probably be attempting to drag it in and launch it in Q3, much like this yr’s Tiger Lake launch.
Meanwhile on the server facet of issues, Intel is making ready for each Ice Lake-SP in addition to its successor, Sapphire Rapids. One of the numerous victims of Intel’s 10nm woes, Ice Lake-SP is Intel’s first 10nm server chip. As of late the corporate has been driving a wave of profitability based mostly on its server components, so a more recent half that improves on core counts and vitality effectivity will probably be a welcomed addition to Intel’s product lineup, to not point out higher capable of fend off AMD’s highly effective EPYC “Rome” processors.
Initial manufacturing shipments for Ice Lake-SP are set to start out by the top of this yr. Though Intel’s language is unfastened sufficient that this will likely imply that bigger volumes of the chip might not ship till 2021.
Following Ice Lake-SP will probably be Sapphire Rapids, Intel’s second-generation 10nm server half. Along with getting Intel’s product launch cadence nearer to being again on observe, Sapphire Rapids will play an necessary function in unifying Intel’s break up Xeon households. Intel’s oddball 14nm Cooper Lake Xeons, that are at the moment delivery, assist bfloat16, however Ice Lake-SP is not going to. For 10nm chips that assist is lastly being rolled into Sapphire Rapids, making the brand new chip the successor to each Cooper Lake and Ice Lake-SP in each method.
Sapphire Rapids will comply with Ice Lake-SP by roughly a yr. According to Intel’s presentation deck, chips will start sampling in H2’2020, whereas CEO Bob Swan’s ready remarks state that preliminary manufacturing shipments will start at the moment.
What follows these chips, in flip, would be the large query that Intel is at the moment wangling with in gentle of their 7nm delay. The firm has made it clear that they intend to keep up an annual launch cadence, divorced from their course of roadmap if needed. Depending on the state of their 7nm course of, that will imply 7nm chips, 10nm chips, chips utilizing dies from each processes, and even utilizing dies from third-party fabs. Intel has opened the door to all potentialities, and their 2022 chips will seemingly be their first likelihood to embrace their new pragmatic strategy.
