Arrandale minus GPU for Apple ?

[NoobyDoo]

Apple ditches 32nm Arrandale, won't use Intel graphics

Apple allegedly refused to adopt Intel's Arrandale and the Calpella platform in its default form. In order for Apple to implement Calpella design with their next refresh of Mac mini / MacBook / MacBook Pro lines, Intel will have to provide Apple with the 32nm version without the integrated graphics part. Again, we cannot confirm the information about the replacement CPU, we only know that Apple rejected Arrandale.

Wouldn't a Arrandale minus GPU be preferred by many ?

 

[Triskain]

That is impossible. Arrandale's Memory Controller is on the same Chip as the GPU. An Arrandale/Clarkdale without an On-Package GPU is impossible.

 

[Idontcare]

That is impossible. Arrandale's Memory Controller is on the same Chip as the GPU. An Arrandale/Clarkdale without an On-Package GPU is impossible.

"without the graphics part" does not mean "without the graphics, IMC, and northbridge parts"

 

[jvroig]

So the IMC and northbridge will be idling so that Apple can continue using nVidia graphics?

 

[lothar]

That might not be worth the cost for Intel to do(create a separate line to manufacture not to mention it might require more R&D)....

What if Intel decides to call a bluff and says no?
What choice will Apple have, go back to crappy PowerPC processors or keep offering the current chip they have now until Intel stops production on them 2-3 years from now, then what?

 

[Idontcare]

Hard to say, this is "bullshit news" reporting after all. Considering how tight Apple and Intel are it would be rather strange for Intel to have assumed Apple would want Arrandale without confiding in them about the roadmap and making sure they had buy-in from their larger customers.

Its not like you spend 3yrs working on something in a cave and then spring it on your customers 90 days from mass-production time.

Whatever Intel has you are assured it is what Apple wants or will accept.

 

[lothar]

Hard to say, this is "bullshit news" reporting after all. Considering how tight Apple and Intel are it would be rather strange for Intel to have assumed Apple would want Arrandale without confiding in them about the roadmap and making sure they had buy-in from their larger customers.

Its not like you spend 3yrs working on something in a cave and then spring it on your customers 90 days from mass-production time.

Whatever Intel has you are assured it is what Apple wants or will accept.

How big is Apple as a customer for Intel(compared to HP, Acer, Dell, Toshiba, Sony, IBM/Lenovo, and the others)?
With how overpriced their products are, I'll be surprised if they have more than a 3-5% market share in the mobile market.

 

[Idontcare]

Big enough they will have gulftown rigs selling before Intel releases them to the rest of the market.

Its not about total volume, its about gross margins. Apple speaks Intel's language.

You can bet the other players are well aware of Intel's roadmap as well. It is an iterative business on that side of the equation.

Even when Apple switched to Intel all three parties (Intel, Apple, and IBM) had more than 2 yrs of transition time before the first Apple/Intel products came to market.

Project horizons are on the order of years, no one operates in a way that could/would create a suprise, thats not how that business is done.

 

[21stHermit]

Hard to say, this is "bullshit news" reporting after all. Considering how tight Apple and Intel are it would be rather strange for Intel to have assumed Apple would want Arrandale without confiding in them about the roadmap and making sure they had buy-in from their larger customers.

Its not like you spend 3yrs working on something in a cave and then spring it on your customers 90 days from mass-production time.

Whatever Intel has you are assured it is what Apple wants or will accept.

Well stated.

 

[lothar]

Big enough they will have gulftown rigs selling before Intel releases them to the rest of the market.

Its not about total volume, its about gross margins. Apple speaks Intel's language.

You can bet the other players are well aware of Intel's roadmap as well. It is an iterative business on that side of the equation.

Even when Apple switched to Intel all three parties (Intel, Apple, and IBM) had more than 2 yrs of transition time before the first Apple/Intel products came to market.

Project horizons are on the order of years, no one operates in a way that could/would create a suprise, thats not how that business is done.

I'm was not debating product developmental cycle.
My question was mainly on "if Intel was developing a product 2 years from now which Apple vehemently disagrees with, but all the other OEM's like"...Something partisan between the OEMs like the health care debate in this country where there's no middle ground.

At the end of the day, I agree with your conclusion(the bolded part specifically)
Whatever Intel has you are assured it is what Apple wants or will accept.
If this rumor from BS News turns out to be true, Apple has no choice but to accept because going back to PowerPC isn't feasible.
If this is false, it's pretty clear that Apple has accepted it.

 

[TuxDave]

I'm was not debating product developmental cycle.
My question was mainly on "if Intel was developing a product 2 years from now which Apple vehemently disagrees with, but all the other OEM's like"...Something partisan between the OEMs like the health care debate in this country where there's no middle ground.

At the end of the day, I agree with your conclusion(the bolded part specifically)
Whatever Intel has you are assured it is what Apple wants or will accept.
If this rumor from BS News turns out to be true, Apple has no choice but to accept because going back to PowerPC isn't feasible.
If this is false, it's pretty clear that Apple has accepted it.

What a crazy hypothetical situation that would be since Intel releases several variations of the same chip and it would require Apple not wanting any of them and at the same time Apple wanting a specific configuration that no other OEM would want.

"I want a single threaded atom processor with as many graphic chips as possible on there and nothing else!"

 

[Idontcare]

I'm was not debating product developmental cycle.
My question was mainly on "if Intel was developing a product 2 years from now which Apple vehemently disagrees with, but all the other OEM's like"...Something partisan between the OEMs like the health care debate in this country where there's no middle ground.

At the end of the day, I agree with your conclusion(the bolded part specifically)
Whatever Intel has you are assured it is what Apple wants or will accept.
If this rumor from BS News turns out to be true, Apple has no choice but to accept because going back to PowerPC isn't feasible.
If this is false, it's pretty clear that Apple has accepted it.

My point is that the rumor implies some degree of "recent-ness" to the situation regarding Arrandale and Apple which is just not how businesses operate at that level.

If Apple had issues with Arrandale they would have been expressed and factored into the design of Arrandale (or the compromises comprehended in Apple's product designs) years ago, certainly no more recently than a full year ago at the absolute latest.

At the productization levels of project management, Arrandale was last year's news for both Intel's designers and Apple's product managers. Whatever Apple is bringing to the market, be it Arrandale with IGP or some castrated version of Arrandale sans the GPU parts of the IGP you can rest assured Apple made their decision sometime circa mid-2008.

Looking at Gulftown, and knowing that the quad-core variant is already out in the wild (ES form), and knowing that Intel made Nehalem architecture (westmere is the shrink, but same basic architecture) to be modular, just how much of a stretch of the imagination or leap of extrapolation do we need to take to envision a dual-core westmere part being fabbed that has on-die memory controller just like Gulftown? (if Apple really just can't live with Arrandale)

 

[TEAMSWITCHER]

Intel is notorious for promising faster drivers by the time the silicon is ready for mass production and failing to deliver. If Intel failed to meet certain performance promises, Apple may be the first manufacturer (FINALLY) to throw Intel under the bus for their crappy graphics.

Intel makes good CPU's, but when it comes to GPU's, nvidia and AMD are much better solutions for moving the industry forward.

 

[JFAMD]

What if Intel decides to call a bluff and says no?
What choice will Apple have, go back to crappy PowerPC processors or keep offering the current chip they have now until Intel stops production on them 2-3 years from now, then what?

Yeah, it's not like there is another company out there selling x86 processors. Not that I am suggesting anything, I don't know anything about client products.

 

[Ben90]

Intel is notorious for promising faster drivers by the time the silicon is ready for mass production and failing to deliver. If Intel failed to meet certain performance promises, Apple may be the first manufacturer (FINALLY) to throw Intel under the bus for their crappy graphics.

Intel makes good CPU's, but when it comes to GPU's, nvidia and AMD are much better solutions for moving the industry forward.

And those faster drivers are notorious for being slower than anything else on the market.

 

[lothar]

Yeah, it's not like there is another company out there selling x86 processors. Not that I am suggesting anything, I don't know anything about client products.

AMD's current processors are not "green" enough for Apple.

 

[jvroig]

I echo JFAMD's thoughts, and wondered why is AMD not in consideration considering Apple also has good relations with AMD (don't they buy a ton of AMD/ATi's graphics cards?)

What is not "green" enough?

 

[JFAMD]

AMD's current processors are not "green" enough for Apple.

I disagree. There are plenty of green options from AMD.

 

[lothar]

On the mobile market?
By "green" I mean energy efficient(performance/watt), long battery life, etc...The whole mantra.

More than any other company in the tech industry, Apple is on the "green" bandwagon.
Heck, they rejected Intel's SSD in their MacBooks because they contained halogen in them.
http://74.125.93.132/search?q=cache...e+intel&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us&client=opera

*EDIT*
Are AMD's processors competitive on performance/watt, long battery life now?
I know during the Dothan/Yonah era they certainly were not being anywhere near competitive on the radar.
Has times changed?...Since Desktop market is still the same since July '07, I'm extrapolating Intel is still ahead of AMD on those metrics.

I know AMD plans to also release a processor(Bobcat) for the mobile market that boasts energy efficiency, but that's not out yet.

 

[Fox5]

Athlon II and Turion II chips are already out and at least somewhat close the gap between AMD and Intel. However, Intel's new mobile chips are still pretty far ahead of AMD in performance/watt.

Maybe AMD's superior IGPs will make up for that? Apple is pushing OpenCL, and I doubt an Intel IGP will do well at it. Plus, Fusion is only a year away, maybe Apple will somehow arrange to get first dibs on any fusion products and we'll see a Fusion product in 9 months as a macbook.
What will Apple sell until then? Probably Intel.

 

[Idontcare]

Athlon II and Turion II chips are already out and at least somewhat close the gap between AMD and Intel. However, Intel's new mobile chips are still pretty far ahead of AMD in performance/watt.

And that is a comparison between AMD's lineup and Intel's existing 45nm mobile lineup, versus the 32nm mobile processor under discussion which should have even better performance/watt.

 

[lothar]

Athlon II and Turion II chips are already out and at least somewhat close the gap between AMD and Intel. However, Intel's new mobile chips are still pretty far ahead of AMD in performance/watt.

And that is a comparison between AMD's lineup and Intel's existing 45nm mobile lineup, versus the 32nm mobile processor under discussion which should have even better performance/watt.

Exactly.
Nail in coffin.

 

[Fox5]

Exactly.
Nail in coffin.

Heh, maybe the integrated graphics can make up for it.

Perhaps we'll see a big push by apple for OpenCL, in which a dual core AMD with IGP will outperform a quad core Intel with IGP. Still, Apple's not really price sensitive, they could just pair an Intel dual core with a low end discrete cheap and probably still come out ahead of AMD.

 

[v8envy]

Apple's customers may not be price sensitive but any business is price sensitive by definition. If option A and B are expected to produce the same results and A is cheaper than B absolutely no business will ever consider B. In practice no two options are identical, but for every sane business decision the total cost vs benefit is the primary driver.

Discrete graphics take up more physical space, complicate board layout, use more power and as a result may impact the cooling and ergonomics of the final product.

I'm not sure what I'm arguing against exactly, but there you go. As far as the OP: smells like BS. Perhaps Apple will get a special SKU with the graphics rendering fixed function parts of the silicon permanently disabled to save power. When they arrive we'll know.

 

[ViRGE]

Heh, maybe the integrated graphics can make up for it.

Perhaps we'll see a big push by apple for OpenCL, in which a dual core AMD with IGP will outperform a quad core Intel with IGP. Still, Apple's not really price sensitive, they could just pair an Intel dual core with a low end discrete cheap and probably still come out ahead of AMD.

Perhaps? We already are. OpenCL is a major cornerstone of Snow Leopard and beyond. In fact the lack of OpenCL support from Intel (and their lousy Mac drivers) is probably why Apple doesn't want Intel's GPU.