Intel Amber Lake

[Eug]

I was surprised to see no Amber Lake thread here yet. I guess people got seduced by the 28-core 4-5 GHz CPU and the interestingly-named 8086K, but was more interested in the news of the new Intel Amber Lake chips.

8th generation
It's 14 nm (again)
Double-digit performance increase. Increase over what though? 7Y30? 7Y32?

I could see an m3 8Y30 1.1 GHz with 2.9 GHz TurboBoost to start. That's a 10% speed boost over 7th gen.

 

[Dayman1225]

I hope Amber Lake supports LPDDR4/X finally. That would be nice.

 

[IntelUser2000]

Amber Lake is said to be 5W, which will improve base frequency by a lot. That plus 14nm++(14nm+ in Kabylake Y) can potentially improve performance by quite a bit.

 

[wahdangun]

Because it's boring, just another lake release.

 

[Eug]

I hope Amber Lake supports LPDDR4/X finally. That would be nice.

I'm thinking it won't, but I'm just guessing.

Amber Lake is said to be 5W, which will improve base frequency by a lot. That plus 14nm++(14nm+ in Kabylake Y) can potentially improve performance by quite a bit.

Where did you see the 5 W spec? I'm thinking that supposed extra 0.5 W maybe just accounts for the integrated WiFi.

AnandTech makes no mention of the 5 W spec:

https://www.anandtech.com/show/12878/intel-discuss-whiskey-lake-amber-lake-and-cascade-lake#comments

 

[Dayman1225]

I'm thinking it won't, but I'm just guessing.


Where did you see the 5 W spec? I'm thinking that supposed extra 0.5 W maybe just accounts for the integrated WiFi.

AnandTech makes no mention of the 5 W spec:

https://www.anandtech.com/show/12878/intel-discuss-whiskey-lake-amber-lake-and-cascade-lake#comments

He is probably going by the fact that CNL-Y bumped the TDP to 5.2w

 

[jpiniero]

Cannonlake-Y is 5.2 W, but my assumption is because of the McIVR. I'd have to think Amber Lake is still 4.5.

 

[Eug]

He is probably going by the fact that CNL-Y bumped the TDP to 5.2w

Yeah, maybe, but of course Amber Lake Y isn't Cannon Lake Y. I'm with jpiniero that it's probably still 4.5 W.

 

[Eug]

So, from what I gather based on the limited information, it may be reasonable to expect a speed bump (perhaps 10-15%?), but nothing else of note vs. Kaby lake.

No LPDDR4x, no Thunderbolt, no USB-C Gen 2 10 Mbps, no quad-core, etc.

 

[LTC8K6]

Well, the one CNL chip we have does support lpddr4x, if that means anything.

 

[Eug]

Well, the one CNL chip we have does support lpddr4x, if that means anything.

Yes. It means that CNL will support LPDDR4x.

Seriously though, I don't think that says anything about this new Amber Lake.

Correct me if I'm wrong, but it sounds like in a parallel universe, Amber Lake could be called Coffee Lake Y.

 

[ksec]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but it sounds like in a parallel universe, Amber Lake could be called Coffee Lake Y.

Well because that is what it essentially is. I am not sure how they are going with the WiFI part.

But the idea is simple. Intel don't want to lower price. So a new "lake" with 14++ instead of 14+, higher base and turbo frequency, and a free "WiFi".

May be that is what's coming in new MacBook.

 

[Eug]

Well because that is what it essentially is. I am not sure how they are going with the WiFI part.

But the idea is simple. Intel don't want to lower price. So a new "lake" with 14++ instead of 14+, higher base and turbo frequency, and a free "WiFi".

May be that is what's coming in new MacBook.

I wonder when Intel made the decision to implement Amber Lake.

Was it decided upon in conjunction with Coffee Lake, or was Amber Lake added even later?

 

[LTC8K6]

I wonder when Intel made the decision to implement Amber Lake.

Was it decided upon in conjunction with Coffee Lake, or was Amber Lake added even later?

Whenever they decided 10nm was lacking in robustness...

 

[ksec]

I wonder when Intel made the decision to implement Amber Lake.

Was it decided upon in conjunction with Coffee Lake, or was Amber Lake added even later?

Coffeelake was never meant for mobile part. It was first and foremost a desktop part. Then as time passes they leaked out more with top / mid range mobile part. At the time Intel was still believing they could fix their 10nm problem, and aiming Cannonlake for low voltage part. All this was nearly 12 months ago.

Now they have to admit defeat, and they needed something in between so they just make a new lake for LV and ULV parts.

 

[Eug]

So, from what I gather based on the limited information, it may be reasonable to expect a speed bump (perhaps 10-15%?), but nothing else of note vs. Kaby lake.

No LPDDR4x, no Thunderbolt, no USB-C Gen 2 10 Mbps, no quad-core, etc.

This leak for Comet Lake U seems to suggest that Amber Lake Y will get USB C / 3.1 with Gen 2 10 Mbps.

https://pc.watch.impress.co.jp/docs/column/ubiq/1126720.html

And my understanding was that if something is going to have Gen 2 10 Mbps USB-C, it might also have Thunderbolt 3.

 

[IntelUser2000]

He is probably going by the fact that CNL-Y bumped the TDP to 5.2w.

I never said "probably they'll raise it to 5W", I said it is 5W.

PCWatch says its being increased to 5W because advancing cooling methods allow it cool 5W passively. That, along with 14nm++ improvements should allow CPU performance gains in the 10-20% range.

 

[Dayman1225]

Intel Core i7-8505Y CPU @ 1.50GHz with UHD 615 Graphics appears GFXBench.

Could this be Amber Lake (Y)?

 

[dooon]

Patchwork : intel: Introducing Amber Lake platform

 

[mikk]

Intel Core i7-8505Y CPU @ 1.50GHz with UHD 615 Graphics appears GFXBench.

Could this be Amber Lake (Y)?

This must be Amber Lake-Y. Doesn't make sense to release a new 8th generation KBL-Y SKU just before Amber Lake-Y. The odd thing is that with 1.5 Ghz this SKU is as fast as core M3-8114Y which wikichip says this is Amber Lake-Y as well. Something is inaccurate.

 

[jpiniero]

The 8114Y is Cannonlake-Y, which I guess we will have to see if it actually ends up being released in something.

 

[mikk]

There is no evidence this is Cannonlake-Y.

 

[jpiniero]

There is no evidence this is Cannonlake-Y.

Just this I think: https://twitter.com/TUM_APISAK/status/996706570552524800. Doesn't mean it's real or will ever make it into a product of course.

The 8505Y is most likely Amber.

 

[mikk]

A motherboard or platform ID string with Cannonlake is no evidence these days. I'm hoping this is a Cannonlake CPU nervertheless.

 

[jpiniero]

A motherboard or platform ID string with Cannonlake is no evidence these days.

This is very much true although the situation is most likely like what happened with Cannonlake-U.. which what they had wanted to ship got replaced by the 8130U.