Discussion Intel Meteor, Arrow, Lunar & Panther Lakes Discussion Threads

[Tigerick]

As Hot Chips 34 starting this week, Intel will unveil technical information of upcoming Meteor Lake (MTL) and Arrow Lake (ARL), new generation platform after Raptor Lake. Both MTL and ARL represent new direction which Intel will move to multiple chiplets and combine as one SoC platform.

MTL also represents new compute tile that based on Intel 4 process which is based on EUV lithography, a first from Intel. Intel expects to ship MTL mobile SoC in 2023.

ARL will come after MTL so Intel should be shipping it in 2024, that is what Intel roadmap is telling us. ARL compute tile will be manufactured by Intel 20A process, a first from Intel to use GAA transistors called RibbonFET.





Intel Core Ultra 100 - Meteor Lake



As mentioned by Tomshardware, TSMC will manufacture the I/O, SoC, and GPU tiles. That means Intel will manufacture only the CPU and Foveros tiles. (Notably, Intel calls the I/O tile an 'I/O Expander,' hence the IOE moniker.)

 

[511]

The part that should concern is that Intel has chosen the least performance, smallest possible CPU die for 18A only. It would be one thing if this was the very first part they've ever done on 18A, but isn't Panther Lake, which is also supposed to use 18A supposed to have been in full rate production and general sale for a good 6 months+ by that point? Either they have very little confidence that 18A can hit the desktop performance targets they need, or they will be massively capacity constrained and will only make what can get high volume on that in house mode.

This is on 18AP not 18A

 

[Magio]

LOL
when Intel changes products from 18A/AP to N2 - 18A is sh**
when Intel gives up foundry due to money problem - doesn't matter

Money problems, technical problems, what's the difference if the end result is that Intel Foundry is screwed in either case?

 

[Josh128]

18A / 18A-P are obviously shat, either perf wise and/or capacity wise, and/or readiness compared to N2, or else Intel would be putting more on it. Panther Lake for laptops is likely going to eat up most of the limited capacity, so it makes sense if less desktop (lower margin/area) designs are done on it, especially if some performance is lacking.

Meanwhile, former Intel CEO Craig Barrett is calling for Trump to force US chipmakers to invest in a USA "fab consortium" to keep Intel fabs viable. Should make for a terrible hit on stock prices for all big hardware producers should this come to pass.

 

[LightningZ71]

This is on 18AP not 18A

Then it's likely the same machines with further process refinements?

 

[Josh128]

Then it's likely the same machines with further process refinements?

Theres nothing more advanced than high NA EUV, so yes.

 

[Magio]

Theres nothing more advanced than high NA EUV, so yes.

18A is regular EUV. 18AP should be too.

14A will be the High NA node... Unless it gets canned.

 

[OneEng2]

18A is regular EUV. 18AP should be too.

14A will be the High NA node... Unless it gets canned.

Intel jumped all over High NA equipment too. It just seems like Intel was desperate to reclaim process leadership through spending the most money on the most cutting edge next gen equipment and processes.

It's also like they completely forgot how badly 10nm went when they tried a similar thing (arguably 10nm was considerably less risky than 18A and most certainly 14A).

We are supposed to see PTL this year. It is still possible that BSPDN and GAA provide a very good PTL processor .... albeit at lower clocks... but then laptops generally have lower clocks anyway.

We will see soon enough.

 

[511]

Then it's likely the same machines with further process refinements?

Yeah additional steps to 18A

 

[DrMrLordX]

18A / 18A-P are obviously shat

18AP might be okay. It's gonna be late to the game, though.

Meanwhile, former Intel CEO Craig Barrett is calling for Trump to force US chipmakers to invest in a USA "fab consortium" to keep Intel fabs viable. Should make for a terrible hit on stock prices for all big hardware producers should this come to pass.

Probably the wrong thread for this but it's interesting news nevertheless.

 

[Jan Olšan]

18A / 18A-P are obviously shat, either perf wise and/or capacity wise, and/or readiness compared to N2, or else Intel would be putting more on it. Panther Lake for laptops is likely going to eat up most of the limited capacity, so it makes sense if less desktop (lower margin/area) designs are done on it, especially if some performance is lacking.

Meanwhile, former Intel CEO Craig Barrett is calling for Trump to force US chipmakers to invest in a USA "fab consortium" to keep Intel fabs viable. Should make for a terrible hit on stock prices for all big hardware producers should this come to pass.

View attachment 128609

If there is industry worth saving by by bailouts and public spending support, this is it, though.

All those "stargate" idiocies that they boast about are pretty stupid investments, if they are willing to let Intel go the way of GloFo at the same time, because somehow everyone throws around billions at any stupid idea but this. Retaining ability to develop and manufacture leading edge silicon? No thanks, not important.

 

[Josh128]

If there is industry worth saving by by bailouts and public spending support, this is it, though.

All those "stargate" idiocies that they boast about are pretty stupid investments, if they are willing to let Intel go the way of GloFo at the same time, because somehow everyone throws around billions at any stupid idea but this. Retaining ability to develop and manufacture leading edge silicon? No thanks, not important.

I agree that the fabs, provided they can keep up with TSMC, are significant to homeland security & defense--- however, just throwing money at the problem doesnt guarantee a solution-- Intel has to be able to produce state-of-the-art silicon at reasonable yields or its a complete waste.

I can even see some type of taxpayer funded General Motors style bailout (they got 49 billion) to get them right footed, but coercing publicly owned companies into buying into it is authoritarian communist stuff. The "shakedown" of Nvidia and AMD for 15% of sales to China is unprecedented in the previous "free market" of the US and is basically amounts to just shameful bribery.

The problem with Intels fabs is that the problem isnt just cash injection, its the cutting edge of physics and materials science and making progress there as well. It would be awesome if Intel comes out with a high NA EUV powered A14 process that just knocks everyones socks off, but if that doesnt happen, I'd be very curious to see what the end result will be.

 

[OneEng2]

The problem with Intels fabs is that the problem isnt just cash injection, its the cutting edge of physics and materials science and making progress there as well. It would be awesome if Intel comes out with high NA EUV A14 and just knocks everyones socks off, but if that doesnt happen, I'd be very curious to see what the end result will be.

Intel has been getting bloodied up on the "cutting edge". Both with 18A, and previously with 10nm.

I think they need significantly more conservative management to correct this bad trend.

 

[LightningZ71]

Even in a world where Intel gets enough traffic on A18 and interest in A14 to finish developing it, I don't see how they are going to get to anything beyond that. The development costs and time scale for each successive node seem to be rising at a curving rate, and Intel, even with modestly improved fortunes, seems incapable of affording that in any time length you try. They will never command enough of a price premium over TSMC for as long as TSMC can exist as an ongoing concern unless they uncover a breakthrough of epic proportions, or someone writes them a blank check.

 

[oak8292]

Even in a world where Intel gets enough traffic on A18 and interest in A14 to finish developing it, I don't see how they are going to get to anything beyond that. The development costs and time scale for each successive node seem to be rising at a curving rate, and Intel, even with modestly improved fortunes, seems incapable of affording that in any time length you try. They will never command enough of a price premium over TSMC for as long as TSMC can exist as an ongoing concern unless they uncover a breakthrough of epic proportions, or someone writes them a blank check.

This isn’t normal capitalism. This is innovation until the last man is standing. ASML already got there with lithography and TSMC is getting there with logic transistor manufacturing.

These are global markets with global demand and the country that ends up with the ‘last man standing’ appears to have an advantage. However both ASML and TSMC actually have global supply chains. A collapse of global supply and demand in a ‘war’ will kill both.

The semiconductor industry is ‘fragile’ and the bull in the China shop could easily break it and set the industry back.

The U.S. ‘invented’ the semi industry and still has an outsized presence in the industry. However the demand is global and it is increasingly dependent on consumer demand versus military or commercial demand. TSMC has moved to the front of the class essentially from smartphones. Mobile drove nodes from 28nm down to 7 nm until AMD moved to TSMC. Mobile wafer volume meant that ‘trailing’. Customers like AMD and Nvidia could get low cost wafers.

It appears that Nvidia and AI may be a stronger driver going forward but the may still need mobile for ‘pipe cleaning’ nodes.

Intel essentially was a classic of ‘innovators dilemma’. They held on the margins they had in their old business and did not disrupt themselves. Mobile processors were low cost and they did not want Atom disrupting the Core business or ARM disrupting x86. When ARM and TSMC took the low end growth markets Intel was in trouble. Intel knew it and reacted with both contra revenue and Intel foundry 1.0 but they did not expected to fail as spectacularly as they did on 10 nm.