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

[Tigerick]

Wildcat Lake (WCL) Specs

Intel Wildcat Lake (WCL) is upcoming mobile SoC replacing Raptor Lake-U. WCL consists of 2 tiles: compute tile and PCD tile. It is true single die consists of CPU, GPU and NPU that is fabbed by 18-A process. Last time I checked, PCD tile is fabbed by TSMC N6 process. They are connected through UCIe, not D2D; a first from Intel. Expecting launching in Q1 2026.

		Intel Raptor Lake U	Intel Wildcat Lake 15W?	Intel Lunar Lake		Intel Panther Lake 4+0+4
Launch Date		Q1-2024	Q2-2026	Q3-2024		Q1-2026
Model		Intel 150U	Intel Core 7	Core Ultra 7 268V		Core Ultra 7 365
Dies		2	2	2		3
Node		Intel 7 + ?	Intel 18-A + TSMC N6	TSMC N3B + N6		Intel 18-A + Intel 3 + TSMC N6
CPU		2 P-core + 8 E-cores	2 P-core + 4 LP E-cores	4 P-core + 4 LP E-cores		4 P-core + 4 LP E-cores
Threads		12	6	8		8
Max Clock		5.4 GHz	?	5 GHz		4.8 GHz
L3 Cache		12 MB		12 MB		12 MB
TDP		15 - 55 W	15 W ?	17 - 37 W		25 - 55 W
Memory		128-bit LPDDR5-5200	64-bit LPDDR5	128-bit LPDDR5x-8533		128-bit LPDDR5x-7467
Size		96 GB		32 GB		128 GB
Bandwidth				136 GB/s
GPU		Intel Graphics	Intel Graphics	Arc 140V		Intel Graphics
RT		No	No	YES		YES
EU / Xe		96 EU	2 Xe	8 Xe		4 Xe
Max Clock		1.3 GHz	?	2 GHz		2.5 GHz
NPU		GNA 3.0	18 TOPS	48 TOPS		49 TOPS

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.

 

[Hulk]

They can't really ship L3-less configs.
L2 macro has no fabric ports available.

IIFC there used to be cache-less Celerons and they were still born.

 

[Thunder 57]

IIFC there used to be cache-less Celerons and they were still born.

The originals lacked any L2.

 

[Doug S]

Apple may not be perfect, but if you open up their Macbooks, they look extremely well organized.

Steve Jobs always said that well designed hardware should look as beautiful on the inside inside as it does on the outside, and actually rejected stuff over this. He may be 15 years absent now but I imagine his influence with ideas like these still hold some sway within Apple HQ.

 

[DavidC1]

depends weather it gets SLC or something MTL LP-E didn't have that so it hurt the performance and they were Skylake tier a Z6 tier 2C/4T shouldn't have issue for idle or video playback or other apps

SLC wasn't the issue. Meteorlake had it on another tile, which was slow and power inefficient, plus it only ran at 2.5GHz.

Lunar and Panther has LPE on the same die, meaning much faster wake up times, and they run at more than 3.5GHz, while also being Skymont. They only need to wake up the cores and the relevant connection to the core, while on Meteorlake they had to wake up entire tile.

Steve Jobs always said that well designed hardware should look as beautiful on the inside inside as it does on the outside, and actually rejected stuff over this. He may be 15 years absent now but I imagine his influence with ideas like these still hold some sway within Apple HQ.

Even circuitry designs, the more neater arrangement results in better results.

Just like every other product, things are priced at what the vendor believes the market will bear. I do believe Dell has lost their minds with this pricing but so has Porsche with the 911 yet they are selling every one they can produce.

Porsche has mindshare, Dell doesn't. And Dell doesn't make good laptops as they think it does. A single screen costing much as a dual screen Asus is just ridiculous.

 

[techjunkie123]

Porsche has mindshare, Dell doesn't. And Dell doesn't make good laptops as they think it does. A single screen costing much as a dual screen Asus is just ridiculous.

Porsches are reliable Swiss army knives that can do it all. Dells are not particularly reliable (neither are Asus laptops tbf).

 

[511]

Porsches are reliable Swiss army knives that can do it all. Dells are not particularly reliable (neither are Asus laptops tbf).

The most reliable OEM is Lenovo in my personal experience

 

[techjunkie123]

The most reliable OEM is Lenovo in my personal experience

I used to think this too. I bought a Thinkpad Z16 and had quite a few issues with it - GPU died, one speaker failed, BSOD issues, eventually the laptop itself died in 4 years. Maybe that was a lemon though.

Funnily enough, I had a cheap Asus laptop that lasted me for about 8 years.

 

[DZero]

I used to think this too. I bought a Thinkpad Z16 and had quite a few issues with it - GPU died, one speaker failed, BSOD issues, eventually the laptop itself died in 4 years. Maybe that was a lemon though.

Funnily enough, I had a cheap Asus laptop that lasted me for about 8 years.

Funny story I have an old Lenovo Ideapad which survives until now, even the Legion from 3 years ago gives fight.

Seems that the golden era of notebooks is about to end.

 

[511]

Funny story I have an old Lenovo Ideapad which survives until now, even the Legion from 3 years ago gives fight.

Seems that the golden era of notebooks is about to end.

Thanks to AI also I remember Intel Macbooks better than OEM Laptops even using nearly same silicon on a sidenote My Lenovo Ideapad is still doing fine

 

[Hulk]

Porsches are reliable Swiss army knives that can do it all. Dells are not particularly reliable (neither are Asus laptops tbf).

True and the PDK is especially so. But those rear main seal issues were widespread and expensive. When something does come up on a Porsche, like an oil change, they are quite "BOAT-like." Meaning "Bust Out Another Thousand." Just kidding on the oil change price, but minor maintenance is crazy expensive.

We all have reliability anecdotal evidence.
I have a 2005 Dell laptop that has been sitting in burning hot summer and then freezing cold winter garage for 15 years and still boots up fine.
My Lenovo T something (Broadwell) got weird after about two years, screen blacking out issues, had to use it with external monitor, nightmare, no help from Lenovo...

But to my original point. Vendors price items where they think (or history has shown) they can sell them. Sometimes the masses are fooled. Note that we are NOT the masses!

 

[coercitiv]

Thanks to AI also I remember Intel Macbooks better than OEM Laptops even using nearly same silicon on a sidenote My Lenovo Ideapad is still doing fine

Some of the Intel Macbooks were fantastic, we still have an Haswell one in storage that impressed me with the excellent cooling & low noise. Some of the Intel Macbook Airs were absolute disasters in terms of cooling. When it comes to Apple, people tend to remember the hits rather than the misses like peeling anti-glare coatings or broken keyboard design. Apple did learn from this though, and the current Macbooks are excellent machines build wise. The one thing that still annoys me about the Air is the screen, I don't think 90Hz refresh is too much to ask.

Lenovo is also a manufacturer that seems to be learning from one generation to another. The Ideapad Pro I bought almost 4 years ago is in perfect condition, I'm almost sorry to replace it. The new Ideapad Pro I bought this year is a clear evolution in every aspect, in fact I would argue it's a different product tier altogether. I do hear that their lower tier models have quality issues though, which makes sense considering they start cutting corners to hit lower BoM.

I wanted to wait for the PTL version, in fact my plan was to upgrade later this year. Alas, I fully expect all laptops to be at least 20% more expensive than their predecessors based on RAM and storage pricing alone.

 

[Doug S]

Some of the Intel Macbooks were fantastic, we still have an Haswell one in storage that impressed me with the excellent cooling & low noise. Some of the Intel Macbook Airs were absolute disasters in terms of cooling.

That can hardly be blamed on Apple. They solved that problem by taking over control of their own CPU roadmap.

When it comes to Apple, people tend to remember the hits rather than the misses like peeling anti-glare coatings or broken keyboard design. Apple did learn from this though, and the current Macbooks are excellent machines build wise. The one thing that still annoys me about the Air is the screen, I don't think 90Hz refresh is too much to ask.

Anyone who tries to push the limits of technology rather than go for the tried and true stuff that has been used and perfected by the early adopters/premium segment will sometimes run into problems. What matters is how you react to it, and Apple's record on that front is pretty schizophrenic - sometimes they take great care of their customers, other times sucks to be you.

Now that Apple will have a lower end laptop than the Air, I wouldn't be shocked if its display will get an upgrade and the low cost Macbook will be 60 Hz. Apple tends to move stuff like that through their line, i.e. iPhone Pro/Max got 120 Hz, then the base iPhone got it, and now only the 'e' has 60 Hz. Someday it will get 120 Hz, but only after some other advance has filtered down through the line above to preserve the separation.

Sure it is reasonable to complain since going to 120 Hz doesn't cost them much but that's what you lose in exchange for having basically the same SoC performance (modulo a GPU core or two and some SLC) in the low end 'e' line that the high end Pro Max does. In the PC/Android world stepping down in price means real sacrifices in performance, even if maybe you still get higher refresh displays. It all depends on what strategy an OEM chooses to use for product segmentation. In the eyes of Apple's designers, the visual side is everything - so quality there (via a lower end display) is what you give up, not so much performance.

 

[Magio]

That can hardly be blamed on Apple. They solved that problem by taking over control of their own CPU roadmap.

It can when the last few pre-Apple Silicon Airs had worse thermal performance than bottom tier windows laptops with the same chips. Were those good chips? Absolutely not, but maybe don't stick your fan a mile away from the CPU and nowhere near any heat pipe and expect decent thermal performance. Apple has generally made great laptops but they've also made a ton of boneheaded decisions, and on reliability too certain generations of Macs had gaping flaws, with their goddawful initial "butterfly" keyboards or several models with a display cable that tended to die.

Windows OEM side the truth is no single OEM has a perfect track record because they all have a million SKUs and pay actual attention to maybe 3 of them each. XPS as a sub-brand definitely has one of the best track records out there, with well built machines, well-tuned hardware and firmware and offered with enterprise-grade warranties (sometimes at no extra cost). They're also always priced excessively but I guess that's worked out for them, on the plus side if you wait a while there are decent discounts.

I have only seen the same level of consistent quality with Lenovo's top Thinkpad SKUs, even the best Asus or HP or Acer offer on their consumer lines is far more hit or miss depending on the year or specific model.

 

[msj10]

E cores are good in terms of area but they are not really any more efficient than than the P cores

 

[poke01]

Okay

 

[gdansk]

Okay

APX comes with a big caveat. Programs must be rebuilt
I.e. it will not apply much in the closed-source, binary world of Windows until well after NVL is obsolete.

 

[poke01]

APX comes with a big caveat. Programs must be rebuilt
I.e. it will not apply much in the closed-source, binary world of Windows until well after NVL is obsolete.

Apparently Intel has a solution for that.

 

[LightningZ71]

Will that answer break the digital copy protection and anti cheat systems that are out there?

 

[poke01]

Will that answer break the digital copy protection and anti cheat systems that are out there?

Yep has to.

It’s called APO+ or something. MLID leaked it.

 

[Geddagod]

E cores are good in terms of area but they are not really any more efficient than than the P cores

View attachment 138426

Aren't the E-cores' L2 being powered by a different rail than the cores too, while the P-cores' L2 is from the same rail as the core?
Better perf/watt up to ~2.5 watts per core is actually helpful for the power envelopes each core is gonna get in the dense core count server cpu, even if it's not for your standard high core count server skus (GNR or Turin non-dense).

 

[511]

Yep has to.

It’s called APO+ or something. MLID leaked it.

It's the CPU so it should know better but have to see whether that thing is even true or not cause that would be a marvelous feat if they do so.

E cores are good in terms of area but they are not really any more efficient than than the P cores

View attachment 138426

There is this as well

View attachment 138428
Okay

Meng is on ignore list but if they get 30% the Gap against ARM would be lot smaller

 

[jdubs03]

View attachment 138429
There is this as well

It almost makes the E-core seem redundant.
There’s only a tiny window in which the e-core performs better nominally; 3.25W-3.75W. Getting such a dramatic downgrade in efficiency should be improved upon.

 

[Hulk]

It almost makes the E-core seem redundant.
There’s only a tiny window in which the e-core performs better nominally; 3.25W-3.75W. Getting such a dramatic downgrade in efficiency should be improved upon.

They are there for area efficiency for MT application that can benefit from them. Intel can get you more MT compute for your dollar with the E cores, that is their reasoning.

If cost wasn't a concern they could just make a couple of huge tiles full of P cores and run themselves out of business because manufacturing cost is too high.

 

[jdubs03]

They are there for area efficiency for MT application that can benefit from them. Intel can get you more MT compute for your dollar with the E cores, that is their reasoning.

If cost wasn't a concern they could just make a couple of huge tiles full of P cores and run themselves out of business because manufacturing cost is too high.

I’m referring more about the LPE cores. They’re significantly more performant per watt.
The E cores have to get quite a bit more juice just to perform at the same level or slightly better. Which is odd because the LPE cores are just slightly down-clocked Darkmonts. Yet they have a very different profile.

 

[511]

I’m referring more about the LPE cores. They’re significantly more performant per watt.
The E cores have to get quite a bit more juice just to perform at the same level or slightly better. Which is odd because the LPE cores are just slightly down-clocked Darkmonts. Yet they have a very different profile.

Cause they are not on Ring so they have different power profile.