The Intel Atom Thread

[NostaSeronx]

It is known but at least with older Atom parts Intel often omitted the price. Listing it at $193 is so overpriced it must be a mistake. Or a joke.

ADL-N IP N100 same price as ADL-M(1C/1t+4c4t) Celeron's $128
ADL-N IP N200 same price as ADL-M(1C/2t+4c4t) Pentium Gold's $193
ADL-N Core i3 N300s same price ADL-M(2C/4t+4c4t) i3's $309

Doing a deep search most of the cheapest full-suite(non-barebone) are only ~$40 to ~$100 more than RCP.

i3-1115G4/i3-1215u/i3-1315u => will be around $359-$409 and less in their best deal variants.

Core i3-N305/N300
IP N200/N100
etc
Would probably have at least full spec; N300/N305+128 Gb(x64) LPDDR5+512GB SSD within $299-$399 range in best deal variants.

 

[dark zero]

Jasper Lake was usually paired with 2xDDR4-2400 to save cost. So, a single 1xDDR5-4800 isn't the worst drop. Since, most OEMs usually paired it with lower than recommend 2xDDR4-2933. Also, most LPDDR designs were single 64-bit PHY anyway. All the non-6000 series minipc that were phone-shaped/pocket-sized had 64-bit LPDDR4, while the 6000 variant were 128-bit LPDDR4.

The big loss is actually the Integrated TCSS stuff which was suppose to include Thunderbolt 4.
View attachment 73869

"Default board ADL-P has 4 typec ports, while ADL-M/N has only 2 typec ports." <== This of course is referring to Thunderbolt Type-C ports.

There was a reality going for Thunderbolt eGPUs Made By Intel, but with Alder Lake-N ditching Thunderbolt, I doubt it will ever happen.
ChromeOS patches for Core i3 and higher, DG2, Thunderbolt eGPU support, indicate that there was going to be an Alchemist eGPU setup for 12th+ gen Core i3s Chromebooks/Chromeboxes.

For the OEM I was talking too:
1. Core i3+ and 2. ChromeOS
=> View attachment 73878
So, their comments plus the branding:
View attachment 73879

Implies in their products that Alder Lake-N should have mandatory Thunderbolt 4 support. Thus, be able to use their rebranded DG2 booksized enclosures(similar to ASUS's XG Mobile/Sonnet's Breakaway Puck, but a lot cheaper)... So, back in November was pretty stoked, now like everything else it's a complete downer.

That would imply that the Core i3 Alder Lake N might have a dGPU in the form of an Intel dGPU?

 

[eek2121]

Someone should ask Intel this:

Why buy Alder Lake N over Coffee Lake, or Skylake, or...

Seriously. I am rather baffled at the pricing. What gives? Gracemont is a great chip, but low end ARM is nipping at Intel's toes here. Sell it for $50 and call it a day.

EDIT: If Intel could give me a 4c/4t SBC with gracemont at 1.5+ ghz for $50 each, I can promise I will buy several dozen of them, at least, assuming at least 4gb of RAM for each one.

 

[NostaSeronx]

That would imply that the Core i3 Alder Lake N might have a dGPU in the form of an Intel dGPU?

For this particular OEM:
Core i3-13xxU series
Core i3-N3xx series
Would at most have two Thunderbolt4 ports on their minipc. All Core i3 and higher have thunderbolt for this OEM.

One of the ports would be paired with an eGPU Thunderbolt4 Add-on/External Graphics Extender. Which would be a tuned-variant of DG2 Mobile for PCIe 3.0 x3, since one lane would be reserved for extra I/O.

Target strategy for multi-choice websites: (Aliexpress, Newegg, Amazon, etc)
1. MiniPC + eGPU Combo (best deal) [First Row offerings]
2. MiniPC independent [Second Row]
3. eGPU independent [Third row]

Alder Lake-N's 2x Type-C Sub-System is the same exact 2x Type-C Sub-System from Alder Lake-M. So, it is weird that they soft gut Thunderbolt4 from N-series. When they said in November/(Feb 03, 2022) that N-series would have Thunderbolt. It was always planned at Intel to have a top-to-bottom Thunderbolt market after 2021:

 

[burninatortech4]

Someone should ask Intel this:

Why buy Alder Lake N over Coffee Lake, or Skylake, or...

Seriously. I am rather baffled at the pricing. What gives? Gracemont is a great chip, but low end ARM is nipping at Intel's toes here. Sell it for $50 and call it a day.

EDIT: If Intel could give me a 4c/4t SBC with gracemont at 1.5+ ghz for $50 each, I can promise I will buy several dozen of them, at least, assuming at least 4gb of RAM for each one.

A pico ITX 4c/4t Gracemont SBC w/4GB LPDDR4X and USB-C power/data/eDP at less than $120 would be a very interesting product. No way that gets made though

A pancake stack of 4 i3-N305 (8c) SBC's would be a fun DC set up (assuming price is good).

 

[Roland00Address]

a

A pico ITX 4c/4c Gracemont SBC w/4GB LPDDR4X and USB-C power/data/eDP at less than $120 would be a very interesting product. No way that gets made though

Bet we are going to get a laptop / chromebook that has that. Maybe it will take 18 months though.

 

[Exist50]

Someone should ask Intel this:

Why buy Alder Lake N over Coffee Lake, or Skylake, or...

Seriously. I am rather baffled at the pricing. What gives? Gracemont is a great chip, but low end ARM is nipping at Intel's toes here. Sell it for $50 and call it a day.

EDIT: If Intel could give me a 4c/4t SBC with gracemont at 1.5+ ghz for $50 each, I can promise I will buy several dozen of them, at least, assuming at least 4gb of RAM for each one.

There's no chance they actually sell to OEMs at that price. The N series has historically been almost a loss leader for Intel, to keep ARM out of the low end market. They almost assuredly cost <$50 in bulk, and that number is probably high.

But ADL-N has a ton of appeal vs Skylake. More efficient, more MT performance, much better graphics, much more modern IO, lower platform costs, etc. I do hope someone tries to make an SBC out of it, but it feels like we haven't had many of those since like Silvermont.

 

[IntelUser2000]

@Exist50 There's a TON of SBCs every generation. Just not upgradeable ones. They pretty much stopped after Asrock's J5005 which is Goldmont Plus generation.

MSI just announced a very small form factor computer using Alderlake-N. Other vendors are going to follow suite very soon.

Someone should ask Intel this:

Why buy Alder Lake N over Coffee Lake, or Skylake, or...

If you are asking this question, then you never thought of it outside the DIY enthusiast market.

I have.
-Lower cost
-Smaller platform
-Lower idle power

 

[DrMrLordX]

With those prices and the single-channel memory config, Intel seems to be deliberately crippling Alder Lake-N.

 

[NostaSeronx]

With those prices and the single-channel memory config, Intel seems to be deliberately crippling Alder Lake-N.

Single-channel isn't what is going to kill Alder Lake-N, it is the lack of Thunderbolt4 and the prices.

Acer: A315-510P-3905 => $499, Core i3-N305, 8 GB LPDDR5, 256 GB SSD, No Thunderbolt
Acer: A515-57-53T2 => $469, Core i5-1235u, 2x4GB DDR4-3200(Upgradeable), 512 GB SSD, 1x Thunderbolt
Deep-dived Intel: NUC12WSHi5 => $500, Core i5-1240P, No RAM(2x Slots), No SSD(22x80 NVMe, 22x42 SATA, 2.5" SATA upgradeable), 2x Thunderbolt
There is a i3-1215u but it is in $500-$600 range, with 8GB LPDDR4X(probably single 64-bit), 160GB-320GB SSD, but is stacked with I/O in laptop format; 2x USB3 5 Gbps, 2x USB3 10 Gbps, 2x TBT4 40 Gbps. Almost forgot about Chuwi with the CoreBox 4th: $350, i3-1215u for 16 GB LPDDR5+512 GB SSD and 1x USB4/TBT4-Compliant port...

So far from what I can find is most if not all the Core i3 N-series are shooting in the Thunderbolt4 range as introduction prices. It would make sense if Core i3 N-series had Thunderbolt4, but it doesn't.

Core i3 N-series has the same Thunderbolt TCSS as the Core i3 U-series. It is really awkward for Intel to have soft gutted Thunderbolt 4 on the N-series at launch. Then, specifically have everyone launch the i3 N-series with no Thunderbolt4 in the same field as i5/i3 U-series that have Thunderbolt4.

Alderlake-N quite clearly has USB4/TBT4 patches referenced on USB4 build up on AMD's Yellow Carp/Pink Sardine. With changes later on to better support x86-USB4/TBT4 across AMD's USB4 and Intel's TBT4 implementation, affecting Icelake -> Meteorlake(includes Alder Lake-N USB4/TBT4 Controller patches).

The brief/Intel website for ADL-N so far is unspecific on the USB-C standard;
- Two USB-C lanes on the CPU
- Four USB 3.2 or eight USB 2.0 lanes on the PCH

I assume it is going to be a wild west of configurations:
Some OEMs will not use it at all (Asus PN42)
Some OEMs will be USB3 5 Gbps (Acer Aspire 3?)
Some OEMs will be USB3 10 Gbps (MSI Cubi N, Asus BR1102?)
Some OEMs will be USB3 20 Gbps (Acer Aspire 3?, Asus BR1102?)
Some OEMs will be USB4/TBT4 40 Gbps (No public reveal yet)

Given the above, I am pretty sure Core i3 N-series will get Thunderbolt/USB4. It just isn't guaranteed across products. Also, there might be a in-year/within a year refresh:
Core i3-N31x
Processor N210, etc
Which might mandate Thunderbolt4 support 2H23/1Q24.

Also, here is the incomplete list of specs:

 

[dark zero]

With those prices and the single-channel memory config, Intel seems to be deliberately crippling Alder Lake-N.

So, is Mendocino but Intel version...

Also...

Single-channel isn't what is going to kill Alder Lake-N, it is the lack of Thunderbolt4 and the prices.

Acer: A315-510P-3905 => $499, Core i3-N305, 8 GB LPDDR5, 256 GB SSD, No Thunderbolt
Acer: A515-57-53T2 => $469, Core i5-1235u, 2x4GB DDR4-3200(Upgradeable), 512 GB SSD, 1x Thunderbolt
Deep-dived Intel: NUC12WSHi5 => $500, Core i5-1240P, No RAM(2x Slots), No SSD(22x80 NVMe, 22x42 SATA, 2.5" SATA upgradeable), 2x Thunderbolt
There is a i3-1215u but it is in $500-$600 range, with 8GB LPDDR4X(probably single 64-bit), 160GB-320GB SSD, but is stacked with I/O in laptop format; 2x USB3 5 Gbps, 2x USB3 10 Gbps, 2x TBT4 40 Gbps. Almost forgot about Chuwi with the CoreBox 4th: $350, i3-1215u for 16 GB LPDDR5+512 GB SSD and 1x USB4/TBT4-Compliant port...

So far from what I can find is most if not all the Core i3 N-series are shooting in the Thunderbolt4 range as introduction prices. It would make sense if Core i3 N-series had Thunderbolt4, but it doesn't.

Core i3 N-series has the same Thunderbolt TCSS as the Core i3 U-series. It is really awkward for Intel to have soft gutted Thunderbolt 4 on the N-series at launch. Then, specifically have everyone launch the i3 N-series with no Thunderbolt4 in the same field as i5/i3 U-series that have Thunderbolt4.

Alderlake-N quite clearly has USB4/TBT4 patches referenced on USB4 build up on AMD's Yellow Carp/Pink Sardine. With changes later on to better support x86-USB4/TBT4 across AMD's USB4 and Intel's TBT4 implementation, affecting Icelake -> Meteorlake(includes Alder Lake-N USB4/TBT4 Controller patches).

The brief/Intel website for ADL-N so far is unspecific on the USB-C standard;
- Two USB-C lanes on the CPU
- Four USB 3.2 or eight USB 2.0 lanes on the PCH

I assume it is going to be a wild west of configurations:
Some OEMs will not use it at all (Asus PN42)
Some OEMs will be USB3 5 Gbps (Acer Aspire 3?)
Some OEMs will be USB3 10 Gbps (MSI Cubi N, Asus BR1102?)
Some OEMs will be USB3 20 Gbps (Acer Aspire 3?, Asus BR1102?)
Some OEMs will be USB4/TBT4 40 Gbps (No public reveal yet)

Given the above, I am pretty sure Core i3 N-series will get Thunderbolt/USB4. It just isn't guaranteed across products. Also, there might be a in-year/within a year refresh:
Core i3-N31x
Processor N210, etc
Which might mandate Thunderbolt4 support 2H23/1Q24.

Also, here is the incomplete list of specs:
View attachment 74464

Why they are selling the N50? isn't supposed to be only for certain vendors and not be sold to notebooks?
A Dual Core no longer is useful for office apps. So expecting only the N100 onwards being put on laptops.

And to make this interesting... isn't good those chips enough to bring back the netbooks?

 

[Roland00Address]

So, is Mendocino but Intel version...

Also...

Why they are selling the N50? isn't supposed to be only for certain vendors and not be sold to notebooks?
A Dual Core no longer is useful for office apps. So expecting only the N100 onwards being put on laptops.

And to make this interesting... isn't good those chips enough to bring back the netbooks?

For $100 netbooks with 4gbs of ram, with the same motherboard as the $200 and $300 option which doubles the core and ram again.

 

[jpiniero]

Why they are selling the N50? isn't supposed to be only for certain vendors and not be sold to notebooks?
A Dual Core no longer is useful for office apps. So expecting only the N100 onwards being put on laptops.

OEMs are still using the N4020... the N50 would def be faster than that.

 

[Roland00Address]

OEMs are still using the N4020... the N50 would def be faster than that.

Yeah 3.4 vs 2.8 ghz aka 20% more clock speed

but more importantly two generations of cpu improvements moving from Goldmont Plus (n4020), to Trentmont, to Gracemont (n50)

here is the same E core only in the anandtech bench at 3.9 ghz for the E-Core. Look for single thread benchmarks not mt (2 vs 8 cores) and multiply the result by 87% to get a rough idea of performance.

CPU 2021 Benchmarks - Compare Products on AnandTech

CPU 2021 benchmarks: Compare two products side-by-side or see a cascading list of product ratings along with our annotations.

www.anandtech.com

For contrast using notebook check numbers for n4020

CineBench R23 Single Thread
Score (Higher is Better)
1068 @3.9 ghz efficiency cores
roughly 930 at 3.4 ghz.
308 w/ n4020

Geekbench 5 Single Thread
1168@3.9 ghz efficiency cores
roughly 1015 to 1020 at 3.4 ghz
462 w/ n4020

as you can see we are talking 2x to 3.4x improvement with the cores due to frequency and massive generational improvement. Of course this is still in the ball park of the A11 and A12 in single thread performance and Apple is now using an A16. Yet this is the most basic chip going to be used for $99 to $150 netbooks (and if you pay more than that, well that is your own fault.)

 

[dark zero]

Still, I can hardly see the N50 being used since the N100 is supposed to be the most basic chip from them.
Those N50 and N95 should go to embedded solutions instead.
So the jump between the most basic should be higher.

Let's wait how this develops, but if the Quad Cores are the new basic is definately good news.

 

[Roland00Address]

Still, I can hardly see the N50 being used since the N100 is supposed to be the most basic chip from them.
Those N50 and N95 should go to embedded solutions instead.
So the jump between the most basic should be higher.

Let's wait how this develops, but if the Quad Cores are the new basic is definately good news.

I agree, but here is the thing…(laughs)

I been frequently wrong with the atoms where I been thinking quad core atoms and various other names for these type of small cores. I been thinking quad core atoms should be standard for almost 10 years now, yet various OEMs still have been shipping dual cores even if I think they should not 🙃

 

[dark zero]

I agree, but here is the thing…(laughs)

I been frequently wrong with the atoms where I been thinking quad core atoms and various other names for these type of small cores. I been thinking quad core atoms should be standard for almost 10 years now, yet various OEMs still have been shipping dual cores even if I think they should not 🙃

The reason was because the Dual Cores were still being the "lowest" of the "lowest". Now that place is taken by a Quad Core.
And the Dual Core going to Embedded solutions, thus making only accesible in certain pieces of hardware like a Pi like board
So, with that clarified, seems that Intel learned the lesson.
The jump to Alder Lake N will be more impressive than expecting. Even with the N100, at least with a Quad Core it can deal better than the pathetic Celeron 7305

 

[dark zero]

Well... time to revive the thread, why?
Well, there is a video that shows up the Intel N100 in action.

The jump compared to the previous gen is impressive. To make it better (and not joking) the fact that is a Quad Core makes it a very competent chip that can deliver better performance than 4th gen Intel Core U tier chips with way less consumption.

It even can play League of Legends without issue.
It cost 200 dollars barebone and 319 with 16 GB RAM and 500 GB SSD. Pretty much decent.
And this is the most basic chip from Intel, so time to see how the N200 and the N305 fares

 

[moinmoin]

It's 6W "TDP" but apparently can use up to 30W in the video. It seems NVMe is connected by PCIe 3.0 x2? I'd like to know how fast the USB 3.2 ports are. The price appears to be a limited discount, with the regular price for barebone claimed to be $399.

 

[Roland00Address]

Well... time to revive the thread, why?
Well, there is a video that shows up the Intel N100 in action.

atFViD1-R7o

The jump compared to the previous gen is impressive. To make it better (and not joking) the fact that is a Quad Core makes it a very competent chip that can deliver better performance than 4th gen Intel Core U tier chips with way less consumption.

Faster than the A11 apple, trades blows with the A12.

Roughly 70 to 75% of the 11th Gen i5s 15watts but using less power (I picked a recent generation cpu that only uses big cores.)

I want to see what this chip is capable as in a steam deck competitor. Not literally a steam deck, but some knock off, but how fast can you go while as cheap as possible and how much power you can extract for the most battery life possible? How good of a device can we make while being a cheap device?

Can we make a $200 device shipped with 8 gb of ram, 256 gb emmc gen 5.1 (ssd much better of course), this cpu and have it shipped in large quantities inside the US?

 

[IntelUser2000]

It's 6W "TDP" but apparently can use up to 30W in the video. It seems NVMe is connected by PCIe 3.0 x2? I'd like to know how fast the USB 3.2 ports are. The price appears to be a limited discount, with the regular price for barebone claimed to be $399.

It's not 6W TDP. It's set at PL1=10W and PL2=15W as shown in the screenshots.

He's referring to system power not CPU power. He says standby power is 8-9W. You can see from HWInfo screenshot the max power does not go above 10.5W. Around 7:20 mark you can see the power meter reading 25.5W, confirming that it's system power, since it's pretty much impossible to measure CPU power that way.

It's 50% faster in both ST and MT Geekbench and Cinebench R23 compared to the predecessor N6005 based on Tremont. The numbers are excellent, as the power graph shows there's zero Turbo-based performance dropping like P-cores do and behaving like good old Atoms being super stable.

So the Tigerlake-based Pentium Gold 7505 running at 3.5GHz max single core Turbo outperforms 3.4GHz Gracemont-based N100 by only about 10% in Geekbench and Cinebench R23.

I think this shows the potential of the E core team again. But it takes a dedicated low power platform like the N-series to get it's maximum potential.

N6005 gets 694/2031 R23 and N100 gets 948/2986. +36%/+47%
N6005 gets 722/2367 and N100 gets 1009/2756. +40%/16%

N6005 has a 3.3GHz Turbo so they gained 30% gen-on-gen again!

 

[IntelUser2000]

Another N100 MoreFine miniPC review but in English:

System power consumption double confirms that it's same power as the last gen Tremont.

Despite single channel DDR4 memory offering half the bandwidth, it outperforms N6005 in games. You can see the reason why looking at the GPU utilization. The N6005 CPU bottlenecks the GPU, while the N100 CPU does not bottleneck it's GPU.

 

[moinmoin]

It's not 6W TDP.

At 0:31 it's listed as a 6W TDP chip, whereas N97 and N50 are listed as 12W and 16W respectively. I can only guess the latter are more truthful.

Anybody know more about the speed of the NVMe and USB 3.2 ports? Those I'm honestly more interested in than Intel's usual "TDP" shenanigans.

 

[IntelUser2000]

At 0:31 it's listed as a 6W TDP chip, whereas N97 and N50 are listed as 12W and 16W respectively. I can only guess the latter are more truthful.

Yes but those are ARK numbers. You can see the manufacturers have set different settings and it's 10W and it's extremely accurate. You can't even see PL2=15W being anywhere in the video meaning it's even on the conservative side.

If I want to make a system based on Intel chips, they'll give me the flexibility on the TDP of the chip I am using. Of course you can't take the N100 and set it to 95W and voila! It's a bit of the range but as long as you're in the range, you can do whatever you want with it. That's why the "9W" U chips are usually set at 15W and 28W can be set at 36W. And you can't set U chips at 28W nor P chips at 45W forever.

The flexibility is actually a GOOD thing. Imagine if it was the other way around. What would you do? If you set it at 9W you are forced to market it as i3 but at 15W you can set it as an i5? What if the 9W allows 15W Turbo for 3 mins but with the 15W the 20W Turbo works for 10 seconds? Do you rate it differently from the 15W that can run 25W for 1 min? What about against a 20W chip that has no Turbo at all?

Or Intel will need to offer a new chip for every feature, and then a subset that differentiates based on power usage? That's ridiculous.

Yes it can be confusing but you have to pay attention. This isn't the simple world of desktops. Manufacturers have dozens of power-related knobs they can play with. If they addressed every complaint then they'd have a thousand SKUs.

 

[moinmoin]

The flexibility is actually a GOOD thing.

Flexibility is good, completely misleading publicized default spec is pure crap. I'm not interested in repeating that whole discussion though, just think Intel should finally grow up in that regard.