Thursday, October 24, 2002
When Will Desktop Chips Hit 15 GHz?
Posted by Jason Dunn in "OFF-TOPIC" @ 09:49 AM
http://www.pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,106241,tk,dn102302X,00.asp
CPU speeds continue to skyrocket upward, but can you imagine a 15 GHz CPU? We'll need to continue to expand the speed of other components as well to keep up with that - AMDs HyperTransport technology is a step in the right direction, but we'll need to see a radical improvement in hard drive speed as well before we'll see the benefits of a CPU this fast.
"Users can expect to see the processing speed of Intel's desktop processors hit 15 GHz and that of wireless device and PDA processors hit 5 GHz by 2010, the chip maker's chief technology officer said in Tokyo on Wednesday. The 15-GHz desktop chip, some five times as fast as the company's soon-to-be-launched 3-GHz Pentium 4 chip, will pack one billion transistors, said Pat Gelsinger, vice president and chief technology officer of Intel as he delivered a keynote address to the company's Intel Developer Forum Japan conference in Tokyo."
The article goes on to talk about the challenges in getting higher speeds out of wireless and PDA CPUs:
"...In the wireless and PDA space, Gelsinger said, the company is expecting to see speeds rise from the current 400 MHz to 5 GHz over the same eight-year period of time..."Desktops today are [consuming power of] 75 to 100 watts and when you go to handheld devices you are typically operating at less than 1 watt," said Gelsinger. "Obviously, you are optimizing the design for different criteria. So today, if I was going to look at a StrongArm core or XScale core, could I create a 2-GHz or 3-GHz XScale today? Absolutely. Could I do so and deliver the best trade-off of power and performance inside a 1-watt envelope? No. You tend to design the chips differently to live inside different devices."
CPU speeds continue to skyrocket upward, but can you imagine a 15 GHz CPU? We'll need to continue to expand the speed of other components as well to keep up with that - AMDs HyperTransport technology is a step in the right direction, but we'll need to see a radical improvement in hard drive speed as well before we'll see the benefits of a CPU this fast.
"Users can expect to see the processing speed of Intel's desktop processors hit 15 GHz and that of wireless device and PDA processors hit 5 GHz by 2010, the chip maker's chief technology officer said in Tokyo on Wednesday. The 15-GHz desktop chip, some five times as fast as the company's soon-to-be-launched 3-GHz Pentium 4 chip, will pack one billion transistors, said Pat Gelsinger, vice president and chief technology officer of Intel as he delivered a keynote address to the company's Intel Developer Forum Japan conference in Tokyo."
The article goes on to talk about the challenges in getting higher speeds out of wireless and PDA CPUs:
"...In the wireless and PDA space, Gelsinger said, the company is expecting to see speeds rise from the current 400 MHz to 5 GHz over the same eight-year period of time..."Desktops today are [consuming power of] 75 to 100 watts and when you go to handheld devices you are typically operating at less than 1 watt," said Gelsinger. "Obviously, you are optimizing the design for different criteria. So today, if I was going to look at a StrongArm core or XScale core, could I create a 2-GHz or 3-GHz XScale today? Absolutely. Could I do so and deliver the best trade-off of power and performance inside a 1-watt envelope? No. You tend to design the chips differently to live inside different devices."
