Yesterday's presentation by Dell, revealing Intel's processor plans, caught public attention. What has long been discussed at the rumor level found some confirmation in official documents. However, we will surely hear Intel representatives' comments on the pace of 10nm technology adoption tomorrow at the quarterly earnings conference, although they are unlikely to differ significantly from the position that has been stated for several months now. It states that the first client systems based on second-generation 10nm processors will hit the shelves by the end of the year, while server processors will transition to 10nm technology in 2020.
Dell's presentation does not contradict Intel's official stance in that the first client 10nm processors will appear this year, and these will be mobile 10nm models from the Ice Lake-U family with a TDP level of no more than 15–28 Watts. The point is that Dell has promised them in the second quarter, albeit in limited quantities. Apparently, several models of ultra-thin laptops based on them will be showcased at the Computex 2019 exhibition in June. By the way, Lenovo has previously demonstrated similar intentions, so Dell is not the only one fortunate in this regard.
On the pages of the website, comments from industry analysts regarding this information leak have appeared. However, it should be noted that Intel representatives declined to comment on this information with the site employees, citing the tradition of not publicly commenting on rumors.
On the other hand, representatives of Tirias Research urged not to draw hasty conclusions based on just two slides from the presentation. Firstly, one of them pertains to Intel's plans in the mobile segment, while the other concerns the commercial segment. For this company, analysts believe that a degree of conservatism in the commercial PC segment may be reflected in the delay of the transition to new lithographic standards. In the consumer sector, the transition to 10nm technology may begin sooner, according to the primary source. Moreover, it is confident that both in the desktop and server segments, Intel's 10nm processors will appear in the second half of this year.
The priority for mastering the 10nm technology may indeed be given to Intel's mobile processors, experts from Tirias Research continue. Now that Intel has announced plans for multi-billion dollar investments in expanding production lines for 14nm processors, there is simply no rush to abandon the corresponding technology process. The server and commercial segments are less sensitive to the relevance of the lithographic technologies used, analysts explain. Moreover, Intel will try to compensate for the delay in mastering 10nm technology by enhancing the capabilities of 14nm processors, for example, by adding new instruction sets like DL Boost.
Source: 3dnews.ru
