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Intel Core Ultra Series 3 Debut as First Built on Intel 18A

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Re: Intel Core Ultra Series 3 Debut as First Built on Intel 18A

#151

Post by etempleton »

aurareturn wrote: post #42
ytch wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://x.com/Kurnalsalts/status/1962173515815424003 Logic Density (may be inaccurate, also it's not the only metric for performance ): Raipidus 2nm ≈ TSMC N2 > TSMC N3B > TSMC N3E/P > Intel 18A ≈ Samaung 3GAP But 18A/20A already has PowerVia, while TSMC will implement Backside Power Delivery in A16 (next generation of N2)

So 18A is roughly TSMC N4P. N4P is part of the N5 family.

18a supposedly has some advantages in power efficiency and some other areas compared to TSMCs approach. Ultimately, TSMC doesn’t have a 2nm product yet, so it is a pretty big deal Intel is competitive again with TSMC latest. Samsung is incredibly far behind at this point.

Re: Intel Core Ultra Series 3 Debut as First Built on Intel 18A

#152

Post by wmf »

gambiting wrote: post #22
vbezhenar wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These processors have NPU (Neural Processing Unit) which is supposed to accelerate some small local neural networks. Nvidia RTX GPUs have much more powerful NPUs, so it's more about laptops without discrete GPU.

But like.....what for example. As a normal windows PC user, what kind of software can I run that will benefit from that NPU at all?

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/ai-features

https://www.pcworld.com/article/2905178/ai-on-the-notebook-t...

Re: Intel Core Ultra Series 3 Debut as First Built on Intel 18A

#153

Post by wmf »

jauntywundrkind wrote: post #32

Xe3 GPU could be super super super great. Xe2 is already very strong, and this could really be an incredible breakout moment. The CPU are also probably also fine! Intel is so far ahead with consumer multi-chip. AMD has done amazing with having an IOD+CCD (io / core complex dies) chiplet split up (basically having a northbridge on package), but is just trying to figure out how in 2027's Medusa Point they're going to m…

For a laptop chip the optimal dsesign is a single die. Apple, Qualcomm, and AMD agree on this. Chiplets are a last resort when you can't afford a single die due to yield or mask costs.

Re: Intel Core Ultra Series 3 Debut as First Built on Intel 18A

#154

Post by JohnBooty »

jauntywundrkind wrote: post #32

Xe3 GPU could be super super super great. Xe2 is already very strong, and this could really be an incredible breakout moment. The CPU are also probably also fine! Intel is so far ahead with consumer multi-chip. AMD has done amazing with having an IOD+CCD (io / core complex dies) chiplet split up (basically having a northbridge on package), but is just trying to figure out how in 2027's Medusa Point they're going to m…

Yes. It's one of those things where even if you will never buy an Intel product, everybody in the world should be rooting for Intel to produce a real winner here.

Healthy Intel/GF/TSMC competition at the head of the pack is great for the tech industry, and the global economy at large.

Perhaps even more importantly, with armed conflict looming over Taiwan and TSMC... well, enough said.

Re: Intel Core Ultra Series 3 Debut as First Built on Intel 18A

#155

Post by adgjlsfhk1 »

notenlish wrote: post #70
klardotsh wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nearly all modern SOCs have built in RAM now. Apple Silicon does it, AMD Strix Halo and beyond do it, Intel Lunar Lake does it, most ARM SOCs from vendors other than Apple do it… Now, unified memory shared freely between CPU and GPU would be cool, like Apple and AMD SH have, if that’s what you meant.

Isnt Strix Halo and apple's m series a bit different. Iirc you need to choose how much ram will be allocated to the igpu, whereas on mac it is all handled dynamically.

strix also does it dynamically, just with a limit (which is generally set to ~75% of your total RAM)

Re: Intel Core Ultra Series 3 Debut as First Built on Intel 18A

#156

Post by stefanfisk »

flyinglizard wrote: post #100
ZiiS wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even thier ultra efficent silicon didn't fully solve this; a 16" M4 Pro often outperforms a 14" M4 Max stuck throttling.

Are they throttling with the fan off? Because I don't recall ever hearing the fan on my M3 Max 14" (granted no heavy deliberate computational beyond regular dev work).

AFAIK it’s only something that happens under sustained heavy load. The 14” Max should still outperform the Pro for shorter tasks but I’d reckon few people buy the most expensive machine for such use cases.

Personally I think that Apple should not even be selling the 14” Max when it has this defect.

Re: Intel Core Ultra Series 3 Debut as First Built on Intel 18A

#157

Post by [deleted] »

smallmancontrov wrote: post #110
daneel_w wrote: post #108

Is Intel's 18A (~2nm) their own hardware or did they acquire ASML equipment for this plant?

Intel never made EUV machines, never claimed to make EUV machines, never aspired to make EUV machines, and have run multiple marketing campaigns bragging about the ASML EUV machines they purchased.

[deleted]

Re: Intel Core Ultra Series 3 Debut as First Built on Intel 18A

#158

Post by mrandish »

gambiting wrote: post #20
chrismorgan wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I assume 9 is better than 7 right? Right? Oh, the number of times I’ve heard someone assume their five- or ten-year-old machine must be powerful because it’s an i7… no, the i3-14100 (released two years ago) is uniformly significantly superior to the i7-9700 (released five years before that), and only falls behind the i9-9900 in multithreaded performance. Within the same product family and generation, I expect 9 is…

>>Within the same product family and generation, I expect 9 is better than 7 Ah the good old Dell laptop engineering, where the i9 is better on paper, but in reality it throttles within 5 seconds of starting any significant load and the cpu nerfs itself below even i5 performance. Classic Dell move.

Yeah, putting an i9 in any laptop that's not an XL gaming rig with big fans is very nearly always a waste of money (there might exist a few rare exceptions for some oddball workloads). Manufacturers selling i9s in thin & light laptops at an ultra price premium may fall just short of the legal definition of fraud but it's as unconscionable as snake-oil audiophile companies selling $500 USB cables.

Re: Intel Core Ultra Series 3 Debut as First Built on Intel 18A

#159

Post by wtallis »

mrandish wrote: post #158
gambiting wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>>Within the same product family and generation, I expect 9 is better than 7 Ah the good old Dell laptop engineering, where the i9 is better on paper, but in reality it throttles within 5 seconds of starting any significant load and the cpu nerfs itself below even i5 performance. Classic Dell move.

Yeah, putting an i9 in any laptop that's not an XL gaming rig with big fans is very nearly always a waste of money (there might exist a few rare exceptions for some oddball workloads). Manufacturers selling i9s in thin & light laptops at an ultra price premium may fall just short of the legal definition of fraud but it's as unconscionable as snake-oil audiophile companies selling $500 USB cables.

That's still assigning too much significance to the "i9" naming. Sometimes, the only difference between the i9 part and the top i7 part was something like 200MHz of single-core boost frequency, with the core counts and cache sizes and maximum power limit all being equal. So quite often, the i7 has stood to gain just as much from a higher-power form factor as the i9.

Re: Intel Core Ultra Series 3 Debut as First Built on Intel 18A

#160

Post by astrange »

webdevver wrote: post #30
dangus wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Intel marketing isn’t the best but I am struggling to understand what issue you’re taking with this. It’s an AI PC platform. It can do AI. It has an NPU and integrated GPU. That’s pretty straightforward. Competitors include Apple silicon and AMD Ryzen AI. They’re predicting it’ll sell well, and they have a huge distribution network with a large number of partner products launching. Basically they’re saying every lapt…

i cant believe we're still putting NPUs into new designs. silicon taken up that couldve been used for a few more compute units on the GPU, which is often faster at inference anyway and way more useful/flexible/programmable/documented.

NPUs aren't designed to be "faster", they are designed to have better perf/power ratios.
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