Interview with Intel: We sat down with Dan Snyder of Intel and talked a bit about current and upcoming Intel technologies and overclocking.

1. Please introduce yourself.

I'm Dan Snyder, the technical PR rep, so I work on the support the Americas trade press and I promote all our latest and greatest& usually CPU technology and related items.

2. How would Intel gauge their performance in terms of product development and acceptance in 2003? Is there anything you would have liked to have done differently?

Well, I think if you look at the results in our annual report and our results for 2003, it's obvious the market shows that there is a lot of acceptance. That was in a time when the market was just starting to come out of its doldrums. We were real happy about the acceptance of the Pentium 4 processor with HT technology and also Intel Centrino technology. I think that was a real win because people saw a lot of broad acceptance for the mobility and this wireless aspect, so yeah, I don't think we have any regrets at all.

3. How would you describe Intel when it comes to product development& proactive or reactive?

If you look at our string of announcements, so for example, the 90 nanometer, the 65nm, we have several 90nm fabs up and running right now. Those are all developments spear-headed by Intel and actually, if you look at a lot of the industry standards and industry specs out there, everything from PCI Express to USB 2.0 to Serial ATA2 and AHCI, final spec. Intel has a very active role in all those committees, so I think in terms of that, it's definitely a major leader and if you do look at the things beyond the CPU as well-- the technology, the nanotechnology, etc, if you ever come to one of our IDFs, you'll see all this stuff.

4. What are some of the technologies that enthusiasts should take note of in the next 12 months?

I think the enthusiasts are going to be excited in the next 12 months. We're launching the Alderwood/Grantsdale platform this quarter--which I think you know something about. This is our next generation platform supporting PCI Express, it's going to support faster speed CPUs in the new LGA775 packaging, so that's the next generation, it's going to have Intel High Definition audio, enabling mainstream 7.1 audio on today's PCs.

You're also going to have integrated wireless access points, so integrated AP included in there, so that's the next generation in Grantsdale. Alderwood will be even little higher performance with some tuning and we'll be able to run the latest and greatest stuff. We're positioning that with kind of the latest Pentium 4 Extreme Editions coming out later this year.

5. Intel has made a big push with WiFi lately. Is this something they see a big future in?

Absolutely. You know, it's something like a huge, huge several X growth in the wireless stuff, and actually, in terms of the mobility, we've seen some data that shows over the next two, three years, notebooks are going to be 30% of the client PCs being sold from 20% today, so we're looking at just the next 3-4 years doubling, or almost doubling up to 30% of client PCs sold will be notebooks. So, this is being fueled by obviously, WiFi and the hotspots. We just announced that the San Francisco Giants, at the SBC Park, are going wireless and they're going to have wireless access for everyone there.

6. Outside of CPUs and motherboards, are there any new technologies that we expect this year?

Well, I think towards the end of the year we've announced in terms some of our fab processes, so towards the end of the year, we should be looking at some of our early samples, some of the 65nm stuff, so our next generation processing technology which pushes our entire product line. But also, PCI Express and High Definition Audio, these are pretty new big things that are really going shake up the industry, so we're on the steering committee of PCI Express industry group, and we're really involved with that quite heavily.

1. How would you describe Prescott& an evolution or a revolution?

Well, I'd say definitely evolutionary with the sweet spot in the architecture coming at faster clock speeds, which happened with Northwood and Willamette.

So with Prescott, you're seeing a lot of parity, the same speed at launch but the architecture has been designed to kind of get its legs when you get up to the higher speed, 3.6, 3.8, 4.0Ghz& stuff like that then when you have the extended pipelines and things you're able to increase clock speed and performance.

2. What can we expect to see from Prescott by the end of the year? How fast do you expect the current line of processors go before a change in architecture is needed?

Well, we publicly said in our roadmaps that were going to hit 4 gigahertz by the end of the year, so that's what were shooting for.

3. Prescott has received some criticism about the heat output. What is Intel's reply on the matter?

The bottom line is that we've almost tripled the number of transistors, so that, even though we've gone to a smaller processor, we've gone from the 0.13nm to the 9nm& when you triple the number of transistors, remember each of those transistors are being switched on and off at the rate of 3.4 gigahertz so that generates a lot of heat. The fact that they've got it down to where they got it is an amazing engineering feat. You know, so you've basically doubled the L2, the L1, you've added the PNI, Prescott New instructions, there's 64 bit instruction waiting to be unlocked in there, so you know, there's a lot of things in there that contribute to that.

Well, I know that right now, the heat is pretty much manageable but when you scale up to let's say, 4 gigahertz in a year, you're probably going to have to rethink your cooling solution. Right now, you use an aluminum heat sink with a copper slug.

They can also work some things on the architecture and the layout and the chip design to help with power, and they're actually working real closely with our mobile group to look at some of the tips and tricks they use on the Centrino technologies. They use a lot of best known methods to optimize for notebooks because you just cannot have those high heat dissipation in a notebook form factor. So they're working cross-team and looking at some of the technologies, things on the desktops, like "hey, let's make sure the leakage isn't bad, let's make sure that certain parts of the CPU can be turned off if they're not being used." And things like that. So, yeah, they're researching it.

4. With AMD now pushing 64-bit, why the delay in Intel's part?

We have a very robust 64 bit architecture and it's been out there for several years -the Itanium processor family. The high end server administrators are really embracing it, you know, so it's not like we've had our blinds up on 64-bit.

Now, about our 64-bit mainstream desktop For years we've had in the labs all kinds of different technologies and stuff so Intel is continually looking at new technologies and yeah, we're developing 64-bit and, who knows, we're probably looking at 256-bit in some lab somewhere! I've seen some pretty crazy stuff going on in the labs, but we don't want to release a product unless there's a mainstream OS out there that can run the product. I still challenge people to go out to any CompUSA or Best Buy and go buy a couple of 64-bit OS'es or games for their desktop.

Prescott will have 64-bit extensions when the ecosystem is ready. We've publicly stated that we're marching towards that right now-should be mid-year-- and that initial release would be targeted at entry level servers and workstations.

5. Clock speeds being equal, the Prescott seems to lag a bit behind the last Northwood. Why didn't they go for broke and release CPUs a lot faster instead of the same clock speeds as before?

I think it's the performance is pretty much parity Prescott versus Northwood at the same clock speed, with Prescott shining more on the video and audio applications. I know you've looked a lot of these benchmarks online, but you know some of the audio-video encode and video editing, that's where we tend to be very strong and these new instructions, a couple of the video guys are already using these new instructions and getting some benefits out of it anywhere 5, 10, 15% just right off the bat at same speed. So, it's an evolutionary thing and it'll get its legs when coming into the architecture here and reaching speeds of 3.6-4+ GHz.

6. How much longer does Intel plan on extending the Northwood's lifespan?

Were looking at Prescott being the fastest ramp ever with over half of Pentium 4s being sold being Prescott sometime by the middle of the year, so I would look at Northwood phasing out this year with some limited solutions left. There will likely be some legacy designs that require it.

7. What are the plans for the mobile CPU market in 2004?

We currently have our Centrinos, and you know about that, everybody loves those and all the integrated wireless stuff and everything. We just released our next generation Centrino, which was code named Dothan. That doubles the L2 cache to 2MB, runs at speeds up to 2 GHz and it will also be on a newer 90nm fab process. So that will be a boost for the notebook, so even more performance but still very good battery life.

8. How much longer can we expect the Socket-478 package to be around?

That will be phasing out starting this summer with the Grantsdale/Alderwood launch. Were moving for the new package, the Socket-T. There will be ATX, microATX, BTX, and microBTX.

9. Although overclocking is officially a no-no, we all know it is something that is done. Do you have anything to say about this?

We realize that there's a big market out there and that people are going to do that kind of stuff --and we're not trying to hide it from those guys but we also tell those guys that "hey, what you do is at your own risk." It's just like if you try to take your car that only goes up to 100 mph and drive it 250 mph down the highway and you come to your dealer and you say "well, you know it was going 250 mph, I don't know why the engine blew?"

You don't get a lot of sympathy.

The key thing in terms of the support is that overclocked CPUs are not covered by warranties. We have our processors are locked at their frequency, in terms of their multiplier. People of course are going out there and doing stuff with the voltages and FSB, and we know this but as always "do this at your own risk".

I have a high end system at home and I do a lot of high-end stuff at home but I don't overclock just because, yeah, I know that it could get 5%, but c'mon in reality 60 frames vs. 58 frames per second or one minute encode vs. a minute 4 seconds--is it worth the risk?& I can wait 4 seconds. But I know people do it and feel it's more of a challenge and "how can I get this up as high as I can get it." With our Prescott review samples we sent out, we had guys well above 4 gigahertz overclocking with all kinds of crazy cooling solutions.

1. Granite Bay, hit or miss?

People seemed to be pretty happy about it. It extended technologies into the Pentium 4 platform such as AGP8X and enhanced memory support.

Let's rephrase the first question. When Granite Bay came out, it had a lot of features that a lot of people were excited about. The thing is that when it did come out, it was actually very difficult to buy and one would assume that after Springdale and Canterwoods came out so quickly, it kind of says, "Well you know, I guess Granite Bay just really didn't work out, so here's Springdales for mainstream and Canterwoods for the high end."

Canterwood and Springdale were positioned to mainstream and advanced mainstream users, the Granite Bay SKU was never intended to be a mainstream board-the chipset was designed by our workstation and server guys.

2. What is Intel's stance on motherboard manufacturers "tweaking" Springdales to perform on par (in some cases, faster) with the Canterwood?

It's kind of similar to the overclocking thing, and we have discussed that already. These guys are going to do it. Again, you are "doing it at your own risk". Well, these guys will continue to do it and we talked to the motherboard manufacturers about that and we said "hey guys, this is kind of pushing things out of spec " but these guys want to go for the most performance and really tweak up systems and all.

So again, it's like the CPU overclocking but it's on the motherboard guys, so if someone's board gets fried , the user's going to have to bring it to the motherboard manufacturer's tech support-will they like that? I always think it's so funny how people get so worked up about 1 or 2% in a certain benchmark and then it turns out they have some unneeded DLLs loaded or they're losing 25 to 30% because their hard drive isn't configured right and they don't even know it. I encourage the power users out there to pick their battles wisely! Alderwood will have some of those performance enhancements on technology like Springdale vs. Canterwood so that will still be going there in our next generation chipsets.

3. Has Intel entertained thoughts of dropping chipset development and letting 3rd party developers make chipsets, or should we expect Intel to continue making their own chipsets for awhile?

There is a lot of synergy between our chipset and CPU development, it's so vital in terms of what's going on with the system and it has to be linked so closely into what's going on at a system level.

4. How much influence does Intel have to 3rd party chipset developers? Do you work closely with them, or are they pretty much on their own?

I know we've done a lot of cross licensing.. We do work with them pretty closely because you know, it's a very classic high tech relationship with your competitors but you're also customers because VIA for example, they have got to work with us because they need those CPU samples to do those chipsets. You can't validate those chipsets, you can't design those chipsets unless you know something about the CPU. They are absolutely linked, so we have to work together in some respect and yes, they're competitors but our CPU crew would say, "Hey this is great! They're partners and we're selling more CPUs thanks to these guys, and to our chipset group, it's obvious they're going to say "well, they're a competitor but our stance on competitors is that competition is good for the market and if they do something new and creative, maybe we'll open our eyes and say, "Hey great idea, let's look at implementing it" and vice versa.

1. Is integrated graphics something Intel develops concurrently with their chipsets, or is it an afterthought?

Yeah, absolutely! Our next generation Grantsdale Intel graphics will have a new core that is 2X the performance of our current generation graphics. It also supports Pixel Shaders 2.0 and several other new DirectX 9 technologies. Recently we actually we showed this off and a lot of the press said, "Well you know you've come a long way" and were still not positioning it at the hardcore gamer. Absolutely not! Were positioning it as corporate stable platforms, but remember that 95% of the users out there are mainstream users, you know? We are fully aware that hardcore gamers will be adding the latest ATI or NVIDIA graphics cards for their gaming experience.

Thanks for the time!

No Problem.

Final Words: We'd like to thank Dan for taking the time to answer our inquiries today, and for being so candid in his responses. If you have any comments, be sure to hit us up in our forums.

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