As first hinted at by Intel again in late April, Intel is embarking on a journey to redefine its consumer processor branding, the most important such shift within the earlier 15 years of the corporate. Having already made waves by altering its retail packaging on premium desktop chips such because the Core i9-11900Ok and Core i9-12900Ok, the tech big goals to introduce a brand new naming scheme throughout its consumer processors, signaling a transformative section in its consumer roadmap.
This shift is because of start within the second half of the yr, when Intel will launch their extremely anticipated Meteor Lake CPUs. Meteor Lake represents a big leap ahead for the corporate with regard to manufacturing, structure, and design – and, it might appear, is prompting the necessity for a recent product naming conference.
Crucial adjustments embrace dropping the ‘i’ from the naming scheme and choosing a extra easy Core 3, 5, and seven branding construction for Intel’s mainstream processors. The opposite notable inclusion, which is now formally confirmed, is that Intel will bifurcate the Core model a bit and place its premium consumer merchandise in their very own class, utilizing the brand new Extremely moniker. Extremely chips will signify the next efficiency tier and goal marketplace for the components, and would be the solely place Intel makes use of their top-end Core 9 (beforehand i9) branding.
Intel: A Temporary Historical past of the Core i Collection
The Core i collection debuted in 2008, round 15 years in the past, marking the top of the primary Core/Core 2 period and signaling a brand new daybreak for Intel’s consumer product strains. This modification occurred alongside the discharge of its 45 nm manufacturing course of by means of the Nehalem structure and lined merchandise similar to Celeron, Pentium Core, and the Xeon manufacturers. Extra lately, in 2020, Intel initiated a extra complete overhaul of its company id to modernize the messaging from a 50 yr outdated firm, the results of that are nonetheless winding by means of the corporate immediately.
This revamp of Intel’s branding has concerned the introduction of recent logos and logos characterised by cleaner typography and simplistic geometric backgrounds with a lighter blue colour scheme. As a part of this course of, Intel has beforehand bid farewell to its long-established price range CPU manufacturers, Pentium and Celeron. These branding adjustments had been undoubtedly supposed to convey a willingness to alter, transcend, and solidify their place in an rising market.
Going from the older Core Duo branding to the Core i3 collection marked the daybreak of Intel’s fashionable low-end processor branding, with the quantitative markup of their different lineups into the Core i5 (mid-range) and the Core i7 collection – which on the time, was reserved for Intel’s flagship processors.
Going Ahead: Deemphasizing Generational Branding
The newest branding change, as beforehand talked about, is the most important within the final 15 years of Intel. Whereas some naming schemes might be complicated and cluttered (ahem, Xeons), Intel is aiming for one thing that is nonetheless fairly clear for the consumer processors. Which is nice timing, as a result of the {hardware} underpinning them is about to get pretty complicated with the transition chiplet-based Meteor Lake and its mix-and-match of dies constructed on the Intel four course of and constructed over at rival-supplier TSMC.
At first, below their new branding system Intel is removing main generational branding. For the final decade plus, we have seen Intel slowly increment by means of their Core generations, similar to 4th Gen Core, ninth Gen Core, 13th Gen Core, and so on. Typically, this was positioned in entrance of the processor description (particularly on OEM gadgets), giving us descriptions similar to “Intel 11th Technology Core i3”.
Underneath Intel’s new branding change, the processor era is being deemphasized – however not eradicated solely. The processor mannequin numbers themselves will nonetheless begin with the era as they do immediately, however that would be the solely place the place the era might be persistently denoted. Technology as a number one indicator might be going away.
At this level, we do not know the place Intel will begin their newest numbering system from. Whereas Intel may very properly proceed on from the place they’ve left off, making the subsequent components the 14th Technology (and thus 14xxx mannequin numbers), extra seemingly Intel goes to make use of this as an opportunity to reset their era rely. The benchmark information leaks that triggered Intel to initially touch upon this matter again in April included point out of a 1003H chip, for what that is value.
Intel Core 3, Core 5, and Core 7 for Mainstream: Dropping the Iconic ‘i’
As a part of the brand new rebranding, Intel is dropping the ‘i’ from their processor tiering system for consumer processors, beginning with Meteor Lake and different merchandise on the roadmap past this. Because of this the Core i3, i5, and i7 naming construction turns into Core 3, 5, and seven, successfully dropping the ‘i’ moniker of the naming construction.
This implies chips such because the Core i5 13600 could be named one thing like Core 5 13600 below the brand new naming conference. This does not represent an enormous change within the naming, however is critical because the ‘i’ has been an iconic moniker for its processors over the past 15 years.
Notably right here, this tier of Core branding is what Intel considers their “mainstream” processors. It does not cowl Core 9 in any manner – that tier is reserved for Intel’s premium “Extremely” model.
Intel Core Extremely: Reserved For Premium Chips – Core Extremely 5, Extremely 7, and Extremely 9
Intel can be formally splitting off its premium consumer chips into their very own sub-brand of types, giving them the brand new Extremely label. Intel’s Core Extremely branding is reserved for his or her “premium” processors, which the corporate is not strictly defining what meaning prematurely. So how this can match into the Meteor Lake era of processors stays to be seen. Although on the desktop, we would not be in the slightest degree stunned to see this substitute (or go hand-in-hand with) Intel’s conventional Ok/KS collection SKUs.
Studying between the strains right here, it is attention-grabbing to notice that, not like Intel’s slide for mainstream processors, which says “Starting with Meteor Lake”, Intel’s Extremely adjustments are “Starting 2H 2023”. There’s nonetheless lots of cloudiness inside Intel’s consumer chip roadmap in relation to their desktop processor plans for the subsequent yr, and the way Meteor Lake could (or could not) match into these. So this slight distinction on when the branding begins could also be an indication that Intel is not aspiring to launch high-end Meteor Lake desktop processors – opening the door to a Raptor Lake refresh or the like.
Lastly, following Intel’s supposed processor numbering scheme sooner or later, for each mainstream and Extremely chips, the processor mannequin quantity might be after the phrase “processor”. Intel’s instance is “Intel Core Extremely 7 processor [model number]” which is not an excessive amount of dissimilar to the present construction, albeit with the phrase ‘Extremely’ thrown in for good measure. That is to suggest the goal market of the processor, just like how Intel used the Excessive moniker for his or her Core X-series processors.
Intel’s Meteor Lake Cometh In H2’2023
The shift to the brand new branding and effectual removing of the ‘i’ from the mentioned branding is attention-grabbing. Whereas processor gross sales have declined over the previous couple of years, the COVID-19 pandemic, the battle in Ukraine, and a common financial downturn have worsened issues. It stays to be seen whether or not or not these new adjustments are designed to advertise an uptick in gross sales, e.g., promoting extra chips, or whether or not or not they characterize making a change because of the large generational shift in how Intel might be fabbing its processors – each as regards to chiplets and the EUV-enabled Intel four course of.
With Meteor Lake not anticipated to splash down from the skies till later in 2023 for cellular and maybe afterward (if in any respect) in 2024 for desktop chips, Intel’s newest Intel four course of represents an enormous shift in Intel’s processor applied sciences. Meteor Lake is the primary in Intel’s arsenal to make use of EUV lithography within the manufacturing course of, together with utilizing the same strategy to utilizing each efficiency (P) and effectivity (E) cores, very like we have seen from each Alder Lake (12th Gen) and the present Raptor Lake (13th Gen) processors.
With out diving a lot too into the meat of Meteor Lake and the developments of what Intel four and TSMC’s personal processes convey to the desk, our detailed protection of Intel’s upcoming Meteor Lake processors might be discovered under:
