Wednesday, September 20th 2023

Intel Demoes Core "Lunar Lake" Processor from Two Generations Ahead
Intel at the 2023 InnovatiON event surprised audiences with a live demo of a reference notebook powered by a Core "Lunar Lake" processor. What's surprising about this is that "Lunar Lake" won't come out until 2025 (at least), and succeeds not just the upcoming "Meteor Lake" architecture, but also its succeeding "Arrow Lake," which debuts in 2024. Intel is expected to debut "Meteor Lake" some time later this year. What's also surprising is that Intel has proven that the Intel 18A foundry node works. The Compute tile of "Lunar Lake" is expected to be based on Intel 18A, which is four generations ahead of the current Intel 7, which will be succeeded by Intel 4, Intel 3, and Intel 20A along the way.
The demo focused on the generative AI capabilities of Intel's third generation NPU, the hardware backend of AI Boost. Using a local session of a tool similar to Stable Diffusion, the processor was made to generate the image of a giraffe wearing a hat; and a GPT program was made to pen the lyrics of a song in the genre of Taylor Swift from scratch. Both tasks were completed on stage using the chip's NPU, and in timeframes you'd normally expect from discrete AI accelerators or cloud-based services.
Source:
HotHardware
The demo focused on the generative AI capabilities of Intel's third generation NPU, the hardware backend of AI Boost. Using a local session of a tool similar to Stable Diffusion, the processor was made to generate the image of a giraffe wearing a hat; and a GPT program was made to pen the lyrics of a song in the genre of Taylor Swift from scratch. Both tasks were completed on stage using the chip's NPU, and in timeframes you'd normally expect from discrete AI accelerators or cloud-based services.
62 Comments on Intel Demoes Core "Lunar Lake" Processor from Two Generations Ahead
Intel was always going to use a technology that has been proven to be so successful. Be stupid not to. Who knows, it might be that good I go back to Intel in 2 or 3 years.
commission.europa.eu/law/law-topic/data-protection/reform/rights-citizens/my-rights/can-i-ask-company-delete-my-personal-data_en
Maybe they'd have to just nuke your whole account, but they are legally liable if they don't comply
You are at liberty to feel however you want to feel about this guys' hat. He's at liberty to make a statement, whatever that is here, btw, I don't know... by wearing a hat. Maybe next time someone wears a My little Pony jumpsuit, it would make that presentation radically different too. Compare how you would respond to that, relative to this hat, and maybe things will clear up a little.
I feel not wholly different as you when someone wears a hat indoors, but yeah. Reasons, complicated, social interactions... its good to tread carefully, because if we reflect on that, all that is, is what we've been taught, is it really relevant is another question. In other cultures perhaps hat wearing isn't frowned upon so much, and since corporate is mighty inclusive these days, well.
Demoing Lunar Lake doesn't make sense to me. TPU says this means Intel 18A is ahead of schedule but Anand Tech's take is that Lunar Lake was moved to Intel 20A. So it's not clear if Intel is demoing good news or bad news. Moreover, the products Intel claims we should be looking forward to are Meteor Lake and Arrow Lake. Why give attention to something even further away from release, unless Meteor Lake and Arrow Lake will be disappointing? AMD did demo Zen a long time ahead of release, but the Excavator µarch was already available and widely known to be inadequate.
Certain Intel SKUs provide more MT performance for your dollar but to say that Intel performs better all across the board is factually inaccurate. The 7950X matches the 13900K in application performance. The 7950X3D does as well, while consuming a fraction of the power. The 7600 beats the 13400f (both same price) in application performance by 1% and by 14% in gaming.
Then consider that AMD is dominating in server and winning laptop marketshare. I don't think your analysis of AMD's current position is accurate at all given the facts. Intel is moving towards a chiplet architecture precisely because of the advantages AMD has demonstrated. Intel makes sense when they provide a value proposition, as in more MT for your dollar, but otherwise if you are buying them because you think they provide the best performance (bar niche situations where you purchase for specific applications) you are only fooling yourself. In terms of application performance either brand is competitive and you should get whichever provides the most bang for your buck.
I get that both TPU and AT editors want to keep speculations to a minimum but this is taking is way too conservatively.
18A was only demoed as a test chip and nothing else. And wafers.
I view hats more as a style choice than a statement or anything.
18% gain is a full node worth of improvement. Intel 4 is 20% over Intel 7.
I'd say Intel 3 is a 0.75 node gain. Again, don't know enough about 18A.
TSMC's naming convention has been a nice marketing coup, some of their names merely denote an updated node for different power ranges. N5/N4 comes to mind.
AFAIK all of Intel's prior nodes would be considered high power, and in fact one of the IDM (foundry) nodes is "Intel 16" which is a reworked 22nm for low power. Low power usually means more dense, and from a desktop user standpoint would be 'very low' power - like sub 10W. Intel 4 / 3 are comparable to TSMC N3 / N3E.
I think 20A and 18A are going to be the same thing, 20A is high power for internal use and 18A will be low power for foundry partners. If they actually deliver product in 2024 on these nodes, they'll be ahead of TSMC by at least 3 quarters.
Even Apple is not using N2 in 2024, and may not use it until 2026.
Intel 4 process doesn't have enough libraries and features to have IO chipsets at all. Intel 3 does. Also Intel 4 is only HP, while Intel 3 is available in both HP and LP. While they did not say it for 20A, the assumption is that they'll follow the same convention as with 4/3.
The HP and LP distinction is also more subtle than most people think. Yes you can have a 5W chip on HP, but it'll be more optimal on LP. The LP transistors sacrifice clockspeeds for lower leakage transistors. Actually LP products use more power at the same frequency than the same on HP. It doesn't make sense, but what's happening is you don't get nothing for free. Leakage becomes dominant for battery life. But for super high frequency like desktops, it's beneficial to have better MHz/W, which is what HP gives you, but at higher leakages, which don't matter since you aren't running on battery and who care about few W when you have a 1000W system? N2's mass production is 2025 so you literally can't have a product until 2026.
The bias is evident. Amd is dominating servers (Intel has what, 80% marketshare) and gains traction in mobile (again, Intel has what, more than 80% marketshare?). ROFL
And yeah, a 13600k slaugthers the 7700x or the 7800x 3d in mt tasks. It's 2 generations ahead.
Besides, 13600K is way cheaper than 7800X3D and the true comparison should be 13700K anyway (soon 14700K)
Also, you can boost Intel gaming performance alot with faster memory (than 6000 Mhz). You can't on Ryzen 7000 since 6000 MHz is sweet spot and going above won't change much and might even lower performance. Even AMD said 6000 MHz is sweet spot.
I want Zen 5 (pref. 3D models) or Arrow Lake next.
It is going to be a good fight in 2024.
Hats off for this topic tho
What a joke...