Intel to go beyond quad-core with Cannonlake processor family

[watercooled]

Without meaning to be the pessimist, Intel call their Xeon D an SoC and that already has 'up to 8 cores' on 22nm Broadwell...

[loccothan]

Just bought skylake - check out my build https://uk.pcpartpicker.com/b/MrjcCJ

Wonder when Canonolake will release - a whole new motherbaord architecture will be required again so it's going to cost Intel as well as consumers

Looking Great -> Look into my AMD Fat1ne
-> http://loccothan.blogspot.com/p/hardware-test.html

[=assassin=]

It's a shame that a more affordable 6 core Intel product won't be available for quite some time still. The 5820k is the current 'best' in that regard, but still costs over £300, with a socket 2011 board costing more by default too, and in the majority of situations, particularly gaming, a 4 core 4790K is the better choice, and also a decent amount cheaper.

[DanceswithUnix]

More cores doesn't always help



(from http://techreport.com/review/29090/f...nce-revealed/4)

nice when it does, but I expect once again it will take some time for software to catch up with the hardware here.

[shaithis]

nice when it does, but I expect once again it will take some time for software to catch up with the hardware here.

Yes, I'm sure we will have to wait for PS5 and XBox-whatever before we see cores getting munched up....and by then I bet our PCs will again have loads more overhead that we will complain that devs aren't using....rinse-repeat :S

[gagaga]

We don't need mpre cores, we need some big fat cores to improve IPC. The current cores are a tiny part of the processor die space. AMD have been so uncompetitive that Intel have not needed to improve the cores more than the 2-4% each generation and have pocketed the savings from the reducing die size.

Hopefully the Apple A9 catching up with the Core M will give them a kick up the arse to get on with this - it's very hard to justify charging £150-200 for a CPU with the performance of a £20 mobile processor.

[LostTech]

I'm still on my 6 year old i7-920 OC @ 4GHz and nothing until this has excited me enough to consider upgrading!! Finally a modern, fast CPU with lots of cores. As someone who does everything from gaming (some of which use all the cores you've got) to 3D modeling/Video editing/photo editing this is very welcome news!!

@EvZ_2: Cannonlake is predicted to be out in H2 2017.

@DemonHighwatman: From the original article on Motley Fool -

"If I had to guess, though, I'd wager that both high-performance client processors as well as "thin-and-light" devices will be derived from the chip that the engineer claims to be working on. Thin-and-light devices will see maximum core counts of four, while desktops and potentially high-performance notebooks get up to eight cores. "

Fingers crossed!

[abaxas]

Sounds perfect as it's the only way to go.

We are near peak IPC so the only dimension left is cores.

[nitro912gr]

I don't care about more cores since most apps just ignores even the second core in most cases...

I have a phenom II x6 since they where available and I got it for some serious rendering at the time and it was so nice to have it work 100%

But since then I haven't done much rendering and it is idling a lot, I rarely see more than 50% usage while one core is trying to get the job done (in many apps) because most apps have terrible to no scaling to more than one core.

If the software is not improved those CPUs will be good just for rendering and show off in cinebench.

[DanceswithUnix]

Interesting analysis of multi core use in Android here http://www.anandtech.com/show/9518/t...recount-debate

It seems things are already more threaded than I for one expected.

[watercooled]

We don't need mpre cores, we need some big fat cores to improve IPC. The current cores are a tiny part of the processor die space. AMD have been so uncompetitive that Intel have not needed to improve the cores more than the 2-4% each generation and have pocketed the savings from the reducing die size.

Without covering old ground again and again, blaming AMD for performance is nonsense if you look at the design process of CPUs, and really I imagine it's quite insulting to Intel's engineers to make out they're doing a half-baked job. Truth is, extracting IPC is really hard and managing to improve it generation on generation is impressive in itself.

Competition can and does have an effect on pricing, but actual core design is a very long-term process and Intel would be taking a massive risk in 'holding off' at early stages of design.

[dreamer77dd]

Maybe the chip makers should help the software developers a lot more with multi thread/multi core chips.
Like gaming engines help game developers.
Help Linux developers more.

Just make it easier and people will write more for that company.

Just not seeing a ton of software using multi core as much as it could.
nothing yet is really pushing the boundaries of daily use.
At least their is a platform to start doing that teaching and developing.

[nazt]

Cannonlake, lol what a name.

[qasdfdsaq]

Of course they are going to have more then 4 cores, I had just decided that I am going to get a Skylake chip to replace my Q9550 . I seriously doubt I can carry on trying to game on this machine into 2018 or beyond.

Good decision. There's no reason to suggest you won't be able to upgrade to Cannonlake when the time comes.

I'm still on my 6 year old i7-920 OC @ 4GHz and nothing until this has excited me enough to consider upgrading!! Finally a modern, fast CPU with lots of cores. As someone who does everything from gaming (some of which use all the cores you've got) to 3D modeling/Video editing/photo editing this is very welcome news!!

So twice the performance at half the power is not exciting? Meh. Your loss.

If you really cared about multicore performance you'd have paid £100 to upgrade that i7-920 to a 6-core at 4.4Ghz or bought a Haswell-EP system with up to 72 cores by now. A Cannonlake 8-core will only bring your performance up to 15% of the maximum configuration, up from the 5% you have now.

Sounds perfect as it's the only way to go.

We are near peak IPC so the only dimension left is cores.

Perhaps you've forgotten about clockspeed. We're already at a profound excess of cores, and they're clearly important seeing as how the 12-18 core CPUs are selling like hotcakes... not.

[gagaga]

Why insulting? Intel engineers are awesome - but they work within the confines they are given.

Qualcomm, ARM and Samsung engineers are also exceptional - but compare the IPC of those chips with that of the Apple A8/A9 where Apple threw a huge die into the ring. Intel chips have been getting physically smaller each of the recent generations - the process shrinkage is being taken as profit rather than being handed to the engineers to produce the best product.

[canopus72]

TBH, I don't really care because intel are just going to make the same old rehashed tripe but this time with more cores. There is nothing new and exciting about their design. It will just be a tweaked version of 'Has-been' or 'fail-lake'. I can hear all the intel fanboys squealing in unison - 'PHWOOAARRR!!. MORE CORES!!. MORE POWA!!'.