New Atom architecture for 22nm Posted on 13/05/2011 at 12:08 by Guillaume
Cnet (relayed by Anandtech have published a few details on the future Atom architecture, starting with a codename: Silvermont. The other news is that there will (finally!) be a new architecture for the Atom cores which hadn’t changed since they were introduced back in 2008. There’s speculation that Intel has abandoned the in-order pipeline and gone back to an out-of-order architecture. Intel had been working on the principle of a five year life cycle for the Atom architecture but what with the explosion of competiton in the mobility sector (from AMD and ARM) this no longer make much sense. According to Cnet, Intel will be coming back to a two-year development cycle in line with the other processor ranges.
In terms of availability, as we mentioned during our presentation of the 22nm engraving, Intel is using a distinct fabrication process adapted to SoCs for the Atoms (P1271 for the 22nm process) and this is still separate from the launch of the standard process. Thus, though the first 32nm processors were available in January 2010, the Atom 32 nms won’t be on the market until the end of 2011. With the launch of Windows 8 (ARM compatible) coming at the end of 2012, it’s in Intel’s best interests to accelerate the Silvermont launch. For the time being, Cnet are talking about 2013.
