Samantha Rose Hunt19 May 2009, 11:44 PM
Intel has announced its intent to release the next generation Calpella notebook platform to its partners, which can only mean one thing...
Many are speculating that the platform will be used by Apple on the MacBook and MacBook Pro computers ranging from 14 to 17 inches. This speculation is likely considering the Montevina, Calpella’s predecessor, is currently Apple's chip of choice -- and that Apple has had first dibs on Intel chips before other manufacturers in the past.
It is rumored that Calpella will launch in late October. We first
covered it at its announcement at the Intel Developer Forum in China in April last year.
Intel has not yet confirmed Calpella specs, but rumor has it that the first round of sixth generation Clarksfield quad-core chips will include a 1.6GHz Core 2 Quad P1 limited to 6MB of Level 3 cache, a 1.73GHz Core 2 Quad P2, and a 2.0GHZ Core 2 Extreme X packed with 8MB of Level 3 cache.
Note the drop in clock speed -- current Core 2 Duo processors being shipped by Apple range up to 2.93GHz, so evidently the quad-core configuration has forced Intel to scale back on clock speed to retain a reasonable heat output for notebook usage.