David Flynn29 November 2009, 6:00 PM
Tests of Intel’s unreleased ‘Gulftown’ six-core 32nm CPU indicate a fire-breathing processor which could find its way into high-end desktops such as the next-gen Mac Pro.
Complete this series: 3, 5, 7... If you said ‘9’, then you’re following the same logic which tips Intel’s forthcoming ‘Gulftown’ processor to debut as the Core i9.
Intel’s made no such announcements, of course – and it’s sticking to its guns that the Core i3, i5 and i7 triple play represents an elegant good-better-best strategy for consumers. That much we agree with.
Gulftown changes the game because it hails from the Xeon family – Intel’s musclebound processor line intended for servers and workstation-class desktops. It’s rarely seen in anything resembling the consumer space apart from Apple’s Mac Pro towers, which currently employ Xeon quad-core chips in single CPU and twin CPU models.
While these are built on the 45nm Nehalem architecture, Gulftown shifts to the 32nm Westmere platform and is expected to debut in early 2010 alongside the 32nm dual-core Arrandale and Clarkdale mobile processors.
But with six hyperthreaded cores and 12MB of shared L3 cache, Gulftown runs rings around today’s Xeon processors.
This weekend Polish website
PCLab published benchmarks for a sample of the six-engine silicon. The article was quickly pulled down following a quick call to PCLab by Intel, but the gist of what you missed is impressive.
PCLab found the six-core superslab was not only 50% faster than a quad-core Xeon running at the same clock speed, it also drew half as much power when sitting idle mode and 10% less under a full load.
Apple is rumoured to be looking at Gulftown for the 2010 refresh of it mighty Mac Pro desktops. This is not just to keep the company’s heavy-hitting flagship on the leading edge of the tech envelope – it would also extend the gap between the Mac Pro and the iMac, given that the later now sports Intel’s Core i7 powerplant.