Computex Half-a-World Away - Part 1: Intel Roadmaps Revealed

Centrino Prospers

The market has never seen such a powerful launch in the mobile sector as Intel's Centrino; shortly after the mobile platform's launch, we are already seeing exciting solutions from all of the major manufacturers. A good part of this article itself was written on a Centrino based mobile platform, there's very little doubt that Centrino (or more appropriately, Pentium-M and the Odem chipset) is the perfect choice for all non-desktop replacement laptops.

Unforuntately, Centrino solutions are not cheap these days (neither are most laptops for that matter) and the question that is often brought up is - when will today's Centrino solutions be obsolete?

Unlike the original Pentium 4, the next Pentium-M won't be such a drastic departure from the current design. With that said, the improvements you can expect from Dothan (Banias'successor) are not insignificant. As we've mentioned countless times before, Dothan will be the first 90nm processor for the mobile market. Interestingly enough, Intel plans on introducing Dothan around the same time as Prescott - meaning we'll be seeing two 90nm introductions in Q4 of this year. There have been a number of times where Intel has debuted a smaller manufacturing process on the mobile side first, before transitioning their desktop parts; with both Prescott and Dothan due out in the 4th quarter, which one comes first is a toss up.

As we mentioned in our Pentium-M (Banias) microarchitecture article, Intel's Israel design team essentially built-in clock speed walls into the processor's architecture. For more information on why this was done be sure to read our review of the CPU, but as a quick recap, in order to minimize the amount of power used Intel's designers had to design the Pentium-M processor in such a way that the CPU would not be able to ramp in clock frequency all that well. The only hope for increasing clock frequency significantly on the Pentium-M, without significant architecture enhancements, would be to manufacture the processor on smaller, faster transistors. In the case of Dothan, using Intel's 90nm process will give the processor some extra frequency headroom. How much headroom?

Currently, the Banias processor is available in speeds of up to 1.60GHz, however in Q3 of this year Intel will introduce a 1.70GHz Pentium-M processor. This won't be the processor to upgrade to, and we'll explain why in a moment. In the same quarter Intel will extend the Low-Volt and Ultra Low-Volt Pentium-M lines to include 1.20GHz and 1.0GHz parts respectively. The reason you won't want to consider any of these processors is because in the next quarter, Q4 '03, Intel will finally introduce Dothan - the 90nm Pentium-M processor with a full 2MB on-die L2 cache.

Dothan will still feature the same 400MHz FSB (it won't really need a 533MHz or faster FSB until the processor starts to ramp well above 2GHz) and will feature some minor architecture enhancements but its biggest feature will be the 2MB on-die L2 cache. Dothan will be introduced at 1.80GHz and we're assuming based on Intel's roadmap, in relatively low quantities. If you're planning a Centrino notebook upgrade in the 2nd half of this year, then you may want to try and wait for Dothan at 1.80GHz. If you must have something sooner, then rest assured that you won't be buying anything obsolete for this year as the processor will top out at 1.80GHz.

In the first half of 2004 we will begin to see Dothan ramp up with 1.90GHz and 2.0GHz versions. We will also see the first Low-Volt and Ultra Low-Volt Dothan processors in the first half, weighing in at 1.30GHz and 1.0GHz respectively. In Q2 '04 we will see 1.10GHz and faster ULV Dothan processors.

Along with Dothan's introduction, Intel will also be bringing a new Wireless LAN chip to market - the Intel PRO/Wireless 2100A. The 2100A will support both 802.11a and 802.11b wireless LAN standards. As you will remember from our Centrino coverage, in order for a manufacturer to use the "Centrino" name they must use Intel's Pentium-M processor, 855 chipset, and PRO/Wireless LAN; unfortunately, Intel currently has no 802.11a solution so if a manufacturer wants to have 802.11a support in their Centrino solution they're out of luck. Instead, manufacturers have been using other 802.11a solutions and resorted to calling their notebooks Pentium-M based solutions, which adds to an already confusing market.

The introduction of an Intel 802.11a solution will definitely help, but the high price Intel is charging for their 802.11x chips will guarantee that manufacturers will continue to make both Centrino and simple Pentium-M based solutions. Intel is planning on pricing the PRO/Wireless 2100A at an astounding $65, that's almost 45% more than their PRO/Wireless 2100 is going for (in 1,000 unit quantities). Of course, Intel will have their usual "rebates" in place to encourage manufacturers to support the Centrino platform instead of using their own wireless solutions combined with a Pentium-M processor.

The beginning of 2004 will see the introduction of an 802.11g PRO/Wireless solution from Intel, although that could happen anytime during the 1st half of next year depending on finalization of the 802.11g spec.

Intel's 855GM chipset will receive a refresh to coincide with Dothan's launch with the 855GME. It is unclear what the enhancements will be and it's also interesting that there's no mention of an 'E' successor to the 855PM, could the improvements only be graphics related (the 855GM chipset features integrated graphics)?