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June 6, 2009 12:31 PM PDT

Intel 'Braidwood' chip targets snappier software

by Brooke Crothers
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Intel appears ready to take another crack at flash memory-based acceleration--this time offering it with future chipsets.

Intel Braidwood technology is based on a flash memory module

Intel Braidwood technology is based on a flash memory module.

(Credit: Intel)

"Braidwood is a flash memory technology that provides faster boot-up time, faster application launch, and a snappier, more responsive system," said Rob Crooke, vice president and general manager of Intel's Business Client Group, speaking during a presentation streamed over the Web from the Computex conference in Taipei, Taiwan, earlier this week.

Braidwood will be offered with the future "5 Series" chipset family--which is Intel's first single-chip chipset--and the future "Clarkdale" processor (see discussion below).

The architecture accelerates I/O (input/output) accesses by saving that data to flash memory, according to Crooke. In a demonstration at Computex, Crooke showed Braidwood "caching the I/O...And then, when it launches that application again, it happens very quickly," he said.

Intel's first stab at technology analogous to Braidwood came in 2006. That product was code-named Robson and eventually branded as Turbo Memory. But it only received lukewarm reviews and was never adopted widely.

"Clarkdale," a Nehalem-based processor, will be offered with Braidwood, according to Intel documentation released at Computex. Clarkdale will integrate graphics silicon into the same package as the main processor. It is on track to begin production in the fourth quarter of this year--with systems available in 2010--and is built on Intel's second-generation 32-nanometer process technology. Clarkdale will be offered with the Intel 5 Series chipset.

On another front, Crooke also talked about the mainstreaming of Intel's Nehalem Core i7 desktop chips, which are currently limited to high-end enthusiast systems. Due later this year, the "Lynnfield" processor is a new four-core, eight-thread processor that will be paired with the P55 Express chipset. Threads essentially double the number of tasks a processor can perform.

Users can expect 40 percent better performance on widely used SPECint benchmarks with the Lynnfield-based platform, compared with last year's mainstream Core Q9650 processor-based technology, Crooke said.

Brooke Crothers has been an editor at large at CNET News, an analyst at IDC Japan, and an editor at The Asian Wall Street Journal Weekly, among other endeavors, including co-manager of an after-school math-and-reading center. He writes for the CNET Blog Network and is not a current employee of CNET. Disclosure.
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by warpsix June 6, 2009 2:53 PM PDT
Lets put the operating system on a matching stick
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by 21st Hermit June 6, 2009 3:03 PM PDT
I'd buy one of those OS sticks.
by 21st Hermit June 6, 2009 2:54 PM PDT
Awesome!!!! I've had my eye on Clarkdale for ~6-months and Braidwood just makes it that much better. All should fit nicely on a mini-ITX MB and soup-up my recent Atom 330 power sipper. I expect Clarkdale to double or triple the Atom's performance and use less power all the while.
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by slickuser June 6, 2009 8:51 PM PDT
Looks like Arab Micro Devices just can't keep up with Intel releasing something
every quarter.
Reply to this comment
by timber2005 June 6, 2009 9:14 PM PDT
Oh?
AMD demoed the first DirectX 11 GPU...
AMD just released a 6-core CPU
by slickuser June 6, 2009 10:58 PM PDT
dude, Intel doesn't make discrete GPU yet. And, AMD is late with 6 core. Intel Dunnington is a 6 core CPU released
in 2008
by tipoo_ June 7, 2009 9:02 AM PDT
Dude, you gotta respect AMD. Intel's advertising budget alone is larger than AMD's entire business, yet AMD remains competitive to this day. So what if a 10x larger company releases products more often?


Besides, AMD will be releasing a 12 core CPU when Intel is scheduled to release their 8-core.
by slickuser June 7, 2009 9:50 AM PDT
AMD remains competitive? thats funny...
by pithenumber June 7, 2009 10:04 AM PDT
@slickuser
Phenom II 720 vs E8400, AMD wins
Radeon HD 3200 vs GMA X4500, AMD wins
the high end server market is still populated by mainly AMD systems
The worlds fastest supercomputer uses Opty+POWER

AMD loses in many categories like the performance crown for desktop processors, or in the mobile arena
but is AMD still competitive? Hell yeah
@tipoo_
Intel already has their 8 core out
beats the crap out of current Opty's I think, we'll just have to wait for the 12 core Opterons to come out to see if Intel will get the high end server market
by codynews June 7, 2009 1:47 PM PDT
Intel has been way ahead since Harpertown came to smack the Opterons around.
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by pithenumber June 7, 2009 3:06 PM PDT
way ahead in the workstation and low end server space you mean

until the Nehalem EX came about, every Xeon added to a server reduced the bandwidth instead of increasing it like the Opterons, when you have 8 processors in a server, this really made a difference
by luke_marsh June 8, 2009 5:11 AM PDT
Yep That would run a Emulation,git Optimisation, and direct hardware access OS machine runer style boot loader very fast indeed but other than that would only be very marginal to using A SSD as your system drive in the first place so the degree interest in this technology would indeed be dependent on progress in the development of Root kernels for the purpose of Virtualisation and the ability to run optimised boots of mostly not visualised direct running machines from boot. Anyway seeming as we are talking about add other memory slots on the main board other than standard DRAM hows about A chip set that allows for a primary SRAM channel to Complement the slower DRAM Channels.
Put all the best of these words together add a high degree of cores and transputational capabilities + some freshly fabricated Coolant equipment and just how fast might that Frame rate of Crises fly.
Oh year!!
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by luke_marsh June 8, 2009 5:50 AM PDT
The next Dilemma.
If indeed Intel could produce small chip-sets that fit inside SD-IO style units offering a high degree of Carbon Nano tube advantages in their Layout how then would.
The main board the chip-sets are mounted into cope with the better IO capabilities and how would would you fabricate suitable Transistor types for such Integrated Circuitry.
One option for the main board to work Optically via the use of Gates that cheaply switch well from electrical signals to optical ones over a fiber bus.
And the Option for the Transistor types is to use more sophisticated energy and network core management at first to compensate for any issues such a technological transition might incur.

What Intel is not going to be able to do is Quickly switch over to the option of building the whole thing In a Dynamic Energy Efficient Layered All carbon Nano Tube form straight of the first production run when moving down from their future 22 nm Fabrication types.

This will probably mean that Intel will indeed have to first use more Cumbersome types of Dynamically layered designs first at low degrees of shrink in terms of gate sizes (probably after 22nm will be more like 18.23nm) That make initial uses of carbon Nano tubing first as opposed to total Cabon .
This means that intel will indeed be offering more Elite options for the full market as to recoup the Investment costs needed for design and fabrication evolution of the further steps and yes that you will probably be talking about gate sizes in scales that work to two decimal places like 18.23nm as opposed to 18nm and will be focusing more on the amount of transistors of a complete mount as opposed to how many are packed on a couple layers on the die surface considering the way in which the layering is dynamic will indicate how well the chip can do with out problems.

So all in all it looks like indeed Intel will right now be looking to offer you as much as you want without virtually any Technological restrictions and to bode well for future development costs when moving past more standard fabrication processes.
Yes Intel want now to sell you more chips than ever before and what you are seeing is just the beginning. So indeed I do want to play old classic games on my new washing machine and hook in my microwave so that i can get the 3D experience on my kitchen screen.
Mark my words indeed I do and I don't think Microsofts current approach would sell the most intel ect chips for the coming manufacturing needs That I don't.
Hey If I'm Not mistaken didn't Intel start by making SRAM chips well Intel I want!!! some yes I do and I want that washing machine + that new set of robot toys and wall painters ect ect so lets get down to business.
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About Nanotech - The Circuits Blog

Brooke Crothers was formerly editor-at-large at CNET News.com, an analyst at IDC (International Data Corp.) Japan, and an editor at The Asian Wall Street Journal Weekly (The Wall Street Journal, Dow Jones), among other endeavors, including a recent hiatus from the tech industry when he co-managed an after-school math and reading center. Nanotech covers computer chip technology and how it defines the computing experience. He is a member of the CNET Blog Network, and is not an employee of CNET. Disclosure.

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