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Musings on the Intel Developer Forum

by Dennis Sellers

Desktops

Developments at the Intel Developer Forum offers some hints as to what we can probably expect in future Macs. So let’s look at what the Mactel pro desktops and future portables might offer.

For example, Intel’s next-generation multi-core desktop processors are due the second half of the year. Not coincidentally, the annual Apple Worldwide Developer Conference has been pushed to August from its usual May/June date. I’d bet that means we’ll at least see a preview of shipping Mactel pro desktops. If we’re lucky they’ll actually ship at WWDC or shortly thereafter.

During a keynote presentation at the Intel Developer Forum, Pat Gelsinger, Intel’s senior vice president and general manager of the Digital Enterprise Group, showcased “Conroe,” a dual-core desktop processor based on the company’s new Core microarchitecture that he said can reduce power consumption by 40 percent while delivering greater than 40 percent improvements in computing performance.

Additionally, Gelsinger announced that Conroe will now also be a part of Intel’s Professional Business Platform—codenamed Averill—which will also be available in the second half of 2006. Gelsinger says that Averill will deliver “world–class IT security and manageability capabilities” for businesses through the Conroe dual–core processor along with a new chipset codenamed Broadwater, Intel Virtualization Technology and the second generation of Intel Active Management Technology.

Broadwater replaces all chipsets from Intel. The virtualization technology is designed to let computer users operate separate virtual environments in the same computer. Theoretically, this means you could run separate operation systems in a single computer without additional hardware. (This is possible currently, but involves costly hardware manipulations on the Wintel platform). The Intel Active Management Technology (or iAMT) specification that allows IT managers to remotely manage or repair networked computers transparently to their users, with the goal of saving time and cost of on-site technical assistance.

So here are my predictions for the next rev of Power Macs (which will undergo a name change, I’d guess): they’ll be announced in August, begin shipping September. However, they won’t include Mac OS X 10.5 (“Leopard”). The next major rev of the operating system will be previewed at WWDC 2006, but won’t actually go on sale until early 2007.

Xserves

Let’s look at what may be in store for Mactel versions of the Xserve and Xserve RAID.

Intel plans to ship three new dual-core processors for servers and workstations this year. As for the quad-core processor, the company gave developers their first public view of a running quad-core processor that’s designed for dual-processor servers.

Intel announced that “Sossaman,” an ultra–low–power server processor designed for server blades, storage devices and telecommunications equipment, will begin volume shipments next week, and that “Demsey,” the the first server processor based on the company’s “Bensley” Xeon–based platform—is on track to ship by the end of the month.. The company also announced at the conference that it plans to ship a quad–core processor—codenamed “Kentsfield” or “Clovertown” (I’ve heard it referred to as both)—for high–end desktop computers in early 2007. However, further details of the chip weren’t available.

According to Xbit Laboratories: “The Sossaman is to be based on the dual-core Yonah micro-architecture – which is marketed under Core Duo trademark – and is compatible with current Intel Xeon DP chipsets, such as Intel E7520. Still due to different form-factor, the new Xeon DP chips will require separate infrastructure. The chip is expected to have power consumption of 31W when working at about 2.00GHz, whereas its low-voltage brother is likely to consume approximately 15W when operating at 1.67GHz. By contrast, current dual-core Xeon DP chips at 2.80GHz consume up to 135W in typical conditions.”

The Bensley platform is designed for two-way servers and incorporates the E7520 chipset. It will bring support for Intel’s 1066MHz FSB to the platform, which also comprises the ESB2 South Bridge, “Gilgal” Gigabit Ethernet chip and Sunrise Lake’ I/O processor, from what I understand. The platform will bring Intel’s fully-buffered DIMM memory system to servers, along with support for Intel’s I/O Acceleration Technology, Virtualisation Technology and Active Management Technology. Intel also promised better power management than previous Xeon DP platforms have been able to offer.

Dempsey is a dual-core Xeon processor that will replace the current line of Paxville chips. The processor will also purportedly allow computer designers to make smaller, denser, cooler machines. “They will allow us to move to small form factor, SAS [serial-attached SCSI] drives. That allows us to reduce the volume almost in half, so you can fit more spindles in the machine, whether it’s a blade or a tower,” Paul Miller, vice president of marketing for industry-standard servers and the BladeSystem line at HP told ComputerWorld.

Kentsfield/Clovertown may be produced on 65-nanometer technology, which reduces power draw by 30 percent and increases transistor performance by 20 percent compared to Intel’s own 90-nanometer processors. Or since they’re not due until 2007, they could be produced on 45-nanometer technology, again reducing power draw and boosting transistor performance.

During a keynote presentation at the Intel Developer Forum, Pat Gelsinger, Intel’s senior vice president and general manager of the Digital Enterprise Group, said that Sossaman, said that in the third quarter of 2006, Gelsinger said Intel will update the Bensley platform with Woodcrest, a processor that will further reduce power consumption by 35 percent while delivering greater than 80 percent improvement in computing performance.

Kentsfield/Clovertown is socket -compatible with the Bensley platform and is slated to ship in early 2007. Gelsinger says it will deliver increased processing capacity and is well–suited for multi–threaded applications, such as those used in databases, financial services and supply–chain management.

So what does this mean for Mac users? I think we’ll see Mactel versions of Xserves and Xserve RAIDs using Sossaman and/or Dempsey platform by November. In early 2007, look for these systems and the Mactel pro desktops to transition to Kentsfield/Clovertown processors in some radical new form factors (though the pro Mactel desktops coming later this year won’t have the same design at the Power Mac).

Laptops

Let’s look at what may be in store for future laptops (Mactel ones, of course).

According to a variety of reports (including ones at AppleInsider and TheStreet), Intel plans to put NAND flash memory chips into laptops starting in 2007. This would offer a long-awaited notebook feature: near-instantaneous boot-ups.

NAND (for the “not and” logic gate) is gaining favor with designers of high-end mobile phones that use an operating system and sophisticated applications. NAND memory writes information faster than NOR memory (an older type of flash memory that is generally more expensive than newer NAND flash memory) and can store larger amounts of data in the same sized chip, making it a better product for products such as cell phones that need to process large amounts of data. NAND memory is also used in expansion cards and Apple’s iPod nano and iPod Shuffle music players.

“We need to have devices that boot up very rapidly,” Sean Maloney, the head of Intel’s mobility group, told developers. “The same way you come off a plane and get a cell phone signal immediately.”

In his presentation at the Intel Developers Forum, Maloney demoed the advantages of flash technology in a computer, by booting up two on stage—one with 256MB of flash memory, and the other without. The computer with flash reportedly booted in about half the time and also consumed slightly less power than the non-flash system.

According to Maloney, the technology can scale way beyond a 256MB flash buffer, potentially running a computer’s entire operating system from flash instead of from the hard drive. It’s still uncertain just how much flash would be incorporated into the forthcoming Santa Rosa notebook platform from Intel. What’s more, if—or rather when—flash memory is practical for hard drives, laptops and some desktops (such as Mac minis) will become more svelte and consume less power as no spinning disk would be involved.

The high price of flash memory has always been its biggest weakness, but costs are dropping dramatically. As the technology advances and prices drop, it’s very probable that we could see iMacs, eMacs and PowerBooks move to flash memory. And, in time, perhaps the Power Mac line.

For the relatively near future, I think we’ll see Apple laptops using flash memory at least to some degree in 2007. And that will only be the tip of the iceberg of what’s to come.

WiMax

Let’s look at what may be in store regarding wireless connectivity.

On March 7, Intel demonstrated the technology on which mobile WiMax will be based and said it will deliver a PC Card using the system in the second half of 2006. Described as “Wi-Fi on steroids,” WiMax can transmit data as far as 30 miles (compared to Wi-Fi’s 300-foot radius). It uses the same technology as Wi-Fi, but is much faster.

Mobile WiMax is a wide-area network technology intended to deliver 1 Mbps (megabit per second) or more to devices in motion. It will be based on IEEE 802.16e, a specification approved late last year, and products will be certified by the WiMax Forum industry group. Sean Maloney, Intel executive vice president and general manager of its mobility group, demonstrated the technology during a keynote address at the Intel Developer Forum in San Francisco, using an 802.16e PC Card in a notebook based on Intel’s Napa platform. The system delivered about 2 Mbps of throughput.

WiMax can be used in any of a broad range of frequency bands, and different bands are expected to be used in different regions, in most cases by carriers who have licensed the spectrum. The PC Card coming this year will use the 2.3GHz-to-2.5GHz band, which Maloney said is being examined for WiMax in Asia. In the U.S., Sprint Nextel Corp. holds a large number of licenses for spectrum around the 2.5GHz band and ClearWire Corp. already offers a mobile wireless broadband service in that frequency range in some areas.

Maloney also showed off a prototype chipset for both WiMax and Wi-Fi, capable of shifting among frequencies in the 2.3GHz to 2.5GHz band, the 3.5GHz band and the entire 5GHz band,. Those ranges encompass the 2.4GHz and 5.8GHz bands that are used for 802.11a/b/g Wi-Fi wireless LANs, as well as the upcoming high-speed 802.11n Wi-Fi specification, he said. Within about three years, Intel expects Wi-Fi and WiMax to merge onto one chipset, Maloney added.

Within three years, Intel plans to have WiMax chips in most laptops, much as it has done with Wi-Fi chips. Long before then Apple will have moved all its new hardware to Intel chips, so the possibility of WiMax-enabled iBooks (or whatever the Mactel version will be dubbed) and MacBook Pros seems like a very good bet. As for WiMax-capable desktops, they’re also possible.

Thoughts? Write me at dsellers@macsimumnews.com