Tag: CPU

Unified Core: Breakthrough Change Is Coming To Intel CPUs

Processors, News | | Jan Olšan

Since 2021 Intel has been using a hybrid CPU architecture with big and little cores (starting with 12th-gen Core CPUs, though it had already been tried a year and a half earlier in the Lakefield SoC). However, the little “E-Cores” derived from former Atom SoC are quite unpopular among some. Now, a radical change is emerging on the horizon—instead of maintaining two completely different core architectures, Intel is moving to a single one. Read more “Unified Core: Breakthrough Change Is Coming To Intel CPUs” »

DLSS 4.5 brings 6× frame generation and better image quality

Graphics, News, Technology | | Jan Olšan

Last night, Nvidia held their keynote ahead of CES 2026, which—as usually—only focused on AI, robotics and large enterprises market rather than consumer PCs and devices. Even so, the company does have something new for gamers.  The company is introducing a new generation of their AI-based game rendering—DLSS 4.5. It places even greater emphasis on interpolated frame generation, but improvements go beyond that as well. Read more “DLSS 4.5 brings 6× frame generation and better image quality” »

Cinebench 2026

Cinebench 2026 is here: New benchmark especially suited to Ryzen

News, Processors, Software | | Jan Olšan

Perhaps the most popular benchmark in reviews and CPU performance measurements is Cinebench, which simulates 3D rendering in Maxon’s professional Cinema 4D software and can be used as a metrics for comparing CPUs. Since version R23, it also benchmarks Apple Arm processors. Maxon has now released a new version, Cinebench 2026, which works better with the latest processors and GPUs and also includes an interesting new mode. Read more “Cinebench 2026 is here: New benchmark especially suited to Ryzen” »

Intel Nova Lake w/o AVX10 and APX? No mention in documents

News, Processors | | Jan Olšan

We previously reported that Intel’s code in the openDNN project hinted at Intel Core Ultra 400 processors codenamed Nova Lake supporting the AVX10 and AVX-512 instructions for the first time—the modern 512-bit SIMD extension useful for AI, multimedia, and demanding computations. Simultaneously, the cores of these CPUs were supposed to gain the APX extension. However, information from Intel has now cast doubt on both. Read more “Intel Nova Lake w/o AVX10 and APX? No mention in documents” »

Intel and AMD agree on future of x86 CPUs: AMX and RAM tagging

Processors, News | | Jan Olšan

AMD and Intel announced a surprising rapprochement a year ago, when both companies, together with PC manufacturers and big software players, founded a consortium to oversee the future development of x86 CPUs and their platform. Faced with the growing threat from Arm processors (which was certainly a motivation), this has proved a good choice and will help push modern extensions for the traditional PC processor platform. Read more “Intel and AMD agree on future of x86 CPUs: AMX and RAM tagging” »

Nvidia and Intel team up: x86 CPUs with built-in GeForce GPUs

Graphics, News, Processors | | Jan Olšan

Last week brought a sensational piece of news. Ever since AMD acquired GPU maker ATi almost twenty years ago, people have speculated whether Intel and Nvidia might one day strike a similar alliance. It seems that time has finally come, though only now that Intel is in trouble and has to push its pride aside. The two companies announced not a merger, but a far-reaching partnership. It will be interesting to watch where this leads. Read more “Nvidia and Intel team up: x86 CPUs with built-in GeForce GPUs” »

Intel reverses course: Hyper-Threading returns to CPUs

Processors, News | | Jan Olšan

We’ve already written about the painful measures Intel is implementing get out of the deep red numbers it sunk into due to maintaining and building its own chip fabs (because as a “fabless” player, Intel would be profitable). Among them, however, is one unexpected development: Intel processors are set to reintroduce Hyper-Threading technology for processing multiple threads simultaneously. And this is actually quite peculiar… Read more “Intel reverses course: Hyper-Threading returns to CPUs” »

Intel cancels x86S, effort to clean up x86 CPUs legacy cruft

News, Processors | | Jan Olšan

In fall, we reported here that Intel’s Panther Cove CPU architecture coming in two years (not in Panther Lake CPUs though) reportedly adopts an upgrade to the x86 instruction set labeled APX and also the AVX10 SIMD instructions, which are a compromise between AVX-512 and AVX2 designed for hybrid processors. However, the x86S architecture, the third of these awaited ISA innovations, will not be coming. It has in fact been cancelled. Read more “Intel cancels x86S, effort to clean up x86 CPUs legacy cruft” »

APX and AVX10 in two years? Intel to introduce them in Nova Lake

News, Processors, Technology | | Jan Olšan

Last year, Intel unveiled plans for improving the x86 platform and instruction set, on which virtually all PC CPUs (from Intel, AMD, China’s Zhaoxin) are based: The APX extension, which breaks through the limitations in the number of registers (somewhat mitigating ARM’s advantage), and AVX10, which is the successor or evolution of AVX-512. For a long time it was unclear when these innovations would ship, but now we finally know. Read more “APX and AVX10 in two years? Intel to introduce them in Nova Lake” »

Zen 5: AMD’s biggest innovation since first Zen [expanded deep dive]

Analysis, Processors | | Jan Olšan

It’s roughly two weeks until AMD releases processors with the new Zen 5 architecture. This week, we finally got proper details on these CPUs’ architecture, which AMD revealed at the Tech Day event. So, we can now break down the changes the company has made to the core, compared to Zen 4 – and they’re pretty extensive, probably more so than they seemed in June. And AMD also reiterated its promise of a 16% increase in IPC for these CPUs. Read more “Zen 5: AMD’s biggest innovation since first Zen [expanded deep dive]” »

Leak gives a peek at the clock speed of Intel Arrow Lake CPUs

News, Processors | | Jan Olšan

Last week, we covered the clock speeds of Zen 5 Ryzen 9000 CPUs. Now another information leak uncovered what clock speeds possibly reached by the Arrow Lake processors from Intel. This is an important piece of the puzzle, as we already know what the IPC of their cores will be, but the clock speeds were a big unknown, given how the new wider architecture and TSMC’s 3nm node could have drastically lowered them. And with that, the performance. Read more “Leak gives a peek at the clock speed of Intel Arrow Lake CPUs” »

Oryon, the Nuvia ARM core of Snapdragon X: Architecture analysis

Analysis, News, Processors | | Jan Olšan

At Computex 2024, Intel introduced the new Lion Cove and Skymont architectures, which we covered in detail. AMD also shared a peek at their competing Zen 5 core, but with little detail, so we’ll have to wait with our analysis of the architecture. But there’s a new ARM-based challenger entering the fray – the Snapdragon X Elite currently coming to laptops. And Qualcomm has now also finally teased its “Nuvia” Oryon architecture. Read more “Oryon, the Nuvia ARM core of Snapdragon X: Architecture analysis” »

Skymont architecture analysed: Intel little core outgrows the big?

Analysis, News, Processors | | Jan Olšan

Intel unveiled their next-gen Lunar Lake mobile processor at Computex 2024. It will power Copilot+ PCs with its NPU and is supposed to be very power efficient, but it’s extremely interesting mainly because of the new CPU architectures, which will power future Arrow Lake desktop CPUs. Ironically, the star of this generation might actually be the little efficient E-Core accompanying the big P-Cores. Its architecture seems to have taken a giant leap. Read more “Skymont architecture analysed: Intel little core outgrows the big?” »

Intel’s new P-Core: Lion Cove is the biggest change since Nehalem

Analysis, News, Processors | | Jan Olšan

Intel revealed its next-gen Lunar Lake mobile processor at Computex 2024, to be released this summer. It will power Copilot+ PCs with its fast NPU and is supposed to be highly power efficient, but it’s also extremely interesting because its new CPU architectures are also coming to future Arrow Lake desktop CPUs. First up, we’ll take a look at the big P-Core architecture, which represents the biggest changes in many years. Read more “Intel’s new P-Core: Lion Cove is the biggest change since Nehalem” »

Ryzen 9000 is here. Zen 5 architecture, IPC and model specs

News, Processors | | Ľubomír Samák

After a long wait, it’s here. During its presentation at Computex 2024, AMD unveiled the Ryzen 9000 desktop CPUs, the first of the generation of CPUs based on the Zen 5 architecture. We now have confirmed specifications and also the IPC of this architecture (the officially stated value, at least). According to AMD, these are the fastest “consumer PC” processors of today, and the company has already shown the first performance claims. Read more “Ryzen 9000 is here. Zen 5 architecture, IPC and model specs” »

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