Intel's 11th Gen line is.... interesting

 

Architecture day 2020 came and passed and I have some thoughts about intel's 11th gen lineup.  

Let's get into it. 

 

Intel has decided to bundle their 11th gen flagship chipsets into "Tiger Lake", intel has fallen behind in nanometers, flops, and power per watt with the likes of AMD and Apple silicon eating their lunch. Intel is gearing up to fight back with 11th Gen, so I'll break down their strategy bit by bit and analyze afterwards.  

Tiger lake will be powered by brand new "Willow cove" architecture that's said to be an improvement over the "Sunny cove" that we had for 10th gen. The main improvement is the new "Super-Fin" transistor that intel claims to be able to deliver a generational leap in processors. Tiger lake will increase power-per-watt efficiency from 10th gen, this means that the low-end can keep their efficiency but gain more speed and that the high-end can go beyond their normal frequency and push higher with more power. 11th Gen will also debut Thunderbolt 4, USB 4, DDR5 RAM, and PCIe gen 4.0.   

Image credit: The Verge

Image credit: The verge

The next part of the story is the Xe graphics.

Intel is releasing the new, Xe graphics into the world with 11th 

gen and Tiger Lake, offering a 50% increase over the Gen11 graphics included with 10th gen. The Xe graphics continue with the narrative of 11th gen: more speed, less power consumption. The Xe 

lineup has 4 tiers, LP for mainstream products and integrated chipsets, HPG for midrange and enthusiasts, HP for data centers/Ai, and HPC for Scientists and scientific matters. 

Image credit: The Verge

Xe is a huge leap over iris+ and just so much better than anything intel has ever done, most computers rely on integrated GPU's so I appreciate intel's reinvestment into Graphics.  Intel might have an edge if Xe can beat AMd's Vega or Radeon integrated and discrete. 

The Verge reports: "Xe-LP also promises better performance for creators and display performance, with support for up to 8K UHD with HDR10 and Dolby vision panels, up to 360Hz refresh rates, and up to two times the performance for encoding and decoding video."

Xe is shaping up to be a huge win for intel and for everyone else.

 With 11th gen Tiger Lake intel is basically trying to cover up their 7nm blunders but if it works, I'm fine with that too. Nothing is the same as 7nm and intel simply can't keep throwing cores or transistors at the problem. Intel needed a win, but I don't think Super-Fin is the long-term answer to their shortcomings; but hey, a band-aid is better than nothing. Especially considering how wounded intel is right now; intel is staving off defeat...for now.  

 

 

On the flipside are the Xe Graphics that might just be a victory for intel. The lower end Xe are better than the highest end iris+ graphics so far and that's really saying something. I don't think intel will be able to aspire to all 4 tiers of their plan for Xe but if they can reach the potential of the Lp tier it can be transformative in mid-range laptops that rely on integrated graphics. 

 

11th Gen Tiger lake is all we've been able to see but 2021 has Golden Cove and Alder lake coming out; I'm not sure about Golden cove but Alder lake is an evolution of Lakefield so I'm excited to see if intel can actually make a good hybrid chipset. I'm not saying Lakefield was not good, but it wasn't the best they could do and compared to ARM it was not good enough, but Alder lake might change that. 

 

Image credit: The Verge

I do want intel to be on notice that AMD's 5th Gen Ryzen and Navi CPU's and GPU's are coming out next year (at least the Ryzen should although they could be delayed due to covid-19). AMD isn't stuck at 10nm, they might leap to 5nm or stay at 7nm but not matter what their gaining on intel's dominance and smoking them in pure performance with 4th gen. 5th gen will be an enhancement that could put intel to shame; so, shape up intel and may the best company win.