Intel's Haswell Architecture Analyzed: Building a New PC and a New Intel
by Anand Lal Shimpi on October 5, 2012 2:45 AM ESTPlatform Retargeting
Since the introduction of Conroe/Merom back in 2006 Intel has been prioritizing notebooks for the majority of its processor designs. The TDP target for these architectures was set around 35 - 45W. Higher and lower TDPs were hit by binning and scaling voltage. The rule of thumb is a single architecture can efficiently cover an order of magnitude of TDPs. In the case of these architectures we saw them scale all the way up to 130W and all the way down to 17W.
In the middle of 2011 Intel announced its Ultrabook initiative, and at the same time mentioned that Haswell would shift Intel's notebook design target from 35 - 45W down to 10 - 20W.
At the time I didn't think too much about the new design target, but everything makes a lot more sense now. This isn't a "simple" architectural shift, it's a complete rethinking of how Intel approaches platform design. More importantly than Haswell's 10 - 20W design point, is the new expanded SoC design target. I'll get to the second part shortly.
Platform Power
There will be four client focused categories of Haswell, and I can only talk about three of them now. There are the standard voltage desktop parts, the mobile parts and the ultra-mobile parts: Haswell, Haswell M and Haswell U. There's a fourth category of Haswell that may happen but a lot is still up in the air on that line.
Of the three that Intel is talking about now, the first two (Haswell/Haswell M) don't do anything revolutionary on the platform power side. Intel is promising around a 20% reduction in platform power compared to Sandy Bridge, but not the order of magnitude improvement it promised at IDF. These platforms are still two-chip solutions with the SoC and a secondary IO chip similar to what we have today with Ivy Bridge + PCH.
It's the Haswell U/ULT parts that brings about the dramatic change. These will be a single chip solution, with part of the voltage regulation typically found on motherboards moved onto the chip's package instead. There will still be some VR components on the motherboard as far as I can tell, it's the specifics that are lacking at this point (which seems to be much of the theme of this year's IDF).
Seven years ago Intel first demonstrated working silicon with an on-chip North Bridge (now commonplace) and on-package CMOS voltage regulation:
The benefits were two-fold: 1) Intel could manage fine grained voltage regulation with very fast transition times and 2) a tangible reduction in board component count.
2005 - A prototype motherboard using the technology. Note the lack of voltage regulators on the motherboard and the missing GMCH (North Bridge) chip.
The second benefit is very easy to understand from a mobile perspective. Fewer components on a motherboard means smaller form factors and/or more room for other things (e.g. larger battery volume via a reduction in PCB size).
The first benefit made a lot of sense at the time when Intel introduced it, but it makes even more sense when you consider the most dramatic change to Haswell: support for S0ix active idle.
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Magik_Breezy - Sunday, October 14, 2012 - link
Probably real customer support without paying an extra $200Spunjji - Thursday, October 18, 2012 - link
Yawn.Spunjji - Thursday, October 18, 2012 - link
The bit that aggravates me the most is that even with this lavishing of review pages, the actual comparison of Apple products to competitors tends to lack (particularly with the Macbook article). This is understandable under some circumstances (iPhone battery life - new test, small selection of data points) but not for others.Arbee - Friday, October 5, 2012 - link
I'm not really seeing any of that. AT's Android and Windows Phone reviews are just as in-depth and complementary where due as their Apple ones. AFAIK both Anand's and Brian's daily-driver phones aren't iPhones, even. They care about the tech, not who it comes from. It just happens that Apple is often the original source of new and interesting things in that space. At this exact moment they're the only people shipping something new and interesting. When the Nokia 920 launches, I'm confident Anand and Brian will be ready with a 15+ page review and discussion of anything novel on the podcast, and when Winter CES brings us Tegra 4 and other Android news, I expect to see eye-glazing levels of detail here at AT.(As an aside, I smiled at how closely DPReview's discussion of the alleged "purple haze" problem tracked Brian's rant on the podcast - clearly both writers know what they're talking about, which can be a rare quantity in tech journalism).
VivekGowri - Saturday, October 6, 2012 - link
I think Anand's daily driver is an iPhone, but he frequently carries the latest Android/WP device on the side. Brian and myself end up daily driving like a half dozen phones a month, depending on what shows up at our doorstep.Zink - Saturday, October 6, 2012 - link
"iPad 3 form factor" was used because all of the other tablets have 25Wh batteries and draw about 5W max. The A5X iPad and it's giant 42.5Wh battery on the other hand can put out over 10W of heat which is the power envelope where Intel might target a Haswell SOC.amdwilliam1985 - Monday, October 8, 2012 - link
I totally agree with you on the Apple part. That's the biggest pullback on reading Anand writings. Too much Apple praising.I used to be an Apple fan, but recently they're becoming the biggest jerks in the technology industry. The human/ethical part of in me hates them so much, that I won't buy anything that has a Apple logo on it.
I gave away my iPad 2, switched to Samsung Galaxy S phones, and using my HP windows 7 laptop over the 2011 MBA.
-say NO to bully, say NO to Apple.
xaml - Thursday, May 23, 2013 - link
Number of problems solved with this approach: NO.dartox - Tuesday, November 27, 2012 - link
Probably because most people know about how large an iPad is - if he said "tablet" form factor that's ambigious.. and if he said "Motorola XOOM" form factor not as many people are familiar with the size.Paer0 - Friday, October 5, 2012 - link
Yes... Macs are well engineered and deliver a solid performance across board.