Intel names future platform "Charlie"

WHILE MOST of the buzz at Intel's Spring Analyst conference was generated by Paul Otellini's will to restructure the company, there were afternoon presentations with more future data.

These, as far as we can tell, weren't web cast, but the slides were available, so we had a dekko at them today.

First off was Sean Maloney, GM of Intel's notebook group, who majored on Merom and future technologies. Some of this we already know about, but while we've been aware of Santa Rosa for some time, Maloney showed a slide which includes platforms know as "Alpha", "Baker" and "Charlie".

Sure - these stand for A, B and C, but we'd prefer to think Alpha was named after DEC's chip, Baker was named after AMD Euro marketing manager Richard Baker, while "Charlie" is named after Charlie Demerjian. Fanciful, perhaps.

ABC are ever smaller designs until we get to the time when our little light notebook is always on, everywhere, and fitted with a global positioning gizmo, so we won't carry it around with us in case our bosses catch us in the pub.

Maloney also said that there were over 175 trials of WiMAX in progress, and 40 networks with confirmed Intel design wins.

Next up was Brit Don MacDonald, who is Mr Sir Viiv. He has a harder task than most - convincing us all that Viiv will be everywhere, a bit like the Everywhere Girl. The slide below is interesting, because it drags Charlie Demerjian into the picture again. Item five is the headline about Viiv Instant On. We don't know what Don had to say about this.

But perhaps the next slide (unpictured) gives a clue - because this says that Instant On/Off is done with your remote control on Intel Viiv, while it's "not fully supported" with non Intel platforms. Unless you turn the screen off and leave the PC running of course.

Lastly, Intel's Tom Kilroy was on to tell us about the 1333MHz dual independent high speed buses using FB-DIMMs. In the second half of this year, Intel will introduce the Tulsa with 16MB of shared on die cache.

Kilroy also compared the Woodcrest with the current generation of AMD Opterons. We'd been promised data about future AMD chips, but while that might have been given verbally, no slides appear to be available.

Kilroy closed by saying Intel is poised to gain market segment share (MSS) with its new server lineup. Interesting times ahead. µ

See Also
Intel doth protest too much, we thinks
Intel Woodcrest to ship in June, Conroe July, Merom August
Intel Pro Platform named and discovered