Conroe and Merom -->> "Intel Core 2"

nixgeek

nixgeek

Mac of the SubGenius! :-)
Looks like Conroe and Merom have officially been named:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060507/tc_nm/intel_core_dc_1

Don't know how interesting "Core 2 Duo" is going to be as a name for Conroe and Merom, but nonetheless it looks like we can expect them soon. I'm just hoping Intel isn't releasing them too early before they're actually ready because of the competition from AMD.

Hoping for this on the upcoming major revision of the MacBook Pro. Or might we see this generation of the Intel Core series in the upcoming MacBook on Tuesday??? ;)
 
One of the posters on that site said:
badlyreckless said:
The new processor name builds on the Core brand, which was introduced with the current "Core Duo" mobile processor generation in January of this year. According to the company "Core 2" is a sign for a second generation of "Core" technology, which may be a bit confusing, as the current "Core Solo" and "Core Duo" processors are built on technology that has been carried over from previous "Pentium M" processors and the new "Core 2" generation is built on a completely new architecture (which is named "Core" as well.)
Click to expand...
This has confused me from the get-go, as someone who wasn't following Intel's developments with a microscope for the past year or two.


I was wondering what the names of the new chips would be. "2 Duo" does seem a bit silly, but...eh. It's clear enough, and that's what's important.

But "Core 2 Extreme" is far from clear. I vote to have the word "extreme" banished permanently from the marketing vocabulary. Pleeeease. (I'm lookin' at you, Apple!)

Naming aside, everything seems to be going according to expectations. Good news.
 
Actually, the name of the processors are "Core" since it's the "core" of the computer. The name for Conroe and Merom will be "Core 2" since it's thenext revision from the original "Core" which was known as Yonah (and is currently found on the Intel Macs). The "Duo" and "Solo" refer to the dual-core and single-core processors, respectively.

The reason they are calling it "Core" is because Intel is moving more towards branding of the whole logic board system. For example, "Centrino Duo" is the name for the combination of the Intel Core Duo processor, the Intel motherboard chipset, and the Intel PRO wireless NIC. I also remember reading a story about Intel bringing back the "Pentium" name but instead of it identifying the processor itself, the "Pentium" name will be used to identify the platform for desktops (Conroe-based Intel Core 2 Duo CPU, Intel motherboard chipset, and probably some other component that belongs to Intel) just like "Centrino" is the name to identify the platform used in laptops (Merom-based Intel Core 2 Duo, Intel motherboard chipset, Intel PRO wireless).
 
Like I just mentioned here on macnews.net.tc, I find there's a nice similarity to OS 10 10. You know, the eks, sorry, "10" in Mac OS X is a 10, too, according to Jobs. So you can soon have OS 10 10.4 running on a Core 2 2. :)
 
I wish Intel could come up with better names if you ask me. AMD has Opteron and Athlon, IBM has POWER, Intel has Core 2 Duo...blegh.

The only thing exciting to me about this is that the naming means its closer to being released. :p
 
Why names, anyway... It's a CPU. "68030" was fine with me. So was "604e" or "970FX". Why can't this just be the "80986b" or something? Then we would _not_ talk about its naming scheme so much, but rather just look forward to it, as nixgeek mentioned. Heck: They're going to be in the Mac Pros etc.! :) :) :)
 
fryke said:
Why names, anyway... It's a CPU. "68030" was fine with me. So was "604e" or "970FX". Why can't this just be the "80986b" or something? Then we would _not_ talk about its naming scheme so much, but rather just look forward to it, as nixgeek mentioned. Heck: They're going to be in the Mac Pros etc.! :) :) :)
Click to expand...


You know, you're absolutely right. I found it much easier just dealing with 386, 486, 68030, 68040, 601+, 604e, etc. Once these companies started using marketing names for all these processors, things got ugly (even with Apple and the G-designation, although that wasn't as bad as some others).
 
Intel is all about branding. But I think they've gotten clueless as time has passed. Their naming schemes are baffling even to a tech-head like me. Making a distinction between "processors" and "platforms" makes this even more confusing. What processor am I getting if I buy a Centrino laptop? For months, I thought it would be a Centrino. But Centrino is not a processor, it's a "platform". Is it a Celeron? A Pentium M? A Core Duo/Solo? Are those even different processors? Or are they not even processors at all? How do they compare? Aahhhhh! (Okay, I know the answers to some of those questions. But not all.)

Things have been easy in the Mac world. G5 > G4 > G3. That simple. Although granted, explaining the difference between a 68040 and a 68LC040 back in the day was not easy...especially since Apple marketed the LC processors with both names! (And got sued for it, actually.)

At least Apple will (probably) keep it simple.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top