Intel's McKinley is one big chip

NEWS

McKinley, Intel's upcoming server processor, will be huge, at least in terms of surface area. The processor, which will come out commercially toward the middle of this year, will cover an area of 464 square millimeters, according to Intel specifications. That's larger than expected and larger than most chips ever made. As a result, the chip won't be the easiest or the cheapest product Intel has ever produced. Big chips cost more to make because fewer can be carved out of a single wafer. Yields -- the number of good chips produced from a wafer -- also typically declines as chip size increases because of the greater potential for defects. "It's a pretty big die," said Kevin Krewell, an analyst at the Microprocessor Report. "It is definitely a challenge to manufacture." "Jesus, that's big," one analyst joked. McKinley is the second member of the Itanium processor family, and will be followed by Madison, Montecito and Chivano, among others. The size of the chip comes from a number of factors. McKinley contains a substantial amount of cache -- data reservoirs near the processor for rapid data access. Intel is integrating a 3MB level three cache, a 256KB level two cache and a 32KB level one cache. The original Itanium features a 4MB level three cache, but it's located on separate chips, and a 96KB level two cache. McKinley also contains more internal subsystems than its predecessor. In all, the chip contains 221 million transistors. All the additional circuitry will help McKinley achieve a large performance boost, said John Crawford, an Intel fellow in the enterprise platforms group. McKinley will run at 1GHz, he added. Intel on Monday will present a paper on McKinley at the International Solid State Circuits Conference in San Francisco. "Applications will about one and a half to two times faster than what you get on a (current) Itanium," he said. Intel has also incorporated a substantial amount of redundant circuitry in the processor, Krewell said. Chipmakers often use redundant circuitry to boost yields. Sometimes, circuits come out scrambled on a finished chip. If the manufacturer has put in two sets of the same circuits, the chip will function properly because it can use the second set. The size of McKinley won't likely represent a huge drain on costs for Intel. While McKinley is expected to be popular, server chip volumes are relatively low. Intel may make only a few hundred thousand McKinley chips in 2002 and sell them for several thousand dollars. Instead, the size effectively means that the chip will cost more to produce than other Intel chips. How big is it? Krewell said it's the second largest chip he's heard of, second only to a Hewlett-Packard PA-RISC chip from a few years ago. Each McKinley could cost $300 (£210) to produce, compared with $50 for some members of the Pentium family. Only about 47 McKinleys will be able to be carved from a standard wafer. Intel now carves about 180 of the latest Pentium 4s from a single wafer. McKinley's acceptance is a major issue for the hardware industry. The chip, which digests data in 64-bit chunks rather than 32-bit chunks like most Intel chips, will be placed in servers that compete against servers from Sun Microsystems and others. While the first Itanium sold only sparingly, Intel, IBM, HP and others harbor far higher hopes for McKinley. The chip provides more performance than its predecessor and is expected to sell in far larger numbers. The ultimate success of McKinley, though, will depend on the availability of software. Microsoft, Oracle and a number of other software developers have committed to delivering products for McKinley. Still, it is uncertain when customers will gravitate to these new products in the current economic climate. Intel is already preparing successors to the chip. In 2003, the company will unveil Madison, a successor to McKinley, and Deerfield, a low-power, cheaper Itanium chip. Madison will effectively be a "shrink" of McKinley. Rather than get manufactured on the 180-nanometer process, Madison will feature circuits measuring 130 nanometers. The shift will reduce the size of the chip dramatically. In 2004, the company will then come out with Montecito, the successor to Madison, and follow it in the 2005-2006 time frame with Chivano, Montecito's successor. Both Montecito and Chivano will contain influences from Compaq's Alpha chip, according to sources.

See Chips Central for the latest headlines on processors and semiconductors. To find out more about the computers and hardware that these chips are being used in, see ZDNet UK's Hardware News Section. Have your say instantly, and see what others have said. Go to the Chips Central Forum. Let the Chips Central editor know what you think by email. And sign up for the weekly Chips Central newsletter.

Post your comment

In order to post a comment you need to be registered and logged in.

You can also log in with Facebook. Log in or create your ZDNet UK account below

By signing up for this service, you indicate that you agree to our Terms and Conditions and have read and understood our Privacy Policy. Questions about membership? Find the answers in the Community FAQ

ZDNet UK Live

How dare film makers, artists or anybody that invests in creativity stop us pirating their works for free. I want to be able to walk into my local...

5 hours ago by JCB33 on ACTA stumbles in Germany

@GrueMaster. I prefer horses for courses rather than one size fits all. I, and I suspect most other computer users, do not really wish to have...

7 hours ago by Moley on A tale of two distros: Ubuntu and Linux Mint

The product that scares me every time I have to use it is the Office 2007 version of Excel. The first bug that I found was applying the median...

7 hours ago by greycynic on Ten flawed products that derail productivity

Nice review and very informative. One thing I'd like to add (in reply to whs001's 1st question), the main reason to have the same interface from...

9 hours ago by GrueMaster on A tale of two distros: Ubuntu and Linux Mint

I'be been using Mint 12 since the RC came out, and I am far more happy with the Cinnamon, the Mate, and, yes (with extensions), theGnome 3...

10 hours ago by Frederick Wrigley via Facebook on A tale of two distros: Ubuntu and Linux Mint

Excellent article. One small correction, though--although a fresh installation of Linux Mint 12 will, indeed, provide the user with a version of...

10 hours ago by bdantas on A tale of two distros: Ubuntu and Linux Mint

In related news, the ISPs club together to get the members of the Home Affairs Select Committee (ya goofed on that part, ZDNet UK) copies of "The...

11 hours ago by Alan Ralph via Facebook on MPs urge ISPs to take down terrorist material

In related news, the ISPs club together to get the members of the Home Affairs Select Committee (ya goofed on that part, ZDNet UK) copies of "The...

11 hours ago by Alan Ralph via Facebook on MPs urge ISPs to take down terrorist material

For Gnome 2 die-hards, it is possible to add icons to the bottom panel (or top top panel, if you prefer) which provide the exact Gnome 2...

12 hours ago by Moley on A tale of two distros: Ubuntu and Linux Mint

Your comments would seem pretty naive and immature. Your 'solution' appears to be, "gee, let's all just give in to the hackers and give them...

12 hours ago by ramwellian on Cloud computing security: no more oxymoron?

"Interesting thought ... If you installed Win7 as a dual boot on a machine that previously only had Linux, and it wrecked your Linux installation,...

12 hours ago by BugStalker on Windows 7 Declares War on GRUB

This is an excellent summary of Ubuntu and Mint and the interface differences between them. Most such articles take a very partisan position for...

12 hours ago by whs001 on A tale of two distros: Ubuntu and Linux Mint

@ewallace. Not so clear. Anyone can obtain the text, for example from here http://www.ustr.gov/webfm_send/2379. I support ACTA so long as it and...

12 hours ago by Moley on ACTA: Facts, misconceptions and questions

I think WinRT is fantastic. I just wish it was an option for people that didn't want to go through Microsoft's App Store with its attendant...

16 hours ago by 45283 on Why Windows 8 needs architectural hygiene for WOA

Nine people? £30m? Who's back pocket is that lot going in? And IF they say it is for new buildings, what about all the ones the government has...

17 hours ago by Burn-IT on Police set to launch three £30m e-crime hubs

Just to be clear, nobody knows what is in the text of ACTA, here is a photograph of the text of ACTA http://twitpic.com/8h9iju as submitted to the...

17 hours ago by ewallace on ACTA: Facts, misconceptions and questions

Unfortunately main issue is that ASUS is refusing to accept that they make some mistake on this version of asus Transformer prime. 1 - GPS sensor...

18 hours ago by fgvrg56 on Asus Eee Pad Transformer Prime Wi-Fi & GPS problems?

@Marcus A fair question. Just talked with Archos which said it was working on an announcement for next week....

19 hours ago by Ben Woods on Archos confirms G9 Ice Cream Sandwich update schedule

Any update on this, considering the claimed "first week of February"?

20 hours ago by Marcus Karlsson via Facebook on Archos confirms G9 Ice Cream Sandwich update schedule

Bill Goodrich : Just as al_langevin pointed out, with Windows Server 2008 there is no Services for Macintosh anymore. It's gone, not available....

1 day ago by apexwm on Windows Server 2008 drops the ball for Mac compatibility

Featured white papers

Latest jobs

Intel's McKinley is one big chip

Daily Newsletters

Topics

Related stories

McKinley servers to massively undercut Merced

AMD looks to ARM itself for low-power tablets

Apple tops list of semiconductor buyers

Post your comment

ZDNet UK Live

Latest in Processors

AMD looks to ARM itself for low-power tablets

Apple tops list of semiconductor buyers

Featured white papers

Latest jobs

Test Analyst - Business Intelligence /Data Warehousing

Test Analyst - Business Intelligence /Data Warehousing

Technical MI Manager - 50-60k - Leeds

Inside ZDNet UK

A tale of two distros: Ubuntu and Linux Mint

2012 Predictions: VCE FastPath, VI SAN Probe & Hadoop

BlackBerry Bold 9790

Case study: How cloud enables growth

Ten factors that make Ubuntu 11.10 a hit

Toshiba Portégé Z830-10P Review

BT's archive: Pictures from the vault

News & Analysis

Reviews

Blogs

Resources

About Us

Member Services

Special Features

Advertising Features

ZDNet UK / News and Analysis / Workspace IT / Processors

Intel's McKinley is one big chip

Daily Newsletters

Topics

Related stories

Post your comment

Get ZDNet UK's daily newsletter

Enter your email address to sign up

ZDNet UK Live

Latest in Processors

Featured white papers

Latest jobs

Inside ZDNet UK

Resources

About Us

Member Services

Special Features

Advertising Features