Intel's Future Laptops Will Have Memory Sticks Again (theverge.com)
- Reference: 0175376215
- News link: https://slashdot.org/story/24/11/01/1837217/intels-future-laptops-will-have-memory-sticks-again
- Source link: https://www.theverge.com/2024/11/1/24285513/intel-ceo-lunar-lake-one-off-memory-package-discrete-gpu
> Remember how this fall's Lunar Lake laptops ditched the idea of memory sticks, putting a fixed amount of RAM on the processor package instead? Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger now says that turned out to be a financial mistake, and Intel [1]won't do it again . Oh, and he may be axing desktop GPUs, too. Future Intel generations of chips, including Panther Lake and Nova Lake, won't have baked-on memory. "It's not a good way to run the business, so it really is for us a one-off with Lunar Lake," said Gelsinger on Intel's Q3 2024 earnings call, as spotted by VideoCardz.
[1] https://www.theverge.com/2024/11/1/24285513/intel-ceo-lunar-lake-one-off-memory-package-discrete-gpu
The most profitable company on earth (Score:4, Interesting)
makes video cards, so we here at Intel think we should exit that market. Genius!
Re: (Score:3)
They're running short on money. Fab spending is cleaning them out, and their nodes are not healthy (yet). It costs money to develop dGPUs. Plus Arc hasn't sold well yet, so it can't carry its own weight. It doesn't help that Ponte Vecchio failed massively and Rialto Bridge was scrapped.
That being said, we need an alternative to Nvidia. AMD has pretty much noped out of the high-end gamer dGPU market as of RDNA4, and it's not clear when (if ever) they may return to it. Competition from Battlemage and RD
Re: (Score:2)
Fab spending is cleaning them out,
They just got [1]billions [reuters.com] of [2]socialist money [cnbc.com] to build a plant(s).
[1] https://www.reuters.com/technology/intel-clinches-nearly-20-bln-awards-biden-boost-us-chip-output-2024-03-20/
[2] https://www.cnbc.com/2024/09/16/intel-awarded-up-to-3-billion-under-chips-act.html
Re: (Score:2)
Those grants are tollgated based on meeting milestones.
Intel isn't meeting the milestones, so they're not getting the money. They have to spend up front, and then they get reimbursed under the CHIPS Act if they actually build shit that works.
Otherwise known as "the way it should be done, if it must be done."
Re: (Score:2)
> makes video cards, so we here at Intel think we should exit that market. Genius!
No, they don't make video cards. In fact, video cards is a minority of their sales (depending on who you ask, anywhere from 10-20% of their sales are GPUs)..
Intel's GPUs have a history of poor performance. Sure, their Iris Pro and Arc graphics do better, but they're stuck in the midrange market and noncompetitive given the amount of midrange GPUs from better known names.
Intel's trying, but the market isn't responding very positi
Re: (Score:2)
That's because their GPUs are shit. Why do you think people go and buy Nvidia products if their system already has an Intel GPU in it?
I absolutely hate it, but... (Score:3)
... the future is apparently ARM cpu's and Nvidia gpu's, with AMD as the distant second backup player, and Intel a once dominant company that goes under. In a decade, Intel will probably be bought up for their IP rights. Even if they lose money initially, Intel should have doubled down on the powerful desktop gpu sector.
scaling smaller (Score:2)
There are probably things I don't understand about making chips on silicone. As things scale smaller it seems that tighter integration of components is a good thing. Have to wonder if this is the right direction in 2024.
Re: (Score:2)
You put chips into that white stuff that lines your shower? Did you mean silicon?
Re: (Score:2)
Yeah, probably.
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Chips on silicone
= snack food crumbs on a Vegas hooker.
Re: (Score:2)
Everyone is very impressed with your pedantry.
[1]https://hackaday.com/2022/01/2... [hackaday.com]
[1] https://hackaday.com/2022/01/23/silicone-devices-diy-stretchable-circuits/
Maybe it's just Intel (Score:2)
Soldering RAM on the MB seems to have worked fine for Apple. Maybe Intel's fan-base just aren't Loyal like Apple's since there there are alternatives, regardless of whether the RAM is upgradeable or not.
Re: (Score:2)
So soldering memory onto the motherboard is not what Intel did. What Intel did was attach the memory into the CPU package. The difference is that Intel now has to source the memory and get memory margin on the whole processor package rather than have the OEM source memory and assemble it into the system. This leads to a massive increase in inventory requirements and a lowering of margins that is unsustainable for Intel's business model.
Intel OEMs have been soldering down memory on motherboards for a few
Re: (Score:2)
> So soldering memory onto the motherboard is not what Intel did. What Intel did was attach the memory into the CPU package.
That's also what Apple does.
The difference is that Intel sells CPUs to OEMs, and Apple sells complete systems to end users.
Since Apple needs to deal with memory inventory either way, it makes sense to integrate it for better performance.
Re: Maybe it's just Intel (Score:1)
Intel could do the same, the capability for multi-tiered RAM is already in Linux. The problem is cost and Windows, it will always be cheaper to get a CPU + RAM than CPU + HBM + RAM. Intel has already painted itself in this corner with DDR5 making the cost appear higher while AMD builders can fall back on DDR4 - for 80% of the desktop market today, a 10 year old CPU with DDR3 is sufficient, even for gamers, I donâ(TM)t see them building all that high end stuff anymore.
The other problem is Windows, it wo
Re: (Score:2)
The memory on Apple silicon is on-package, not soldered to the motherboard. Trying to move all of the different stages of the memory hierarchy closer to the CPU is how computer engineering has been solving the performance disparity for the past 30 years. Without a major revolution in memory performance, the future will likely have memory on-die.
I love modularity (Score:5, Insightful)
I would rather have a slightly thicker laptop than one I can't upgrade or repair.
In my opinion, a laptop should be a chassis and backplane into which all the other components can be mounted without tools. Sliding in a new graphics card would be a wonderful option.
Re: (Score:2)
> I would rather have a slightly thicker laptop than one I can't upgrade or repair.
Thicker, upgradeable laptops are available, but they're a niche market, so you'll likely pay more for the ability to upgrade than if you'd just bought a better-spec machine in the first place.
Re: (Score:2)
> I would rather have a slightly thicker laptop than one I can't upgrade or repair.
> In my opinion, a laptop should be a chassis and backplane into which all the other components can be mounted without tools. Sliding in a new graphics card would be a wonderful option.
Nothing's stopping you. They still sell luggable computers that are fully moduler, save the screen and keyboard. Not quite as big as a Compaq Portable, think a small briefcase. Unfasten the cover to reveal the screen, unstow the keyboard and you ha
Re: (Score:2)
I think you can buy exactly that from companies like [1]Framework [frame.work].
[1] https://frame.work/
Good (Score:3)
Any sign that a big tech company recognises that denying options and choice to users is a bad thing, is to be welcomed.
Our current products suck! (Score:2)
He's basically telling everyone that their current laptops stink. Great? Good marketing plan!
Re: (Score:2)
Lunar Lake is about the best thing in Intel's entire product portfolio (for now). Unless Arrow Lake-H makes a big splash vs Strix Point.
Re: (Score:2)
> He's basically telling everyone that their current laptops stink.
No. He's saying that current laptops are less profitable.
Sounded good to me. (Score:2)
Putting the CPU, ram and perhaps storage in the same package seems like a no-brainer. Apple pretty much aced it. Not sure how Intel managed to screw it up financially but I can see lots of uses for laptops using this architecture, like every sales person out there (no disrespect intended), to just about every causal home user. Most people are not special case power computing users. That said, There will always be a market for discrete architecture builds in the future, for people like most of us here.
Re: Sounded good to me. (Score:2)
Apple had decades of experience with ARM manufacturers making SoCs for a while now. It is still a relatively newer or niche concept for x86 derivatives, though not one that would necessarily be prohibitive. In the end, it was simply cheaper for them to keep it separate, probably due to scale.
I love to have 64GB on my laptop... (Score:4, Interesting)
I am a memory-lover - I love to have 64GB on my laptop and twice that on desktop.
The fact that on macbook it was not possible and event 48GB means a huge cost increase is what is keeping me on x86....
Re: (Score:2)
And yet, my two year old MacBook Pro has 64GB - so it has been possible for at least a few years...
Re: (Score:1, Informative)
The fact that on macbook it was not possible and event 48GB means a huge cost increase
You can now order MacBook Pros with 128GB of memory. I think you missed a few updates.
It's a little expensive, yes, but also very fast and reliable memory.