Intel Arrandale chips detailed, priced and dated?
By Vladislav Savov 
posted Nov 12th 2009 9:38AM
posted Nov 12th 2009 9:38AM
Who's up for some more Intel roadmap rumoring? The latest scuttlebutt from "notebook players" over in the far East is that the chip giant has finally settled on names, speeds, and prices for its first three Arrandale CPUs, which are expected to arrive in the first half of 2010. The Core i5-520UM and Core i7-620UM both run at 1.06GHz, while the top Core i7-640UM model speeds ahead at 1.2GHz, with bulk-buying prices of $241, $278, and $305 per unit of each processor. Even if the processing speeds might not impress on paper, these 32nm chips splice two processing cores, the memory controller, and graphics engine all into the same package and thereby deliver major power savings. Platform pricing is expected to remain at around $500 for netbooks, while the ultrathins these chips are intended for should hit the $600 to $800 range... if Lord Intel wills it so.
new chips are always cool
benchmarks should be out soon. cant wait to see how these trounce the core 2 duo
$500 for netbooks?
netbooks with core i7 in.. so more like, real notebooks, but with the size of a netbook.
You mean Ultraportables (ie. around 12 inches of screen real estate and a real processor, not just a "I need to check my email" Atom)?
Should I be waiting for this? I'm really not wanting to...
It seems like the clock speeds should be a lot higher when compared to the quad core clarksfield, Whats the deal with that?
they are the ultra low voltage variants. they are always around 1.06 to at most 1.4ghz (i guess that will get introduced later)
I assume the clock speeds will turbo boost when needed, depending on number of cores currently being used. The quoted clock speed is just the base speed.
@LondonConsultant I think you have that reversed. For example, the Core i7 920 is rated at 2.66 GHz, but will clock down to 1.6 GHz when not in use. With turbo boost, it will reach 2.8 GHz, but that's only a 5% boost over the base clock.
@Alfred - Turbo mode clock speeds really are faster than the base clock speeds, not the reverse!
@Alfred-I believe they are referring to the Turbo Boost in the i7 8xx series of chips the i7 9xx series got the shaft with Turbo Boost. The i7 860 is a base clock of 2.8Ghz, however it has a max Turbo Boost clock of 3.46Ghz. Granted on the i7 9xx series all of the cores go up in speed, but the option of having the chip go significantly faster on a core if a single process needs the speed is a plus in my book.
I'm not impressed with this lineup intel needs some competition wheres AMD these days?
Look down a few posts on the engadget page, the answer lies there. (Hint: AMD isn't really here until 2011)
Are these clock speeds right? I know Wikipedia isn't always the most reliable source, but they have completely different speeds. They are more in line with what we have seen though. I'm just thinking, for a MacBook Pro to go from a 2.66 Ghz standard to 1.2 Ghz? Doesn't seem right.... and if it is, Apple's going to have to market it in some special way.
My mistake, seems like these are the ultra low variants that DigiTimes is speaking about. Hence the "U" in the model number. Regular Arrandale's will just be 520M, 640M. Well interestingly, they can still hit 2.13 and 2.26 Ghz with Turbo Boost respectively.
Looking forward to Arrandale. Been considering buying a MacBook but am in no hurry -- Tom's hardware was very positive about the new unibody + integrated 7h battery but suggested waiting for Arrandale in early 2010 unless you need something Real Soon Like Now. Unfortunately, gotta wait till Feb this year for MWSF and of course if the chips aren't available in dec/early Jan, the ship dates will be pushed back into March or thereabouts.
Arrandale will have aggressive turbo boost like clarksfield. As mentioned above ULV "overclocks" to 2.13 and 2.26ghz in turbo.
Cheaper arrandale dual cores are i5-520M and i5-540M with 2.4 and 2.53ghz which will turbo to 2.93 and 3.06ghz while high end i7 arrandales with be 620M and 640M.
Across the board arrandales should crush core 2 duos in both idle power and performance benchmarks.
I would hold off buying anything except low end laptops until these cpus are released on jan 7th.
im wating on intels Arrandale chips so i can get a new lappy to make into a Hacintosh $600 to $800 range would be perfect.
If you're gonna spend $600-$800 on a new system and plan to run OS X on it, you might as well go to the $1000-$1200 range and get a MB or MBP. I hackintoshed a Thinkpad I had lying around, and it's absolutely worth the effort... for a free laptop.
I can't fathom spending $800 to deal with hackintosh issues when you could pony up a bit more and have a fully functioning system.
*Breaks out netbook/notebook with new chip. Ahh, now after a hours of work , I'm going to unwind and do a little gaming. Oh wait, I forgot my nice new 2010 system is STILL using onboard intel graphics....
Stereotypes are fun and all but, check some of the leaked benches. The westmere IGP's are closer in performance to an Ion than they are to intel's 4500HD.
they should rename it i7Lite or something-an i7 logo on a spec sheet is going to be very misleading
Wait...I don't understand this. I have the Intel Core 2 Duo 2.6GHz processor. I know the i7 is supposed to be redonkulous fast...yet it's Laptop i7 is only 1.2GHz? I see they said because it runs 2 things at once, it is faster....can someone elaborate on that?
Yeah, see the u in the part numbers? These are "ultra low voltage" parts, the equivalent c2d parts run from 1.1Ghz to 1.6Ghz. These run from 1.2 to 2.26.
So what you're saying is the new laptop i7 core does 1.2-2.26GHz? The i7 for the desktop is known to be a powerhorse, the i7 for the laptop seems kind of average. Or maybe I'm not understanding this...
You can't compare two completely different architectures by clock speed. The Core i7 gets WAY more done per clock cycle than the Core 2 Duos. And it removes many of the bottlenecks that have plagued Intel processors forever.
Looks like you're not really, these aren't standard voltage chips. Standard voltage i7's have a tdp of 35W and top out at nearly 3Ghz.
These chips have a tdp of only 18W and are clocked lower. These chips are designed to replace the culv c2d chips that come in the thin-and-light notebooks and have pretty crappy performance.
I always referred to this when looking at the upcoming Arrandale chips for laptops:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_future_Intel_microprocessors#Mobile_Processors
The ones they are showing on this roadmap are only the netbook/ultrathin chips that has a TDP of 18 W (these are the UM chips). The comparable chips to the C2D will be the Core i5-520/540M, Core i7-620/640LM, and Core i7-620M. So the LM and M chips are what we want. Still no idea when those will come out though from this roadmap, but hopefully not Q3 2010 lol.
Somebody correct me if I'm wrong. :)
"Oleanders growin' outside her door; soon they're gonna be in bloom up in Arrandale"
The only mobile Core i7s available now are Clarksdale which are the high-end quad cores with 45W TDP and start at 1.6ghz. These are low-end versions but they're likely faster than many mid-range Core 2 Duos available today.
Calling the ULV chips low-end is a little misleading. Cue unavoidable car metaphor:
If the Clarksdale chips are Lamborghini's,
The standard voltage Arrandales would be Porsche's,
Which would makes these chips Lotuses.
Sure they're not as fast, but they get 30mpg, to the Porsche's 20 and the Lambo's 10.
@jon very nicely said! =D
ULV is not low end. They will be part of laptops like dell adamo refresh, thinkpad x200 etc. There is CULV processors which are not that power efficient(or powerful) which will be part of low end thin laptops. Currently we dont know when nehalem based CULV cpus will be released.
Also please dont compare core 2 duo 2.6ghz with these cpus. They are different beasts and we have Core i7-[56][24]0M processors replacing those. These cpus are replacing core 2 duo SU9300/SU9400/SU9600.
I'm glad at least one other person gets it. I've been practically holding my breath for an 11-12" note with a 640UM since I first read about them.
So... this roadmap only shows the Nehalem UM chips coming out. Wonder when we'll get the LM and M chips that will truly replace the C2D?? I've been waiting forever for a real processor upgrade :(
I'd like to see these in 11.6" and smaller notebooks, of course they will.
I hate the new naming mess intel is creating.
Aren't these all CPUs with GPU on the package?
So now we get 3 totally different Core i7s.
Some with 2 cores, some with 4 cores, some with PCI in the die, some with a GPU on the die.
They will perform very very different per Ghz
It's just a mess.
M.