While Intel has been sticking to dual- and quad-core CPU designs in the mainstream segment for quite some time, it's possible that 10nm Cannonlake architecture might bring hexa- and octa-core designs to the mainstream as well.

These days Intel is hiring a CPU Design Engineer to work on Cache Coherency Protocols for the upcoming 10nm Cannonlake processors with 4/6/8 cores. What’s so interesting about this? Intel is explicitly hiring an engieneer to work on „Cannonlake“ and not Cannonlake-E or Cannonlake-EP. In combination with the fact that 4/6/8 cores are mentioned, it’s reasonable to assume that Intel is looking for an engineer to work on a 4/6/8 core mainstream CPU architecture, since Cannonlake resembles such an architecture.

In combination with the upcoming 10nm process technology, which will make its debut with Cannonlake, it appears to be possible to create CPUs with a thermal limit between 84 and 95 watts, which feature up to eight cores. Since these days we’re limited by sheer CPU frequencies, the only way to improve the CPU performance is to create more complex designs. This on the other hand means, an integration of more cores on one die. Otherwise we’d have to go back to Pentium 4 days with a significantly longer pipeline, but in that case, we would lose a lot of IPC efficiency and Intel would, sooner rather than later, encounter massive issues regarding current leakage.

In our opinion, it’s likely that with Cannonlake, octa-core mainstream CPUs could make it to the market. Apart from that it could also mean that Intel wants to take as strong as possible position facing AMDs future Zen architecture, which is to feature eight native cores as well.





Source: Wccftech.com.