New Intel Chip - Codename Nehalem

This is the next generation of chip sets from Intel - codenamed Nehalem. It brings a critical change not just to the processor but also in the way it communicates with memory and other processors. Intel have branded this as the QuickPath Interconnect (or QPI). QuickPath involves two main ingredients - one is a built-in component called a memory controller that is separate on today’s Intel chips; integrating this memory controller reduces communication delays in transferring data to and from memory. All in all this should mean a dramatic increase in memory latency and bandwidth improvements with initial reports of as much as 3 times performance increases on today chipsets. They are expecting to sell “Nehalem” processors with 8 cores on a single slice of silicon in 2009