Intel's Graphics Chips: 10 Times More Graphics Power Until 2010

Intel has quite some plans in developing new technologies, such as its WiMax and the new generation of input-output controllers. However, the chip giant seems to be increasingly concerned with graphics, or "visual computing", as Intel likes to call it.

The most important achievement for the chip manufacturer is the Larrabee, Intel's upcoming high-end multi-core graphics chip. As far as the integrated graphics business is concerned, Intel will try to move the graphics cores into the company's upcoming processors, especially in its low-end and mid-range offerings.

The high-end market will still be fueled by discrete graphics for hardcore performance. However, if Intel succeeds in achieving CPU-integrated graphics cores, this will unleash high-quality HD video playback, and HDMI or DisplayPort support even for the low-cost offerings.

Intel is also gearing up for technological advancements in the graphics sector with a lifespan of a generation per year for the next four years. Integrated graphics have been two generations back – for instance, 45-nanometers processors would pair with 90-nanometer chipsets.

Intel intends to shift its chipsets to the 65-nanometer technology during 2008. The next advancements are slated to reach 45-nanometer in 2009 and 32-nanometer until 2010. According to Eric Mentzer, GM of Intel's Graphics Development Group, Intel will offer graphics chips to reach 10 times the performance of the chips released last year.

However, the real big gun is Intel's Larrabee project, that will deal with high-definition video formats, photo-realistic 3D modeling, as well as with computational modeling. Meltzer claimed that the chip will be a significant advancement in ray tracing for more realistic images, among others. Intel has only provided small bits of information regarding its graphics project. It is for sure that the Larrabee will include a number of Intel Architecture cores especially designed to provide multiple threads of math simultaneously.

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