RegHardware
reports Intel expects to ship more dual-core than single-core mobile chips
this quarter. This figure is expected climb to a 9:1 dual-core to single-core
ratio by the end of the year, leaving only 10% of new Intel-based notebooks with
single-core chips. Intel is expecting Merom's desktop equivalent, 'Conroe', will
help in the desktop market too, but clearly to a much lesser extent. Last week,
it said it will quit 2006 with 75 per cent of its desktop CPU production
dedicated to dual-core offerings, up from the "over 70 per cent" it had
previously forecast - the same figure as its previous portable prognostication.
Ironically, the move to Merom will be less advantageous for end users than
adopting Conroe, Intel's own figures show. It reckons Merom delivers a
performance boost of over 20 per cent above that delivered by the 2.16GHz Core
Duo T2600. That compares with the greater than 40 per cent increase Conroe
delivers over the 3.6GHz Pentium D 960.