Intel's Tukwila slips yet again

From CNET News.com: Intel released a statement Thursday on the schedule changes. It reads in part:

"During final system-level testing, we identified an opportunity to further enhance application scalability best optimized for high-end systems. This will result in a change to the Tukwila shipping schedule to Q1 2010.

In addition to better meeting the needs of our current Itanium customers, we believe this change will allow Tukwila systems a greater opportunity to gain share versus proprietary RISC solutions including Sparc and IBM Power. Tukwila is tracking to 2x performance vs its predecessor chip. This change is about delivering even further application scalability for mission critical workloads."

That may be true. However, the fact remains that this is yet another delay to the program. This will put Tukwila's introduction more than two years after the debut of the current "Montvale" generation--which itself was a delayed and modest speedbump to "Montecito"--and one that Intel barely announced publicly.

Tukwila has had an especially bumpy history. This generation of Itanium processor began life as a chip project code-named Tanglewood and was said to be envisioned as a radical multicore design by the ex-Digital Equipment Alpha engineers who worked on it.

First, Intel changed the code-name to Tukwila after the Tanglewood Music Festival complained. This was back in 2003--to give you an idea of how long this particular project has been weaving its way through development. At that time, it was slated for something in the neighborhood of a 2007 release.

View: Article @ Source Site