Hyper Threading, X58 and Socket LGA 1366

Hyper Threading

Inevitably, chips based on the Nehalem family will have between two and eight cores, the high-end range will be capable of handling two independent software threads per physical CPU core. This is called Hyper Threading, Intel's name for the concept. It allows a processor to execute two different code streams at pretty much the same time.

This was a feature found in Intel's single-core Pentium 4 processors but later discontinued with the advent of multicore chips, but it's essentially the same technology as before. With two threads per core, Core i7 Gulftown chips will pack no less than twelve logical cores at launch. If you look at the screenshot to the right you can see that happening.

The X58 Chipset

High-end Intel Core i7 processors are paired with the Tylersburg chipset, you guys know it as the Intel X58 Express chipset. This chipset uses the same ICH10(R) 'southbridge' as the Intel P45 (Eaglelake) chipset, but the X58 chipset is obviously overall radically different:

• The X58 Express will utilize socket LGA1366 (also known as socket B).
• No more memory controller.
• Intel QuickPath Interconnect (QPI) as the interconnect between the Core i7 processor and the X58 Express.

Plenty of bandwidth. A major feature over a chipset like H55 or P55 is that you'll have a lot of PCIe lanes available. There is support for two x16 PCI Express 2.0 slots with the option for four x8 slots to support multi-GPU graphics cards. Or you could run a graphics card at full PCIe X16 and still have 16 PCIe links available for say PhysX, a USB 3.0 or SATA 6G controller and so on.

Placing the Nehalem processor family in perspective

Intel has got a lot in store with the Nehalem family of processors right now. We placed all data that we know of into a chart, also this is a handy chart to see which processor has which socket/package and what more you can expect anno 2010 desktop processor wise (we left out the mobile parts).