Korean technology media outlet Gamma0burst recently reported that Intel is developing two new core architectures named Royal Core and Cobra Core. This information comes from the LinkedIn profile of Intel's chief technical engineer, Antony Jose Emmatty, who indicates that his team has been working on these architectures since 2023. Emmatty's profile mentions his responsibilities in enhancing design quality and implementing advanced methodologies that leverage artificial intelligence to improve system-on-chip (SoC) execution speed and effectiveness.

Moving Away from the "Cove" Naming Convention

Since the 12th-generation Alder Lake series, Intel has used the "Cove" naming convention for its core architectures. For example, the upcoming Core Ultra 200V (Lunar Lake) laptop processors and Core Ultra 200 (Arrow Lake) desktop processors are based on the Lion Cove microarchitecture. A significant change with Lion Cove is the removal of Hyper-Threading technology. Intel has largely moved away from this feature, aiming to deliver double-digit instructions-per-cycle (IPC) gains over CPUs based on the Raptor Cove architecture.

Royal Core Architecture

The Royal Core project represents a notable shift in Intel's architectural approach. While specific details about the architecture remain limited, it is suggested that Arrow Lake will serve as a transition to Royal Core, which is expected to debut on the Nova Lake platform in 2026. Similar to Arrow Lake, the Royal Core architecture is anticipated to forgo Hyper-Threading technology to enhance single-core performance and efficiency.

Sources indicate that Intel is considering replacing Hyper-Threading with rentable units, providing a more granular method for allocating tasks between performance cores (P-cores) and efficiency cores (E-cores). This change could optimize resource utilization and improve overall processing efficiency.

Cobra Core and the Return of Hyper-Threading

Following the Royal Core, Intel plans to introduce the Cobra Core architecture. Unlike its predecessor, Cobra Core will reintroduce Hyper-Threading but with support for four threads per core. This architecture will employ Intel's Beast Core design, potentially offering significant multithreading capabilities and performance enhancements.

An intriguing aspect of these developments is the alleged involvement of Jim Keller, a prominent engineer known for his work on AMD's Zen architecture. According to reports from Notebookcheck.net, the Royal Core project was initiated by Keller during his tenure at Intel. Keller departed from Intel in 2020 for personal reasons, and there were speculations that his project was either canceled or divided into components for future architectures. The emergence of the Royal Core and Cobra Core architectures suggests that Keller's contributions may still influence Intel's roadmap. 

• 
• 
• 
• 

Source: gamma0burst