Intel’s 11th Gen Core Rocket Lake Detailed: Ice Lake Core with Xe Graphics
by Dr. Ian Cutress on October 29, 2020 11:00 AM EST- Posted in
- CPUs
- Intel
- 14nm
- Xe-LP
- 11th Gen
- Rocket Lake
- Cypress Cove
During a time of increased competitor activity, Intel has decided to disclose some of the high level details surrounding its next generation consumer processor, known as Rocket Lake or Intel’s 11th Gen Core. The new processor family is due in the market in the first quarter of 2021, and is expected to share a socket and motherboard compatibility with the current 10th Gen Comet Lake processors, providing an upgrade path even for those with a Core i9-10900K, Intel’s highest performing desktop processor to date. New 500-series motherboards are also expected to be available.
The new Rocket Lake-S silicon or SoC is going to be known as ‘Cypress Cove’. Intel confuses itself in the press release compared to the PDF presentation, as the press release dictates that this isn’t the core – it specifically states that the core microarchitecture is Ice Lake (Sunny Cove). However the presentation PDF says Cypress Cove is the core. In this instance, to be clear, Sunny Cove and Cypress Cove are set to be practically identical, however Sunny Cove is on 10nm and Cypress Cove is the back-ported variant on 14nm.
Paired with these cores will be the Tiger Lake graphics architecture, known as Xe-LP, which is also being backported from 10nm to 14nm for this product. The combined 14nm representation of Ice Lake cores and Xe-LP graphics is what is going to be known as Rocket Lake, (at least one of) the SoC(s) of the 11th Gen Core family.
With the new processors, Intel is targeting a raw instruction-per-clock uplift in the double digit range, which would be similar to the uplift we saw moving from Comet Lake to Intel’s Ice Lake mobile processors. Because of the node difference, the exact IPC change is likely to be lower than what we’ve seen before, but 10%+ is still highly respectable, especially if Intel is also able to maintain the high frequency it has achieved with the current generation of Comet Lake.
One of the benefits of moving to a back-ported Sunny Cove core will be the inclusion of the AVX-512 vector acceleration unit in Cypress Cove. This enables Intel to enable its library of Deep Learning Boost technologies for AI and ML acceleration, including support for Vector Neural Network Instructions (VNNI), finally bringing AVX-512 to the desktop platform.
However, to mix and match the right combination of core count, graphics, and AVX-512 for die size/yield/cost, it appears that Rocket Lake-S will only offer a maximum of eight cores in its largest configuration. Within the press release PDF, Intel stated that the current silicon as tested is rated for 125 W TDP, with a top turbo boost of 250 W, which matches what we see on the Core i9-10900K already. There’s no escaping the performance-per-watt characteristics of the process node, which indicates that Intel might find hitting those high frequencies a little easier with fewer cores to deal with. Intel is also promoting new overclocking tools with Rocket Lake, however did not go into details.
Another feature that Intel has disclosed with Rocket Lake is the move to PCIe Gen 4.0 on the processor, with up to 20 lanes available. These are likely to be split into one x16 for graphics and one x4 for storage on most motherboards, and this aligns with what we’ve seen on the latest generation of Intel Z490 motherboards, some of which have already promoted support for PCIe 4.0 ‘on future Intel processors’. This means Rocket Lake. Intel also mentions that the memory controller now supports up to DDR4-3200, however the projected performance numbers were done with DDR4-2933 memory.
On the graphics side, moving to the Xe-LP graphics architecture is going to be a big uplift in graphics performance, with Intel suggesting a 50% improvement over current Comet Lake integrated graphics. It is worth noting here in the slide that Intel mentions ‘UHD Graphics ft Xe Graphics Architecture’ – this would perhaps point to a scaled down version of Xe compared to Tiger Lake. I’m fully expecting to see only 32 EUs here, as a balance between die area, power, and performance. In the fine print it suggests that there will be some versions of Rocket Lake without the integrated graphics enabled, similar to the F processors we see on the market today.
That being said, for those units with integrated graphics, Intel is promoting new media encoders and display resolution support, with up to 4K60 12-bit for 4:4:4 HEVC and VP9, or up to 4K60 with 10-bit 4:2:0 AV1, showcasing AV1 support for mainstream processors. Display resolution support has also increased, with up to three 4K60 displays or two 5K60 displays, supporting DP 1.4a (with HBR3) and HDMI 2.0b.
This was an unexpected news announcement this morning - speaking to peers it all seems to be a bit of a surprise - perhaps even for the PR teams, given that the system configurations as 'projected' in the slide above is dated 6th August, almost 3 months ago. It will be interesting to hear if Intel will disclose more details ahead of launch.
Source: Intel
Related Reading
- Intel Confirms Rocket Lake on Desktop for Q1 2021, with PCIe 4.0
- The Intel Comet Lake Core i9-10900K, i7-10700K, i5-10600K CPU Review
- The Intel Core i7-8086K Review
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GeoffreyA - Friday, October 30, 2020 - link
Agreed, and it's doing its job of confusion beautifully.Allowing for simplification, there are just three architectures: Skylake, Sunny Cove, and Willow Cove (if we even entertain the latter for its cache). But in the hazy realms of language, where 2 + 2 can equal 5, Intel can have as many as they want.
sing_electric - Sunday, November 1, 2020 - link
FWIW, I think one example of model numbers "done right" is Dell's monitor nomenclature: its consistent, and though it starts off looking random, once you get the hang of it you can even "predict" model numbers that don't exist: I don't know if they'll release a UP3221Q, but I do know that if they did, it'd be:U: Ultrasharp (brand for higher-end monitors with small bezels)
P: Premier color (typically 10 bit, professionally calibrated from the factory)
32: 32" size class
21: Released in/for 2021 (they sometimes jump the gun a bit, but at least you know that a U2412 is an ~8-year-old design)
Q: 4k display.
GeoffreyA - Monday, November 2, 2020 - link
That's an excellent scheme. Packed to the brim with useful information. I think from now on, when I chance to come across a Dell monitor in the advertisements, my mind will be trying to decode its model number :)Spunjji - Monday, November 2, 2020 - link
Indeed - and there's no reason Intel and AMD couldn't do something similar, although it does make for unwieldy names when used as part of marketing. The example I came up with was "Ryzen 5 (5th gen) U8 (Ultra-low-power, 8 cores) 48 (4.8Ghz boost) G8 (Graphics, 8EUs). U848G8 is quite a mouthful, though, and AMD have already used the "Ryzen 9/7/5/3" nomenclature as a performance class thing rather than the generation of product.Still, at least they've been fairly consistent with Ryzen 3 being 4 cores, Ryzen 5 being 6 cores, 7 being 8 cores, and 9 being "whatever else we have going".
Intel's i3/5/7/9 nomenclature started off terrible (2-core and 6-core i7s in the same generation back with Sandy Bridge!) and has only gotten worse since then.
GeoffreyA - Tuesday, November 3, 2020 - link
Here's what I came up with, borrowing a bit from yours:[Zen generation] - [cores] [SMT] [base clock] [boost] - [TDP] [graphics + EUs]
Ryzen 5 5600X = Z3-6T3746-D
Ryzen 7 3700X = Z2-8T3644-D
Ryzen 3 3200G = ZP-4N3740-DG8
My system's a mess.
GeoffreyA - Tuesday, November 3, 2020 - link
* 36 for 3200G, not 37SMT = T
No SMT = N
anonomouse - Thursday, October 29, 2020 - link
Sunny Cove had the bigger L1, Willow Cove had the bigger L2. If they're saying it's based on Sunny Cove/Ice Lake, then i'd expect no bigger L2 (which makes sense, considering 14nm means these cores will be fat).The other distinction of Willow Cove is some ISA support, so again, same story.
Hulk - Thursday, October 29, 2020 - link
FYI Sunny Cove also has larger L1/D by 50%.yeeeeman - Friday, October 30, 2020 - link
Willow cove has a different cache layout vs sunny cove. So if rocket lake uses the cache subsystem from ice lake, then that it is. Cannot say it is derived from Willow cove.drajitshnew - Thursday, October 29, 2020 - link
Dear @iancuttress @ryansmithAT @anandtechI think most readers are annoyed by the placement and the title "Rocket lake DETAILED" which suggest that this is a significant news and ?a significant breakthrough from Intel. I most certainly am. My perception is that over the years AT has started to draw a more professional crowd than the enthusiasts it had originally. Both of these will be annoyed. Please note "enthusiasts" as used by me does not equal to gamer.
On the other hand a gamer that misinterprets this as a breakthrough, and holds off his purchase for a potentially late and disappointing launch, will not trust AT again.