VIA, whose activity was especially high lately, has said that the samples of its new Erza processor (following Samuel II) will be available in the second quarter of this year, while its mass production will start a quarter later. This will be a 0.15-micron CPU clocked at 1 to 1.2GHz (and perhaps even higher than that).
Sadly, no information concerning L2 cache is delivered. According to some sources, it may be either 128KB or 256KB. Another vague matter is whether Ezra will support SSE instructions or not. Speaking of L1 cache, we can state right away that it will be the same 128KB as that of Samuel I and II. No notable changes in architecture are awaited as well. It implies that the newcomer won’t be much faster than its predecessor, Samuel II.
However, VIA doesn’t have big ideas about its freshly-made processors, aiming them just at the Low-End sector. A good piece of evidence is that not only Samuel I, but also the on-going couple, Samuel II and Ezra, are to be packaged in BGA. Subsequently, all these CPUs will be used for the least pricy systems.