So, Intel yesterday announced its first Celeron processor based on the "new" Willamette-128 core. As you should remember, this core is a cut down version of the 0.18micron Pentium 4 Willamette that is why I used the word "new" in inverted commas. Despite the recent rumors the maximum clock frequency of the new Celeron processor is now equal to 1.7GHz, and not 1.8GHz. In fact, Intel announced only one model working at 1.7GHz. The slower models with 1.6GHz and 1.5GHz core clock will undoubtedly be shipping, although they will not take so much air.

As you remember, the new Celeron processors differ from PGA478 Pentium 4 (Willamette) only by the L2 cache size (128KB against 256KB) and marking. So, they should work in the same Socket478 mainboards as Pentium 4 does (these are the boards based on i850/i850E, i845, SiS645/650, VIA P4X333/266/A, etc.).

At the same time we found the nearly lost Celeron on 0.13micron Tualatin-256 core working at 1.4GHz. Like its predecessors, it is intended for 100MHz system bus, Socket370 and mainboards based on i815 B-Step chipsets and the like (such as VIA Apollo Pro 133T, SiS633T, etc.).

And in conclusion a few words about the pricing. As we have expected, Celeron 1.7GHz costs very little money: $83 in 1,000-unit quantities. Its freshly announced 1.4GHz counterpart on Tualatin-256 is even more expensive: $89. Well, this is a marketing paradox :) As far as I understand, this is the first time in Intel’s business that a CPU with higher core clock frequency costs less than its slower brother.