by Anna Filatova
08/15/2002 | 11:50 PM
Some time ago I received the confirmation of the info about Intel’s new strategy towards the budget Celeron family we had at our disposal. Despite all doubts we had, the future Celeron CPUs based on the cut down 0.13micron Northwood core will really have 128KB L2 cache. This way, the new Celeron family based on NetBurst architecture will get absolutely no extra advantages the finer manufacturing technology can grant.
As for Intel’s plans regarding the schedule for the new Celeron CPUs launch, they have been changed quite significantly, because the entire family was speeded up. In particular, Celeron 1.9GHz was cancelled, instead Intel is planning a 2GHz model. Celeron 2GHz is expected to arrive in the end of August – beginning of September. These particular 2GHz processors will be the first CPUs based on the cut-down 0.13micron Northwood core.<%BANNER[article]%>
New Celeron manufactured with 0.13micron technology will be practically the same as their predecessors. Their L2 cache will be equal to 1q28KB and the bus frequency – to 400MHz.
Then Celeron 2GHz will remain the fastest model in the budget family from Intel until the end of 2002. Only in Q1 2003 Intel will announce the next CPU of this family - Celeron 2.1GHz. In Q2 2003 the core clock of the new Celeron processors will rise up to 2.2GHz. These CPUs will also be based on Northwood core with 128KB L2 cache. At the same time Intel will discontinue the Celeron family based on Tualatin-256 core, which core frequency stopped at 1.4GHz. This way the Q2 2003 can also be considered as the last day of the Socket370 standard.
Also we would like to point out that another price reduction will touch upon Celeron processors on September 1. Celeron 1.8GHz will cost $83 instead of $103. The $103 price will be set for the new Celeron 2GHz. Celeron 1.7GHz, which used to sell for $83, will then cost $69. Celeron 1.4GHz based on Tualatin-256 core will cost $74 after September 1, while now it sells for $89. Both slower Celeron (Tualatin-256) models working at 1.3GHz and 1.2GHz will cost the same $64, while today Intel offers them for $74 and $69 correspondingly.