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Lunar Lake is the codename for
Core Ultra 200V Series mobile processors designed by
Intel
Intel Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company headquartered in Santa Clara, California, and Delaware General Corporation Law, incorporated in Delaware. Intel designs, manufactures, and sells computer compo ...
, released in September 2024. It is a successor to
Meteor Lake which saw Intel move from monolithic silicon to a disaggregated
MCM design.
Background
On May 24, 2024, details on the Lunar Lake architecture were unveiled during Intel's
Computex
COMPUTEX Taipei, or Taipei International Information Technology Show (), is a computer expo held annually in Taipei, Taiwan. Since the early 2000s, it is one of the largest computer and technology trade shows in the world.
The most recent COMP ...
presentation in
Taiwan
Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia. The main geography of Taiwan, island of Taiwan, also known as ''Formosa'', lies between the East China Sea, East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocea ...
. SKU names of Lunar Lake processors or details such as clock speeds were not announced.
Architecture
Lunar Lake is an ultra-low power mobile SoC design. It is a successor to 15 W Meteor Lake-U processors while Arrow Lake replaces the midrange 28 W Meteor Lake-H processors. Lunar Lake's focus on increased power efficiency targets premium ultra-thin laptops and compact mobile designs. Intel said that with Lunar Lake, it aimed to "bust the myth that
/nowiki>x86">x86.html" ;"title="/nowiki>x86">/nowiki>x86/nowiki> can't be as efficient" as ARM architecture family">ARM
In human anatomy, the arm refers to the upper limb in common usage, although academically the term specifically means the upper arm between the glenohumeral joint (shoulder joint) and the elbow joint. The distal part of the upper limb between ...
.
Analysis of tests performed on Lunar Lake CPUs available at market launch indicated that, although their multi-core performance was not particularly good under full load, their efficiency under everyday use was good, even if the ARM competition still has its advantages.
Process node
Lunar Lake is the first processor design by Intel where all logic dies are entirely fabricated on external nodes outsourced to
TSMC
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company Limited (TSMC or Taiwan Semiconductor) is a Taiwanese multinational semiconductor contract manufacturing and design company. It is one of the world's most valuable semiconductor companies, the world' ...
. An analysis by Goldman Sachs indicated that Intel would be spending $5.6 billion in 2024 and $9.7 billion in 2025 outsourcing to TSMC. In March 2024, Intel's chief financial officer admitted during an investment call that the company was "a little bit heavier than we want to be in terms of external wafer manufacturing versus internal". The following month, Intel disclosed that their foundry business made a $7 billion operating loss during 2023.
Compute tile
The Compute tile is Lunar Lake's largest tile. It has expanded functions over Meteor Lake's compute tile which solely housed CPU cores and cache. Instead, Lunar Lake's compute tile houses CPU cores and their cache, the GPU and the NPU. The previous generation Meteor Lake used the
Intel 4 process on its compute tile while Lunar Lake moves to
TSMC
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company Limited (TSMC or Taiwan Semiconductor) is a Taiwanese multinational semiconductor contract manufacturing and design company. It is one of the world's most valuable semiconductor companies, the world' ...
's
N3B node.
N3B is TSMC's first generation 3 nm node with lower yields compared to the updated N3E node. Lunar Lake's compute tile was originally planned to be built on Intel's
18A node.
18A will not debut until 2025 with Panther Lake mobile processors and Clearwater Forest server processors. Lunar Lake shares the same Lion Cove P-core and Skymont E-core architectures with Arrow Lake desktop and mobile processors.
With the
Lion Cove P-core, Intel claims a 14% IPC uplift on average over
Redwood Cove.
Simultaneous multithreading
Simultaneous multithreading (SMT) is a technique for improving the overall efficiency of superscalar CPUs with hardware multithreading. SMT permits multiple independent threads of execution to better use the resources provided by modern proces ...
(SMT) has been removed from Lunar Lake's Lion Cove P-cores. SMT first made its debut in an Intel desktop processor with the Northwood-based
Pentium 4
Pentium 4 is a series of single-core central processing unit, CPUs for Desktop computer, desktops, laptops and entry-level Server (computing), servers manufactured by Intel. The processors were shipped from November 20, 2000 until August 8, 20 ...
in 2002. The last
x86-64
x86-64 (also known as x64, x86_64, AMD64, and Intel 64) is a 64-bit extension of the x86 instruction set architecture, instruction set. It was announced in 1999 and first available in the AMD Opteron family in 2003. It introduces two new ope ...
Intel desktop processor lineup not to feature SMT in any way was
Core 2
Intel Core 2 is a processor family encompassing a range of Intel's mainstream 64-bit x86-64 single-, dual-, and quad-core microprocessors based on the Core microarchitecture. The single- and dual-core models are single- die, whereas the quad-c ...
, which was discontinued in 2011. SMT, or Intel's marketing term
HyperThreading, allows a single physical CPU core with 2 threads to execute two tasks simultaneously. In the early 2000s, SMT was a way to add more processing threads to dual and quad-core CPUs while not using too much die space. The removal of SMT allows the physical core die area to be reduced. Increasing the number of processing threads with a greater number of physical cores can compensate for the removal of SMT providing 2 threads per core. Intel's removal of SMT yields a 15% saving in die area and 5% greater performance-per-watt. To counteract the removal of SMT, Intel prioritized executing more instructions per cycle for high single-threaded performance rather than parallel execution. L2 cache per core for Lion Cove is increased to 2.5 MB from Redwood Cove's 2 MB. Lunar Lake is able to exercise more granular control over Lion Cove's boost clocks. Lion Cove's boost clocks are able to increase in increments of 16.67MHz rather than in 100MHz increments.
Lunar Lake's cluster of 4 Skymont E-cores exist on a 'Low Power Island' separate from the P-cores. As a result, the E-cores have their own dedicated L3 cache not accessible to the P-cores rather than sitting on a ringbus fabric with P-cores. Intel claims a massive 68% IPC gain in Skymont E-cores over Crestmont. It achieves this with the inclusion of new 8-wide integer ALUs, doubled from Crestmont.
Neural Processing Unit (NPU)
Lunar Lake's
Neural Processing Unit
A neural processing unit (NPU), also known as AI accelerator or deep learning processor, is a class of specialized hardware accelerator or computer system designed to accelerate artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning applications, inc ...
(NPU), which performs AI operations locally, in-silicon rather than in the
cloud
In meteorology, a cloud is an aerosol consisting of a visible mass of miniature liquid droplets, frozen crystals, or other particles, suspended in the atmosphere of a planetary body or similar space. Water or various other chemicals may ...
, has been updated to Intel's "NPU 4" architecture with increased clock speeds. Intel claims that Lunar Lake can achieve a total of 120 TOPS of performance in AI workloads, with 48 TOPS coming from the NPU alone while an additional 67 TOPS come from the GPU and 5 TOPS from the CPU. Lunar Lake's 48 dedicated NPU TOPS meets
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company, technology conglomerate headquartered in Redmond, Washington. Founded in 1975, the company became influential in the History of personal computers#The ear ...
's requirements for laptops in order to be certified as
Copilot+ PCs.
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American multinational corporation and technology company, technology conglomerate headquartered in Redmond, Washington. Founded in 1975, the company became influential in the History of personal computers#The ear ...
has mandated 40 TOPs on NPU performance in order to run
Copilot
In aviation, the first officer (FO), also called co-pilot, is a Aircraft pilot, pilot in addition to the Pilot in command, captain, who is the legal commander. In the event of incapacitation of the captain, the first officer will assume command ...
locally on
Windows
Windows is a Product lining, product line of Proprietary software, proprietary graphical user interface, graphical operating systems developed and marketed by Microsoft. It is grouped into families and subfamilies that cater to particular sec ...
PCs. For comparison, the NPU in Meteor Lake and Arrow Lake processors is able to output 10 TOPs.
Graphics
Lunar Lake's GPU features second generation
Xe2-LPG cores based on the Battlemage graphics architecture. The Battlemage architecture launched in Lunar Lake mobile processors before discrete Arc desktop graphics cards. It contains eight X
e2-LPG cores that share an 8 MB L2 cache. The GPU is able to provide up to 67 TOPS of
INT8 compute for AI processing. The display engine has three display pipes with
HDMI 2.1
High-Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI) is a proprietary digital interface used to transmit high-quality video and audio signals between devices. It is commonly used to connect devices such as televisions, computer monitors, projectors, g ...
,
DisplayPort 2.1 and a new eDP 1.5 connection.
It features
H.266 VVC hardware fixed-function decoding support.
Platform controller tile
The small platform controller tile provides security functions and I/O connectivity including Wi-Fi 7,
Thunderbolt 4, 4
PCIe 4.0 lanes and 4
PCIe 5.0
PCI Express (Peripheral Component Interconnect Express), officially abbreviated as PCIe, is a high-speed standard used to connect hardware components inside computers. It is designed to replace older expansion bus standards such as PCI, PCI ...
lanes. Lunar Lake's platform controller tile uses the same N6 node from TSMC that is used by Meteor Lake and Arrow Lake's SoC tiles.
The platform controller tile in Lunar Lake does not feature two dedicated low power E-cores like those in Meteor Lake and Arrow Lake's SoC tile. This change has been attributed to the power efficiency gains from the compute tile moving from the Intel 4 process to TSMC's more advanced N3B node.
Memory
Lunar Lake features on-package
LPDDR5X-8533
RAM
Ram, ram, or RAM most commonly refers to:
* A male sheep
* Random-access memory, computer memory
* Ram Trucks, US, since 2009
** List of vehicles named Dodge Ram, trucks and vans
** Ram Pickup, produced by Ram Trucks
Ram, ram, or RAM may also ref ...
available in 16 GB or 32 GB capacities. This on-package memory is a similar approach to
Apple
An apple is a round, edible fruit produced by an apple tree (''Malus'' spp.). Fruit trees of the orchard or domestic apple (''Malus domestica''), the most widely grown in the genus, are agriculture, cultivated worldwide. The tree originated ...
with its M series SoCs that integrate unified LPDDR memory onto the package beside the CPU silicon.
On-package memory allows the CPU to benefit from higher memory bandwidth at lower power and decreased latency as memory is physically closer to the CPU. Intel claims that Lunar Lake's on-package memory achieved a reduction of 40% in power consumption and "up to 250 square millimeters" of space.
Furthermore, memory that is integrated onto the CPU package means that the overall processor physical footprint in laptops can be reduced as memory does not need to be placed onto a separate board with its own cooling solution. Less complex cooling being required means that Lunar Lake processors can more easily fit in ultra-low power compact mobile solutions. The downside of Lunar Lake's on-package memory is that is not user replaceable or upgradable to higher capacities beyond 32 GB with SO-DIMMs.
Due to the inclusion of on-package memory, an additional 2W is added to the
TDP of Lunar Lake processors. Lunar Lake processors have a TDP ranging from 17 to 30W compared to the 15–28W TDP of Meteor Lake-H processors.
List of Lunar Lake processors
Mobile processors
See also
*
Zen 5
Zen 5 (''"Nirvana"'') is the name for a CPU microarchitecture by AMD, shown on their roadmap in May 2022, launched for mobile in July 2024 and for desktop in August 2024. It is the successor to Zen 4 and is currently fabricated on TSMC's 5 nm ...
- a competing x86 architecture from AMD
*
Arrow Lake
Notes
References
{{Intel processor roadmap
Computer-related introductions in 2024
Intel x86 microprocessors
X86 microarchitectures