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The Pentium 4 is coming soon, but it is only the first of a number of products coming from Intel in the next 16 months.

Translation: RSN (an acronym for the big lie of the 80's)

The company is preparing to launch its Pentium 4 early in the fourth quarter and will follow the release with a number of processors for different product segments, according to sources. The chip will run at 1.4 GHz, Intel has said.

At the best it will be out and will not have bugs. A the worst it's a bluff attempt to encourage buyers to put off that purchase of a Ghz AMD for the holidays. Considering the problems observed noted on Tom's Hardware Page with a PIII attempting to run 1.13 Ghz, this seems excessively optimistic. IMHO Tom Pabst jumped the gun a bit to trample Intel, shoot first and call Intel PR later, I'm cynical enough to consider this a ploy to prop up Intel reputation, if not 4th quarter stock value.

Toward the end of the third quarter in 2001, the company will come out with Northwood, an improved version of the Pentium 4, according to Bert McComas, an analyst at InQuest Market

Improved: With the Bugs worked out?

Before that, in the middle of 2001, Intel will come out with Tualatin, a version of the Pentium III made on the 0.13-micron process, more advanced than the current 0.18-micron process, McComas said. The micron measurements refer to the size of certain features on the chip. By shrinking the features, a manufacturer can make the chip smaller as well as boost its performance.

Along with being faster, Tualatin will also contain a larger secondary cache, a bank of memory close to the processor that boosts performance, according to one source. Tualatin Pentium IIIs will contain 512KB of integrated cache, compared to 256KB of integrated cache on current Pentium IIIs.

Maybe Titilation would be a better name. Why continue to develop the PIII and Celeron with the PIV out? Shouldn't one of these (PIII | Celeron) be dumped?

Tualatin will also come with a 200-MHz system bus.

This actually sounds more exciting.

The Pentium 4 and its successors come at a pivotal time for the Santa Clara, Calif.-based chipmaker. The company has not been able to meet demand for many of its processors since last November. The chronic shortages, combined with the success Advanced Micro Devices has enjoyed with Athlon, have allowed AMD to capture a substantial position in the consumer market.

The most telling, "RSN, RSN!!"

The Pentium 4 is expected to give Intel the advantage over AMD in performance, according to analysts.

Analysts who haven't read about the AMD 64bit CPU.

Northwood will be made on the 0.13-micron process. The shift to this more advanced manufacturing process will allow Intel to boost the clock speed.

Just 0.13 microns thicker than vapor. Wow!

Overall, Rambus will occupy only a niche, he said. "It's a pretty clear admission that Intel is not going to make more of Rambus than the market is willing to make of it," he said.

Rambus would make a good name for a clown...

Intel could not be reached for comment and typically does not comment on product code names or unreleased products.

But their happy to comment on vapor.

Intel executives have said that Pentium 4 will be ready for the holiday buying season in 2000.

Read: Gift buying season.

Vote Naked 2000

But, They could have solved the situation without alienating Linux hackers. They could offer an open platform (maybe with a standard IDE port) available at a decent profit to them. Then they could offer two levels of service, one cheaper with the ISP service bundled, one more expensive but allowing the user to choose their ISP AND/OR modify the box.

This would help them with the major gripe about their service (lock-in to them as an ISP) and keep them on good terms with the influential Linux communnity.

It could also immediately increase their cash flow (very important to a young company), and increase their volumes on the hardware, which could help their costs.

Hopefully someone like VIA is watching this, and sees the opportunity for cool Linux appliances.

I would like to see something modular (upgradeable).

VIA seems to know something we don't know about ABit's Athalon plans. I just hope it's soon . . . and supports BSD. ;-)