Intel announced the 12th Gen Core Alder Lake chipset back in October 2021. The company then followed it up with H-series powerful CPUs for desktops and laptops at CES 2022. To finally top it off, Intel has now announced the new P-series and U-series Alder Lake 12th Gen chips for ultrabooks and notebooks. These are the chips that will power thinner, lighter, and affordable laptops of 2022.
"Following the launch of the fastest mobile processor for gaming, we’re now expanding our 12th Gen Intel Core processor family to deliver a massive leap forward in performance for thin-and-light laptops. From the ultra-thin form factors to enthusiast-grade performance in a sleek design, we’re providing consumers and businesses with leadership performance and cutting-edge technologies."
— Chris Walker, Intel’s corporate vice present and general manager, Mobility Client Platforms
Intel has announced a total of 20 chips across the P-series and U-series chipsets. P-series chips are said to run at 15W while the U-series chips are said to run at even low power (9W). The company says the first laptops with these chipsets will arrive in March this year.
Intel's betting a lot on its 12th Gen chipsets. The company finally gave in and adopted a new architecture that has two different sets of cores running at different clock speeds: P-cores (Performance cores) and E-cores (Efficient cores). The architecture on the first look sounds similar to ARM's big.LITTLE, but Intel says it's more than that.
Source: Windows Central
The company claims the high-end P-series chipset, the Core i7-1280P chipset has 70% better multi-thread performance than the last generation 11th Gen chipset. It even adds that some chipsets of the new series beat Apple's M1 and M1 Pro and AMD’s Ryzen R7 5800U in tasks like web browsing and photo editing.
Like the other 12th Gen chipsets, Core i7-1280P also has cores divided into P-cores and E-cores. This chipset has a total of 6 P-cores and 8 E-cores (14 in total) and provides a maximum clock speed of 4.8GHz. Intel says it's a base power consumption of only 28W but it can go up to 64W to reach Max Turbo speeds when plugged in.
Source: Windows Central
On the other hand, U-series Alder Lake chipsets are targeted towards the slimmest ultraportable. Intel says its high-end U-series chip, the Intel Core i7-1265U, has a max clock speed of 4.8GHz. It is a 10-core chipset with 2 P-cores and 8 E-cores. It has a case power consumption of 15W which can go up to 55W to reach Max Turbo speeds when plugged in.
Both the chipsets introduced feature Iris Xe integrated graphics. The company says manufacturers will be able to add the discrete Arc GPU as well. But, Intel claims that the 1280P chipset was able to achieve 82fps in Grand Theft Auto V (on medium settings at 1080p) using the integrated graphics. It remains to be seen how the new chipsets perform outside the company's labs.
Via: XDA Developers, The Verge