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Intel to drop the “I” moniker in upcoming CPU rebrand
- gjsman-1000 3y agoEr… what? As they say in the comments, they’re getting hammered by AMD… so throw away the brand recognition? I personally never understood why they didn’t spread it to all their lines. Their GPU line could have been the G3, G5, and G7; SSDs could have been S3, S5, and S7; Wi-Fi could have been W3, W5, and W7; and Chipsets could have been C3, C5, and C7. Oh well…
- djbusby 3y agoYou gotta do more than practical to impress the VPs and Board. Do some sillyness, point to line go up, promotion!
- kibwen 3y agoI think this is overestimating the amount of "brand recognition" that Intel gets out of the "i". Ordinary consumers don't give a damn about it whatsoever, hell, I guarantee 99% of ordinary people don't even know which manufacturer produced the CPU on any given device that they own. Meanwhile, enthusiasts will roll their eyes and use whatever dumb naming scheme Intel replaces it with. It was terribly convoluted before, and it will certainly be terribly convoluted after. This is a non-event.
- opportune 3y agoPersonally I think the i-N naming convention (and Ryzen naming convention for that matter) may have slightly hurt sales of the higher performance i-3 chips, which could be better than even midrange i-<5-9> chips for specific or general scenarios. If I were branding chips I’d do some combination of core count, clock speed (yes I know performance is much more complicated), chip type/power requirements/specialization, and iteration. Like I have no idea how to compare an i3-4971058373 to an i7-5927263849. I can much more easily compare an i6L-36v2 (six core, 3.6 GHz, laptop thermals/power, second version) to an i8D-38v1. And even more importantly I can seek out SKUs according to my requirements rather than having to go through multiple third party websites doing the work of cataloguing/comparing specs and explaining wtf each sku is.
- qwytw 3y ago> I guarantee 99% of ordinary people don't even know which manufacturer produced the CPU on any given If you define 'ordinary people' as people who don't know what CPU their PC has you'll be right. But I generally I'd assume most people who buy their devices themselves might have some understanding about i3 < i5 < i7
- internet2000 3y ago> The “i” branding is extremely powerful with the average consumer and removing it is bound to cause confusion amongst consumers who aren’t technically-inclined. There's no way this is true. The iNumbers were never used consistently enough to mean anything.
- ethbr0 3y agoWhen they were first released they were. i3: single core, hyperthreading i5: multi core, no hyperthreading i7: multi core, hyperthreading It only jumped the shark once hyperthreading stopped being a differentiating feature, and Intel tried to retcon equivalent performance levels into their previous numbering system. Edit: Nehalem (~2008). Apparently i3 didn't exist until the Westmere die shrink?
- deaddodo 3y agoThis was true for only the first generation (Nehalem): https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nehalem_(microarchitecture) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nehalem_(microarchitecture) And they didn't even have an i3 model. What you refer to as the i3 above was still branded as "Celeron". The immediate successor (Westmere) didn't follow this convention at all: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westmere_(microarchitecture) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Westmere_(microarchitecture) All of the i3 and i5s of that generation were MC+SMT.
- ethbr0 3y agoLooked up the history and got there the same time as you. Hindsight is 20/20, so I see how Intel ~2008 could have thought "Maybe SMT will fail in real world scenarios, so we don't want it on our entire product line." But at some point relatively soon after that it was clear that SMT worked well and they could cram it into every chip. That's when they really should have ditched the i* and converted to a new system.
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- klodolph 3y agoI do think the i3/i5/i7/i9 monikers are actually pretty confusing, just speaking as someone who has been using computers much longer than the brand existed. Problem is that a CPU from 2009 is going to be called an “i5” and there are just so many people who say they have an “i5” or “i7” without knowing what generation it is from.
- MBCook 3y agoI kind of like what Nvidia has been doing in GPUs. They have series. 1000s, 2000s, 3000s. Each generate is a new series. Then the products inside seem to be in performance order. A 3080 is better than a 3060 is better than a 3020 (if that exists). I know it gets messier than that. The fact that they add the titanium versions kind of screws with it. And in the last year they had that card they had to renumber because a change to its memory configuration (?) made it perform wrong for its moniker. But at least you know a 3080 is two generations newer than a 1080. Compared to the seemingly random numbers on CPUs it’s simple.
- userbinator 3y agoBut at least you know a 3080 is two generations newer than a 1080. That's similar to what Intel was doing with the numbers following the i{3,5,7,9}: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Intel_processors https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Intel_processors
- marak830 3y agoI believe his point is, that the I(3/5/7/9) moniker represents the chip power relation, but which generation of the chip is hidden, unlike with say the GeForce cards with the 10xx/20xx/30xx.
- klodolph 3y agoThe problem with Nvidia is that I blinked and the numbers wrapped around, so a GeForce RTX 4070 is really new, but a GeForce FX 5200 is really old.
- jzb 3y ago“The “i” branding is extremely powerful with the average consumer and removing it is bound to cause confusion amongst consumers who aren’t technically-inclined.” Who’s the “average” consumer here? I’m skeptical that the majority of PC buyers have internalized the “i” branding. Gamers, sure. But average consumers? I’ve talked a number of less computer savvy friends and family through computer purchases and there was awareness of Intel, but beyond that not so much. I don’t think a rebrand is going to change much for Intel either way. Average consumers are either going to buy by price point and familiar brand (Lenovo, Dell, etc.) or phone a friend to get advice. Or use whatever they get handed by their employer.
- MuffinFlavored 3y ago> “The “i” branding is extremely powerful with the average consumer and removing it is bound to cause confusion amongst consumers who aren’t technically-inclined.” I feel like you're either in one of two groups: 1. a PC "nerd" (kind of deragotory) who is obsessed with specs all the way down to things like L2 cache size, etc. 2. somebody who has 0 clue what any computer/laptop specification means whatsoever
- MBCook 3y ago> somebody who has 0 clue what any computer/laptop specification means whatsoever Life was so easy in the MHz-wars days. The bigger number was basically always better, and you could easily tell by how much.
- lynguist 3y agoNope, the IPC was hugely different in the MHZ wars days. Pentium III had 20% higher IPC than Pentium 4 Northwood; AMD K8 (Athlon 64) had 35% higher IPC than Pentium 4 Prescott. Same in the RISC vs CISC days: Pentium had 33% higher IPC than the original PowerPC 601. Late generation RISCs like Alpha were a completely different beast again, with the DEC Alpha 21264 (EV6) having 25% higher IPC than Pentium III. It was never obvious back then, and it was also never obvious since then. IPC keeps rising among different architectures. A couple years ago Apple overtook Intel, and ARM did as well.
- nikodunk 3y agoThat leaves us with Intel 3, Intel 5 and Intel 7, which is quite strong IMO because it drops the i sub-brand?
- userbinator 3y agoSetting the stage for the Intel 11, because it goes to 11.
- Arrath 3y ago*Liquid Nitrogen cooling apparatus not included
- klyrs 3y agoNothing says executive floundering quite like blowing millions on a rebrand. Here's an idea: make it a new product, a good one, and give that a different name.
- technocratius 3y agoDepends on what you consider a "new" product though. Intel makes CPUs, and if you look at it from an architectural perspective it's quite reasonable to say that every generation is a new product. But I guess you could argue that when the core functionality (CPU) stays the same (as opposed to changing it to e.g. an APU), the product stays the same...
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- MBCook 3y agoI’ve been out of the enthusiast game since the P4. I understand that an i5 is better than an i3 and worse than an i7. Outside of that I’m totally lost. Different core counts, different kinds of cores, multiple clock speeds (minimum, normal, max, ultra-boost), etc. and of course a current i3 probably destroys an older i7 in benchmarks. GPUs aren’t quite as bad. A 3060 is better than a 2060, but is a 3060 better than a 2080ti? But I find CPUs (when I see model numbers mentioned) totally inscrutable. I don’t know if the i-series names are valuable. The last Intel name I really remember is the Core 2 Duo name. i3 is no where near as memorable. Whatever they do, I hope they find a way to make their various lines and models easier to understand. I know that’s difficult for a company like Intel with such a huge line up of products.
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- precompute 3y ago> I understand that an i5 is better than an i3 and worse than an i7. That isn't always true. It's pushed by intel as a "handy reference" for specifications, when it's actually just a price bracket. Many noobs will see it as a three-level hierarchy and conclude that they need an i7 for their mundane office work, when a pentium would have sufficed. You gotta read and understand the specifications. AMD has an actually useful naming spec for their processors, unlike intel.
- tadfisher 3y agoI have a Core i3 that supports ECC memory, for example. The contemporary i5 and i7 models did not. Baffling, somewhat.
- bluedino 3y agoWait until you get to the Xeons. Platinum, Gold, Silver, and Bronze.
- ddtaylor 3y agoCan we just go back to numbers where higher is always better?
- rincebrain 3y agoWell, if we have 32 cores at 2 GHz, and 48 cores at 1.5 GHz, from the same chip architecture, which is better? For some workloads, it's one; for others, it's the other. A one-dimensional performance axis is hard in practice.
- MBCook 3y agoYou could use a synthetic benchmark. Create your own Geekbench like thing and use those numbers. Intel-$singlecore-$multicore So an Intel-6-12 had twice the single core performance of the Intel-3-48 but is much worse in multicore. Yeah, things are WAY more complicated. But at least it gives you a chance without memorizing spec sheets first. Higher numbers are always better. No redefining. This year’s 5 can’t be better than last year’s 20 in performance. I don’t follow Intel/AMD chips anymore. If I wanted to buy a computer I’d have to learn it all from scratch. This would give me a nice leg up.
- bubblethink 3y ago>Intel-$singlecore-$multicore There will be power specs, and igpu specs, and ecc, and so on. It's hard to capture succinctly.
- Dylan16807 3y agoGpu can be a third number. Power doesn't need to be in the model number. Neither does ecc, also all cpus should have such an easy to implement feature.
- ddtaylor 3y agoFor the most part the transistor count (or something akin to it) is usually increasing, even if the die space is larger.
- yk 3y agoSounds like someone is getting an earful for not checking the branding guideline's spelling while "leaking."
- ksec 3y agoI wish Intel get back to the absolute basic. Great Products, Easy to understand spec numbers, less artificial market segmentation ( apart from optimising for yield ).
- UberFly 3y agoThat site is really good. Definitely speed dial worthy - thanks for the story. About dropping the "i" - I think Intel is in need of a refresh and a new name wouldn't hurt the brand as a whole. I just hope they'd come up with something sensible and easy for the consumer to understand.
- andrewstuart 3y agoThe technical term for this is "debranding", which is when a company doesn't believe there is significant value left in its core brand.
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- phendrenad2 3y agoIntel Core 3 Duo?
- Maursault 3y agoThis strategy isn't going to work. Dropping the moniker isn't going to make any difference. They need to drop the platform. Until they do, they'll never catch up to Apple. Intel has been pwned by Apple since 2020, and that trend will only continue if Intel keeps on beating their dead horse. This is ridiculous, the kind of decision-making that killed Sun, and obviously the brain child of some ambitious MBA.
- borissk 3y agoHaha, you're an Apple fanboy. Intel CPUs are more than fast enough for current software. Just today I took out of storage an almost 5 year old laptop (a Dell Precision) with Intel i7-8750h (6 cores, 12 threads) and 32GB RAM. Put in a new SSD (Samsung 980 Pro) and it flies with Windows 10 - browsing, watching 4K movies, using JetBrains WebStorm with a fairly large TypeScript project all work perfectly well and the laptop is completely silent. There is no noticeable difference between this laptop and my desktop with i5-13600K. iSheeple usually compare M1 and M2 laptops with Apple's old Intel based laptops and not with current Intel and AMD mobile processors - which are completely competitive in terms of performance.
- saagarjha 3y agoResponding to a “fanboy” with “iSheeple” doesn’t really win you any credibility.
- andromeduck 3y agoBattery life and thermals are much better on M1. It's also that Intel laptops are pretty trash in general especially at equivalent price points vs what apple offers. Not everyone needs or wants it all buy you want really good quality, screen/keyboard/trackpad build quality/acoustics apple is pretty much the only choice out there.
- lostgame 3y ago'iSheeple' cringes You had some credibility up until then...
- mikelward 3y agoThe original article uses lowercase "i", which is much clearer than the title here.
- gambiting 3y agoBrands are just going bananas trying to get rid of their own identity for some reason. It's the same as Land Rover(JLR) announcing that they won't call their cars land rover anymore, "because customers find it confusing". Apparently according to their spokesperson "no one says they own a Land Rover Defender, it's just a Defender". Like.....everyone ok in the head over there at the HQ?
- red-iron-pine 3y agoFundamental shifts in the market -- i.e. the "K shaped recovery" where the poor got poorer and the rich got much richer -- require brands to start recalculating who and what they're marketing. A race to the bottom but also a race to the top, and requirements to re-shape what those brands mean as they reach to those segments. Definitely an issue for a luxury brand, too.
- corbulo 3y agoIts a lot like movie studios making sequels without subtext or numbers to have a 'cleaner' title. Really bizarre practice that doesn't actually make it easier for the consumer, as the year of release becomes the number instead.
- spacebanana7 3y agoSimilar to Yves Saint Laurent dropping the "Yves"
- wruza 3y agoAs someone who didn’t know but then learned it, I don’t think it is a good idea. Naive people say “I have i7”, so what? All enthusiasts refer to model numbers like 12700k. i-notation is useful in a “today” context like “recent i7” or “compared to previous i7”. This is exactly what less savvy consumers want when buying a modern pc. Latest-ish i-something to do-something like gaming, video editing or spreadsheets.
- simula67 3y agoI think we are now conditioned to think that higher numbers are 'better' or 'continuations' of lower numbers. For example, "Back to the Future: 3" movie is a continuation of the story of the movie "Back to the Future: 2". Similarly, Windows version 3 is the new and improved version of Windows Version 2. It seems that marketing executives have forgotten that part of their jobs is to ensure that they communicate product qualities accurately to consumers. Google is one of the worst offenders in this, with their madness over naming. Is Nexus 5X an earlier version of Nexus 6? No? It denotes the size of the screen? What exactly is a Pixel? Phone? Tablet? Notebook? What does Chromecast have to do with Chrome? I always though Intel is a close second. There can be better names for Intel processor lines: i3: Mobile i5: Balanced i7: Professional i9: Creative/Graphics There may be better approximations of course. But ideally if a product is targetted at a segment, it should be made clear in the brand name. Generations can be mentioned as suffix: p13 would be 13th generation of Professional, m5 would be 5th generation of mobile. Apple does a good job of this with their Mac lines: Air: Ultraportable Pro: Creatives/Professional users M1, M2 etc: higher is always better. People don't want to feel ripped off, so I am sure that the clear communication from the Apple marketing team provides a significant tailwind to their sales team.
- void-pointer 3y agoApple understood this from the word go and I don’t understand why everyone else is struggling so much: M 1 Pro ^ ^ ^ Form Gen Intra-gen Factor Differentiator Admittedly, the Pro/Max/Ultra names are arbitrary, but it’s still easier to pronounce and understand than “Intel Core i9-10900K”
- SlackingOff123 3y agoYes, but each intel CPU generation has more than 3 models. Having arbitrary names for 12 (?) models would just be silly.
- Macha 3y agoi5 10 700k ^ ^ ^ Bracket Gen In gen differentiator
- red-iron-pine 3y agoThe K also has a meaning: in this case, that the processor is unlocked
- Ekaros 3y agoi3, i5, i7 and i9 really aren't so bad. Just need to consider words following that is generation X. Later generation usually better. Bigger numbers generally better.
- PedroBatista 3y agoI think Intel branding is the least of their problems and it’s not the reason why people aren’t buying their CPUs.
- bfrog 3y agoNo one really does a nice job of this, once the marketing department gets hold its all "super/ultra/maximum/titanium/silver/gold/plantinum/diamond" etc These words have lost all meaning. No its not just Intel, its literally every single consumer cpu and gpu maker.
- abudabi123 3y agoAssociate each product with three names targeting the market segment that is classy:tea, classless:water, crass:fizzypop-zerosugar. The regulator should assign a grid coordinate for the product to locate its absolute/relative performance. ARM seems to have a meaningful naming scheme a:application, r:i-forget, m:mobile.
- corbulo 3y agoThe tech hardware industry generally has terrible marketing. Look at laptop SKUs. None of them are effective at delineating product tiers in an easy to understand way. Even Apple post-Jobs is bad at this: wtf is an air vs pro vs just 'mac' or 'macbook'? What in the hell is an ultra max? As someone who keeps tabs on the products I can pretty quickly get an intuition for what they mean, but the semantics do no favors. They're just placeholders for 'better' and 'best' when used in various combinations. But once you stop labeling the base model (such as plainly 'Macbook') you're not qualifying what the marketing term is trying to convey (what is it 'better' than?). 'Air' as opposed to...? 'Pro' compared to...a product you no longer sell? 'Ultra' or 'Plus' for phones but 'Pro' for desktop OSs? If you tried to chart out the marketing terms used in the tech hardware industry it would look like the Always Sunny Charlie Conspiracy meme.
- tibbydudeza 3y agoM1 or Pro or Ultra Simple really.
- bluedino 3y agoHere's my question. Why are there SO MANY PROCESSOR SKUs? https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/products/platforms/details/cascade-lake.html https://www.intel.com/content/www/us/en/products/platforms/d... I lost count at 75 SKUs for Cascade Lake. Do we need 2-core increments? Do we need 0.2 GHz increments? Is this just part of the binning process? Wouldn't it make it easier for everyone if they had 1/4 the amount? I'm trying to think of the amount of manhours wasted in meetings where IT staff debate 16-core vs 18-core and 20-core, alonge with 2.1GHz vs 2.3Ghz and 2.5GHz, when all the CPU's are within $100 of each other. I think back to the Pentium days when you'd only have a handful of clockspeeds and then something new (like MMX), or a new socket would come out and then you'd get a couple more chips.
- corbulo 3y agoCould it be a result of the manufacturing process? To my layman understanding, not all silicon is created equal.
- MichaelZuo 3y agoYou answered the question already. Binning.
- NBJack 3y agoIt does raise an interesting question: is the 'spectrum' bigger because marketing wanted to capitalize, or is it a bigger range of outcomes on chips due to the progression of shrinking fab sizes?
- MichaelZuo 3y ago> a bigger range of outcomes on chips due to the progression of shrinking fab sizes You don't even need me to answer.
- gumby 3y agoGood they are dropping this confusing naming system. As usual, Apple does it so much better. It’s just a MacBook Air, except in the documentation it’s “Macbook Air Late 2019” except when you ask the machine itself it uses yet another name.