What will Intel make in Timna's place? A new Celeron! As we said in our Intel Roadmap, Intel will continue to produce the Celeron into next year and, in early Q1, will produce a 100MHz FSB Celeron based on the same Coppermine technology as the current Celeron. Upping the FSB clock to 100MHz will make a tremendous difference to the Celeron's performance, seeing as how the FSB is currently hobbling the Celeron. Also, going to a separate MCH allows for third party chipsets, which are currently the heart and soul of the Intel value market.

We still see a future in CPU integration, and we believe Intel does as well. For instance, while the Pentium 4 will have a 100MHz, quad-pumped, FSB-carrying 3.2GBps of data bandwidth, we see no reason why Intel could not, some day, have a full-speed on-die FSB between an on-die MCH and the CPU.

We also believe that there is a future in integration reducing system costs. Timna appears to have come at the wrong time with the wrong level of integration. That does not mean everybody else is missing the mark. SiS is working on wholly integrated CPU/video/northbridge/southbridge combo, which should be the ultimate in x86 integration for a while to come. By cutting out both the north and southbridges, SiS will be able to reduce systems costs much more than Timna can with its separate ICH2.

So there you have it folks -- an update on where Intel is with their newest products. If you have questions or comments, please take them to www.sharkyforums.com, where you can discuss them with other Sharky Extreme readers as well as the Sharky Extreme staff.

Jon Simon
Assistant Editor