Intel’s next-gen Panther Lake CPUs rumored to feature Cougar Cove architecture

Intel Cougar Cove cores for Panther Lake

According to Moore’s Law is Dead, Intel has developed a new core design that might end up in a future Core series CPUs. 

Meteor Lake and Raptor Lake Refresh

Intel has introduced some changes to the roadmap of their client CPUs. It looks like the Meteor Lake for desktop might truly be canceled, which has been mentioned by many sources already, including Intel themselves. But the next-generation Core series for desktops will also include a new architecture known as Arrow Lake.

It may appear that the recent Z790 platform refresh which is now undergoing will be the last major update for LGA1700 socket. Intel is now set to launch a refresh of the Raptor Lake series in the second half of 2023. The series are to feature higher clocks and support faster memory, but apart from that, we are looking at the same architecture underneath.

Arrow Lake

What was supposed to be an update to the desktop series in a form of LGA-1851 socket, might now be pushed back to Q4 2024, which is when the Arrow Lake desktop platform is to be released. The ARL series is to be the first major update delivering double digit performance increase over Raptor Lake. The IPC claims aside (which are typically never accurate), the new series are to feature up to 40 cores (8 Performance with 32 Efficient). This alone will result in higher multi-threaded performance, but the claim is that the same core count is already providing up to 40% increase over Meteor Lake.

Intel’s rumored client architectures, Source: Moore’s Law is Dead

Interestingly, it is reported that Arrow Lake will mainly be manufactured using TSMC nodes, at least the high-end compute dies will, including 8P+32E, 8P+16E and 6P+8E. Intel is to launch at least five different dies for Arrow Lake, including 6P+8E and 2P+8E based on Intel 20A node. There is also a talk about potential downgrade of the integrated GPU, which as we remember is to feature Xe2-LPG (same architecture level as Celestial). Rather than 320 units, the highest core count might be 192 EU.

Panther Lake and Beast Lake

According to MLID, the next-gen client series following Arrow Lake might introduce a new core architecture known as Cougar Cove. It is still said to target 8P+32E configuration, but the early projections show another big jump in single and multi-threaded performance. What is also important is that Panther Lake will be socket compatible with Arrow Lake.

The video also covers a new codename of “Beast Lake”, which is to focus on single-core performance leadership. Should Intel really want to unleash a “Beast”, it might finally feature more than 8 Performance cores. At least 14 SKUs are currently mentioned by Intel documents which were not unfortunately disclosed.

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