Yes, according to ExtremeTech, Intel is pushing the number of transistors on a chip close to one billion!
Intel's "Montecito" dual-core successor to the Itanium will integrate a whopping 18 megabytes of level 3 cache, Intel executives revealed, pushing the transistor count closer to one billion.
Nimish Modi, general manager of Intel's Enterprise Processor Division, disclosed that each core in the Montecito, due in 2005, would use two discrete caches. Moreover, he said, each level 3 cache will be at least twice the size of the previous processor – or the so-called "Madison 9M", which uses a 9-Mbyte level 3 cache.
It is not clear whether Montecito will require the same number of transistors as essentially two Madison 9M processors crammed onto a single die. "Madison", due this year, will contain up to 6 Mbytes of on-die level-3 cache and require 410 million transistors. Madison 9M takes up greater than 500 million transistors. Intel will manufacture Madison and the Madison 9M on a 130-nanometer processor, however, while the company will build Montecito on 90-nanometer lines.
When asked when Intel would manufacture a billion-transistor microprocessor, Modi replied, "Before 2007."
Source: Mark Hachman, ExtremeTech, February 10, 2003
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