In its first quarter 2010 earnings conference call in April, Intel confirmed that it is working on its next generation of computer processors. Codenamed Sandy Bridge, these 32nm processors are the expected successor to the current generation Nehalem processors and are slated to hit full production later this year. Though Intel has remained silent on the underlying architecture of these upcoming processors, a rumor out of Notebook Italia may shed some light on the specifications and naming conventions for this upcoming crop of Intel-branded CPUs. Keeping with the Core iX branding, the Sandy Bridge processors are though to include the following:
- Core i7 2600: quad-core processors with Hyper-Threading, 3.2 GHz, 8 MB L3 cache
- Core i5 2400: quad-core processors without Hyper-Threading, 3.1 GHz, 6 MB L3 cache
- Core i5 2500: quad-core processors without Hyper-Threading, 3.3 GHz, 6 MB L3 cache
- Core i3 2100: Dual-Core with Hyper-Threading, 3.1 GHz, 3 MB L3 cache
- I3 2120 Core: Dual-Core with Hyper-Threading, 3.3 GHz, 3 MB L3 cache
All the Sandy Bridge processors are expected to be Socket LGA 1155 compatible with a minimum clock speed of 3.1Ghz. As with all rumors, take this one with a grain of salt as it has not been confirmed and these early specs may change as the R&D and manufacturing process moves forward.