Intel Corp. will introduce its new Dothan mobile processor at a launch event in San Francisco on May 10, the company announced Thursday. Dothan is the code name for the 90-nanometer version of the Pentium M processor, first introduced under the Banias code name last year. The Pentium M, along with a mobile chipset and a wireless Internet chip, makes up Intel's Centrino mobile package for notebooks. Intel doubled the amount of Level 2 cache that comes with Dothan to 2M bytes. Cache is used to store frequently accessed data close to the processor in order to reduce the time needed to fetch that data and run it through the processor.
The jump to a 90-nanometer process technology allows Intel to decrease the size of the transistors on the chip. This means the company can add transistors to improve performance without having to increase the size of the chip. Intel has already shipped the Prescott Pentium 4, its first 90 nanometer processor for desktop PCs. That chip actually consumed more power than its Northwood predecessor, and there are some concerns that Dothan might duplicate that power consumption increase due to the additional cache as well as excess power leakage from chips made on the 90 nanometer process generation.
News source: InfoWorld
