Via dubs Isaiah Intel Silverthorne competitor

Chicago (IL) – Via-Centaur has completed the development of its new Isaiah core processors, which are expected to begin shipping this Spring. The manufacturer claims that processors based on the new architecture will be faster than Intel’s upcoming Silverthorne processors, while playing in the same power league.

Via processors have not been very visible in North America to consumers, with the exception of some UMPCs perhaps. But the company hopes that this scenario will change with its new Isaiah CPU and an IT industry that is focusing more and more on opportunities in emerging markets. The company today revealed first details of the processor : There are few surprises, as Via brought its processor up to date, but the market is clearly shifting and may enable Via to sell more silicon.

Isaiah will remain a single-core CPU and integrate 64 KB L1 cache and initially 1 MB L2 cache. Clock speeds were not disclosed but we do expect dramatic changes from the current C7 (Esther core) range of 1.0 – 2.0 GHz. Via claims that Isaiah will be about two to four times faster than Esther at comparable clock speeds. The 65 nm chip will get many of the features we have seen in AMD’s and Intel’s recent processor technologies, such as smart cache, branch prediction as well as micro/macro fusion. Isaiah now also includes 64-bit support and new SSE instructions “to take advantage of the latest software” advances, Via said.

Surprisingly, however, Via isn’t shy of positioning Isaiah directly against Intel’s Silverthorne processor – a chip that will target Mobile Inter Devices and PCs at the very low end of the spectrum. Via has been more conservative when comparing its own processors with Intel chips : This time, Via claims that Isaiah will not only be faster than Silverthorne - while maintaining a similar power level - but “probably as fast as some of the Intel products on the market today.” He did not specify which products he was referring to.

With Intel trying to aggressively opening emerging markets for the IT industry, Via could be following in the tailwind. And Via claims that it has some advantages over Intel – including a backwards compatibility of the Isaiah chip with C7 Esther CPUs. C7-based systems in production today can be upgraded with a simple Isaiah drop-in, Via said.

Open questions, of course, include how well Isaiah performs not just on paper but in real products and we do not know how much Silverthorne and Isaiah processors will cost. And cost may very well be the most critical component of processors that are aiming for the $200 to $300 range of PCs.