Originally posted here by phishphreek80
I would guess intel is going to focus more on the 64bit processors.
They have to keep up with others like AMD.
AMD relased a 64bit processor that is backwards compatible with 32 bit and it even has the northbridge chip built in! Intel's 64 bit processor is not backwards compatible and they still have the northbridge chip on the mobo. AMD dealt a blow to intel. Now they have to play catch up.
AMD dealt a blow to Intel by outselling them, nothing more, nothing less. Just FYI, the Athlon-64 does not have a northbridge on the processor, it has the memory controller only, which was most of what made up a north bridge, but not all of it. Certain other things sit on a north bridge, like the AGP bus, as one example.

Originally posted here by Danielsd
The problem with 64bit processors is that there are no 64bit operating systems. LONGHORN please come faster!
Umm, there are plenty of 64 bit operating systems, only two are pertinent at the moment. WinXP 64bit is in beta at the moment, and Linux has supported the AMD64 architecture pretty well since it was introduced. I think it's funny that Microsoft has come full swing with their NT-based OSes and 64-bit processor support. Had it, ditched it, have it again!

Originally posted here by Und3ertak3r
the heating problem and the problems with testing /quality control ..

AMD has been Benchmark clocking their chips for the past couple of years


so has Moores law been beaten?
Moore's law has nothing to do with speed, and everything to do with transistors. It hasn't been broken, nor will it likely ever be, unless we move past transistors and on to some other technology that can't be described as such.
Anyway, This is what Intel has to say about it.

Originally posted here by nihil
I think that dual cores and much larger caches give a better cost/performance payback than raw clockspeed at this moment.
They make desktop operations and multitasking run smoother, but so few applications are written with SMP in mind that it is useless if you are singletasking.

Originally posted here by Tim_axe
I'm sorry to say, but I don't have hopes for extra Cache and less MHz to be the cure for solving heat problems. Think of it like this: L2 Cache runs at the same speed as the core.
Only if it's full-speed L2 Cache. On many processors -- excluding the top of the line current ones -- it runs at half the speed.

Like the 3.8GHz 2MB L2 example the article gave. Currently Prescotts are running with 1MB of L2 cache at the speed of the processor. At 3.2GHz they are pretty heated. Think of adding 2x more Cache size on the die, and having all of that running at 3.8GHz. I don't know how big the L2 cache is compared to the rest of the die, but IIRC 512kb was a pretty costly chunk of silicone (at least for 130nm). And I'd imagine that it running that fast will produce some heat...

But Intel's change of strategy is sure a showing that they have the balls to turn their hugely successful microprocessor business 180 degrees out of the GHz race. Props to them for it
It's kinda hard to not be hugely successful when your chief competition has only had decent products for about 7 of the last 20 years. It's not really balls either, they know that they can only push it so far before they end up with another PIII/1133 launch (within I think a month and a half after "launch", they recalled them).