Core Ultra 5 240F, expected to use two versions of the Arrow Lake-S silicon

A new rumor suggests Intel will continue its ‘tradition’ to mix silicon dies within the mid-range CPU segment.

The next-gen Arrow Lake-S series is on track to debut on the desktop platform this year, introducing the LGA-1851 socket and pointing to the early retirement of the Raptor Lake family. The recent 14th Gen Core Refresh lacked significant improvements, the the frequencies did receive adjustments but the core count remains the same.

The next frontier for Intel will require a new socket (LGA-1851), which will house Arrow Lake-S processors featuring brand new Lion Cove and Skymont CPU cores for the first time through a chiplet design for desktops. The new rumor suggests that Intel will once again mix the dies for its mid-range segment, namely the Core Ultra 5 240(F) processor, which is expected to succeed the Core i5-14400 models, which were also seen using two different dies or more precisely tiles.

In Arrow Lake’s case, that means a different core tile, while the remaining tiles should be the same (I/O and GPU). According to Xino, the F-variant, which actually lacks (or has disabled) graphics, will use two configurations of said tiles, either an 8P+16E core one or a 6P+8E variant.

Rumor on Core Ultra 5 240F, Source: Twitter/X

While the configuration of the CPU is not known yet, the least we can assume is that it will be the same or better than the 14th Gen Core series in terms of CPU cores. When it comes to threads, the Arrow Lake-S series will no longer support hyper-threading technology, thus the thread count will be lower unless Intel adds more cores. However, it is clear that Core Ultra 9 290K will have fewer threads than the i9-14900K, because it represents the highest configuration in the series.

In the case of Core Ultra 5 240F, a change of CPU tiles may also mean a change of fabrication node. The 6+8 version is said to be using Intel 20A, while the 8+16 is rumored to use either Intel 20A or TSMC 3 nm node.

Based on Intel’s past handling of the last three Core series launches, the 240F shouldn’t be expected until 2025, because the 65W TDP models typically launch either at or close to CES.

Source: ITHome , Wccftech