Alleged 8-Core Intel Coffee Lake Processor Leaks Again Via SiSoft Database
If all goes to plan (*revised* plan, that is), Intel will finally start shipping its 10-nanometer processors in volume early next year, delivering its much anticipated Cannon Lake lineup to the masses. In the meantime, Intel is extracting as much performance out of Coffee Lake as possible, and rumor has it there are 8-core variants in the wings. Supporting that notion is yet another leak of an 8-core Coffee Lake chip on a benchmarking site.
The Coffee Lake processor in question poked its head from SiSoftware's Sandra Titanium database. Sandra is a popular system utility with various benchmarking tools, and we use it quite often around these parts. One of the benchmarks focuses on CPU performance. That is where the unreleased Coffee Lake processor showed up, or at least that is what it appears to be based on the data provided.
Looking at the listing, it actually indicates the test system as being an Intel Kaby Lake Client platform, or Kabye Lake-S. What that actually reveals, however, is that Coffee Lake in 8-core form is likely to run on Intel's existing LGA 1151 socket.
Click to Enlarge (Source: SiSoftware)
The CPU itself is listed as an 8-core/16-thread processor with a 2.6GHz base clockspeed and 16MB of L3 cache (2MB per core). There's no mention of a boost clock, and quite frankly, the base clock isn't all that exciting. However, this is likely a test sample—the finalized specs could change by the time this particular SKU (whatever it is) makes it to market. Or not, as there's just no way of knowing at the moment.
We're crossing our fingers that 8-core Coffee Lake CPUs arrive soon. The signs seem to point at that being the case, both because of the increased number of CPU leaks recently, and Intel having revealed documentation on its website for a new Z390 motherboard chipset.
There's certainly plenty of motivation for Intel to bring 8-core CPUs to the mainstream market. AMD's second generation Ryzen processors have been generating a lot of buzz and excitement, and while single-threaded performance isn't quite as strong as what Coffee Lake delivers, Ryzen does really well with multi-threaded workloads.
