Intel is rethinking its low-cost, low-power processors for entry-level laptops in a big way this year. That mean a new name, new features, support for higher frequencies and more processor cores, and a new architecture… well kind of new.
The new Intel Alder Lake-N line of chips are basically what you’d get if you took Intel’s 12th-gen processors and only used Efficiency cores without any Performance cores. And that’s not a bad thing at all, because while the new chips won’t offer the same level of performance you’d expect from an Alder Lake-U, P, or H-series chip, they’re a big step up from the Jasper Lake processors that had previously been Intel’s go-to chips for laptops with starting prices below $400.
Alder Lake-N processors will be branded as Intel Processor Nxx or Intel Core i3-Nxx chips, depending on the model.
For example, the Intel Processor N200 is a 4-core, 4-thread chip with support for burst speeds up to 3.7 GHz. With PL1 and PL2 set at 6 watts and 25 watts, respectively, the chip should be pretty energy efficient.
The Intel Core i3-N305, meanwhile, is a 15-35W chip with 8 cores, 8-threads, and support for burst speeds up to 3.8 GHz. Basically it earns the Core i3 name by offering the kind of performance you’d expect from an entry-level Core chip rather than what Intel used to brand as Celeron or Pentium Silver. There’s no hyperthreading, but with 8 cores you might not miss it.
Alder Lake-N processors are manufactured using an Intel 7 process and use the same “Gracemont” architecture as the Efficiency cores in Alder Lake-U and faster chips. They feature Intel UHD integrated graphics with up to 32 execution units, and support for:
- LPDDR5-4800, DDR5-4800, and DDR4-3200 RAM (single-channel only)
- SSD, UFS 2.1, and eMMC storage
- PCIe 3.0
- 2 x SATA 3.0
Intel says it’s dropping the Celeron and Pentium branding because they were confusing for shoppers. That’s something I probably could have told the company a decade ago… repurposing older brands and giving them new meanings was bad enough. The fact that Intel offered both Pentium Silver (Intel Atom-based) and Pentium Gold (Intel Core-based) chips just made things even more confusing. So I’m not sad to see those names go… but I do wonder about the decision to include a Core i3 model. Hopefully using 3 digits after the Core i3 instead of 4 will help set it apart.
In terms of performance, Intel says you can expect an N200 processor to offer up to 28% better CPU performance than a previous-gen Pentium N6000 chip, and up to 64% better graphics. Things look even better if you jump up to a Core i3-N305 chip, which offers up to a 70% CPU performance boost and up to 120% faster graphics (although the N305 processor is a 15-watt chip, while the N6000 has a 6-watt TDP).
Other features include support for WiFi 6E, Bluetooth 5.2, AV1 video decoding, 10-bit HEVC/VP9 video encoding and decoding, and support for up to three 4K HDR displays thanks to HDMI 2.0b support.
Here are some key specs for some of Intel’s new low-power chips:
Chip | Cores | Threads | Base / Boost freq | L3 Cache | GPU | Power |
Core i3-N305 | 8 | 8 | Up to 3.8 GHz | 6MB | Intel UHD (32EU / up to 1.25 GHz) | 15W |
Intel Processor N97 | 4 | 4 | Up to 3.6 GHz | 6MB | Intel UHD (24EU / up to 1.2 GHz | 12W |
Intel Processor N95 | 4 | 4 | Up to 3.4 GHz | 6MB | Intel UHD (16EU / up to 1.2 GHz | 15W |
Core i3-N300 | 8 | 8 | Up to 3.8 GHz | 6MB | Intel UHD (32EU / up to 1.25 GHz) | 7W |
Intel Processor N200 | 4 | 4 | Up to 3.7 GHz | 6MB | Intel UHD (32EU / up to 750 MHz) | 6W |
Intel Processor N100 | 4 | 4 | Up to 3.4 GHz | 6MB | Intel UHD (24EU / up to 750 MHz) | 6W |
Intel Processor N50 | 2 | 2 | Up to 3.4 GHz | 6MB | Intel UHD (16EU / up to 750 MHz) | 6W |
Intel has also quietly added a few new 6-12W Alder Lake-N chips with Gracemont CPU cores to its “Atom” line of embedded chips for commercial customers:
Chip | Cores | Threads | Base / Boost freq | L3 Cache | GPU | Power |
Atom X7425E | 4 | 4 | Up to 3.4 GHz | 6MB | Intel UHD (24EU / up to 1 GHz) | 12W |
Atom X7213E | 2 | 2 | Up to 3.2 GHz | 6MB | Intel UHD (16EU / up to 1 GHz | 10W |
Atom X7211E | 2 | 2 | Up to 3.2 GHz | 6MB | Intel UHD (16EU / up to 1 GHz) | 6W |
https://liliputing.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/intel-n_01-780×439.jpg
^This art work serious cringe
Such a mess in naming! It looks like there is will be another year and another names. I have an oDroid N2 as mini PC and it works well – it is low powered and passively cooled.
Something Brad missed is that all the new SoCs in the charts above are all single-channel memory designs.
Good point – I just added a note to the article!
First I was excited about N305/N300 to buy/build new efficient capable Mini PC.
I uses Ramdisk and VM’s soi want min. 32GB better 64GB RAM.
Now I am very disappointed to found out about the 16GB single channel limitation!! The absolute nogo killer. (Single channel might not be too bad with DDR5).
$308 for this stupid 16GB limit – No thanks
orange pi 5 is supposed to come with 32GB RAM at a good price (rk3588s) but I didn’t find where to buy it with this amount of RAM …
We still can hope that the chips run larger RAM beyond the official specs. I successfully run the pre-predecessor Gemini Lake with 32GB – and also with a large ramdisk 😉 despite it officially only being capable of 8GB max.
The “N” stands for Netbook… if you buy one of these, you are buying a netbook.
the market is missing some good netbooks with about 11-12 inch screen, preferably 16/10 or 3/2 … too bad the surface laptop go screen is not good … the surface laptop go is also noticeably heavier than a samsung book pro 13.3 … hopefully somebody will come with an interesting linux netbook with the rk3588s processor …
“Hopefully using 3 digits after the Core i3 instead of 4 will help set it apart.”
In my opinion it won’t, possibly they made things even worse, now the average Joe can become confused between an Atom based Core and a Core based Core. After all if Gold/Silver wasn’t enough it’s unlikely that a single digit will be very helpful.
Also, the phrase “my laptop has an Intel Processor N200 processor” is going to be really funny. Maybe they could have used a new name or straighten the usage of the venerable Pentium/Celeron brands.
Or, just go back to calling all the ones that only have efficiency cores Atom…
Millennials still associate Atom with netbooks, they can’t do that.
Something the size and shape of a GPD Win 2, but with an N200 or N300 in it would be interesting. I wonder what the performance delta would be between those and the old 7y30…
Depends on what that device is expected to do. Gaming? Might be double the performance from a 7y30. Might be higher with a Pentium Silver N6000.