Intel Panther Lake Promises Revolution in Mobile Processors with New 18A Process
Company Intel is preparing to launch a new mobile platform Panther Lake, which promises to be the biggest leap in performance in years. The new processors will not only be built on the proprietary process technology 18A, but will also bring significant improvements in the field AI computing, which is especially important against the backdrop of growing interest in neural network applications.
According to fresh data discovered by the user @InstLatX64, the Panther Lake architecture will use Cougar Cove as performance cores (P-Cores) and Darkmont for energy-efficient cores (E-Cores). This change in plans - previously expected to use Skymont - opens up the possibility for Intel to offer excellent performance in the mobile segment.
As for configurations, leaks have revealed several interesting options:
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PTL-H SKU #1: 4 P-Cores + 8 E-Cores + 0 LP-E Cores + 4 Xe3 Cores (45 W)
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PTL-H SKU #2: 4 P-Cores + 8 E-Cores + 4 LP-E Cores + 12 Xe3 Cores (25 W)
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PTL-H SKU #3: 4 P-Cores + 8 E-Cores + 4 LP-E Cores + 4 Xe3 Cores (25 W)
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PTL-U SKU #1: 4 P-Cores + 0 E-Cores + 4 LP-E Cores + 4 Xe3 Cores (15 W)
In terms of power consumption, the processors will have maximum PL2 values up to 80 W (PL1 45W), which promises outstanding performance for notebooks and ultrabooks.
One of the most significant innovations will be the fifth generation of specialized AI accelerators (NPU), capable of reaching up to 180 TOPS computing power. For comparison, this is more than twice as much as current Lunar Lake solutions. It also supports memory management LPDDR5X at speeds up to 8533 MT/s и DDR5 to 7200 MT/s, which will further increase the throughput of the systems.
Mass production of Panther Lake is expected to begin in 2026 year, and the first devices will appear on the market already in second half of 2025. At the moment, the processors are being actively tested by Intel partners, which indicates the high readiness of the platform for commercial launch.
