Intel is fighting to maintain global processor supremacy, but it remains the go-to company for now.
According to Mercury Research (via Reuters), the US company accounted for around 68.7% of the most popular x86 chip market in the fourth quarter of 2022. However, rival AMD has steadily increased to 31.3%, while chips Apple and Qualcomm based on ARM continue to become more popular.
Despite this, chances are your next laptop or PC will be powered by Intel. So what does the company do next? Unsurprisingly, 14th Gen Meteor Lake CPUs are on the way, but rumors suggest they may be limited to mobile CPUs. Here’s everything we know so far.
Intel Meteor Lake Release Date
Intel has confirmed an approximate release window for the first 14th Gen processors, but it’s nothing more specific than 2023.
However, a June 2022 YouTube video from “Moore’s Law is Dead” (via Wccftech) suggests that Meteor Lake chips could debut as early as the second or third quarter of 2023 – that is, anytime between April and September.
These will supposedly be for laptop chips, before the first desktops arrive in Q4. However, the latter may never materialize if the rumors (below) of no desktop chips turn out to be true.
As for a more specific launch date, Intel usually launches its new processors at the company’s Innovation event. This is where we saw the first Raptor Lake processors in late September 2022, before many more arrived in January at CES 2023.
A similar delay is possible for Meteor Lake, but by no means guaranteed.
However, in August 2022, Intel was forced to deny that any consumer-focused chips will be delayed until 2024. As The Verge reported, there were plenty of earlier rumors suggesting Meteor Lake was late.
But Intel has insisted that not only will the first Alder Lake processors launch in 2023, but they will be available for purchase before the end of the year.
Will Intel release Meteor Lake desktop and mobile chips?
Maybe not. Mobile chips for Windows laptops and tablets seem to be the order of the day, but they might not be joined by desktop versions this time around.
In December 2022, regularly that the Meteor Lake-S chips designed for desktop computers had been canceled. A later tweet from the same account suggests that the same product will instead be used in a Meteor Lake-P laptop processor:
Around the same time as the tweet above, PC Gamer’s Jeremy Laird described Arrow Lake 15th Gen as the “true desktop replacement” for Raptor Lake – not Meteor Lake.
But if that turns out to be true, that’s nothing new for Intel. Neither Ice Lake (10th Gen) nor Tiger Lake (11th Gen) included desktop processors, and that hasn’t affected the strength of two generations since.
Intel Meteor Lake Pricing
Pricing is something few rumors are able to subdue, especially when it comes to just suggested numbers for desktop processors that may never arrive.
But if Intel decides to release standalone versions of Meteor Lake processors, they may be priced similar to current 13th-gen processors. Here’s how much you can expect to pay for Raptor Lake-K at launch:
- Core i9-13900KS – $699
- Core i9-13900K – $589
- Core i9-13900KF – $564
- Core i7-13700K – $409
- Core i7-13700KF – $384
- Core i5-13500K – $319
- Core i5-13500KF – $294
The global chip shortage has eased considerably, but high inflation in many countries around the world could still drive prices up.
But keep in mind that Meteor Lake mobile processors will not be available for purchase as standalone components. They will be integrated into the laptops and tablets that you buy next, so the cost of the devices depends on various factors.
Intel Meteor Lake Specs Rumors
The first source of information about Meteor Lake is Intel itself. At the company’s 2022 Investor Day, she presented the following roadmap:
Intel
The main takeaway here is the move to the Intel 4, which sees the company finally moving to a 7nm process. Intel 20A refers to a 5nm process, but that’s not expected until Arrow Lake in 2024.
In April 2022, AnandTech said Meteor Lake would be the company’s first to use EUV (extreme ultraviolet lithography) in manufacturing, moving away from the current hybrid architecture.
There will still be the mix of performance and efficiency cores, but this new chip design will supposedly make it easier to mix and match CPU components (according to The Verge).
According to Twitter leaker Raichu, this will bring big gains in power efficiency, which should in turn benefit battery life:
A suggests that the new integrated GPU (a successor to the current Iris Xe) will deliver nearly 2x the performance as it currently does – depending on clock speeds, anyway.
In a now private tweet (reported by VideoCardz.com), the leaker revealed some details about what the Meteor Lake-S desktop chips could be. This includes a total of 20 PCIe Gen 5 lanes (16 for GPU, four for storage) and four additional from the new Z890 motherboard.
6-performance/8-efficiency and 6-performance/16-efficiency versions are thought to exist, with a base eight-performance version also said to be in the works. There is also mention of Windows 12, adding to rumors that a major new release could be on the way soon.
In 2021, Wccftech suggested that Meteor Lake would use an entirely new architecture known as Redwood Cove. It will be the successor to the current one and will supposedly bring “IPC and architectural improvements”.
Other key specs for Meteor Lake are revealed later in the article. These include the LGA 1700 platform and DDR5 memory, with author Hassan Mujtaba hinting at potential 800-series chips and PCIe Gen 5 support.
A June 2022 YouTube video from “Moore’s Law is Dead” claims to disclose several key specifications of Meteor Lake:
The video suggests we should also expect a new LGA 2551 socket, significant IPC increases over Raptor Lake, and a new architecture to rival AMD’s Zen 4 for desktop processors. However, some clock speed regressions are claimed, while the video was also unable to reveal any clock speeds.
We’ll update this article once we know more about Meteor Lake. If you’re currently on the hunt for new Intel processors, check out our complete guide to the 13th Gen Raptor Lake chips.
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