Intel launches new chip logos, rating system

[Trotter]

Source: Intel launches new chip logos, rating system | Nanotech - The Circuits Blog - CNET News

Intel has revamped its processor badging and rating system. Consumers are the main target, though business systems will get new badging too.

The new badges include a die (the chip minus the packaging) accent in the upper right hand corner, a prominent main brand (e.g., "Core"), and the modifier (e.g., "i7").

Intel has also instituted a star system that rates chips from five stars (best performance in class) to one star (lowest performance). "So when a consumer goes into a Best Buy store they can distinguish between Centrino, Core, Celeron, Core 2 Duo, Core 2 Quad," said Intel spokesman Bill Calder.

That may be a little easier said than done, however. Some consumers (but not including "tech savvy" Giampaolo, of course) will still need help from the sales person to decipher the badging. A daunting challenge in the case of consumer laptops, which are typically plastered with a hodgepodge of stickers from Intel, Nvidia, Advanced Micro Devices, AMD's ATI graphics chip unit, and other companies.

Intel is in the process of moving to a "pretty aggressive brand simplification plan," Calder said. "When we launched Core i7, we said we're moving to a single primary client brand, which is Core. We're moving in that direction," he said.

The Atom processor will not get a modifier. In the future, the Nehalem server processor, currently branded only as "Xeon" with a letter and number suffix, may also get new branding to make it more readily identifiable as part of the Nehalem architecture like its desktop sibling the Core i7, Calder said.

 

[hikaricloud]

They look kinda nifty.

So they're all going to be called Core now? I guess it's kinda...almost the same as they were doing before...

 

[philbar71]

i think i liked the old ones better

 

[hikaricloud]

The old ones were nifty, the only thing I don't like about these are the chips showing, but they still look alright.

 

[philbar71]

ya, having the die shot showing would, in theory, make it look cool but it really dont

 

[hikaricloud]

I think it's the color scheme of the die that throws me off. If they had different colors, it would be cool.

 

[philbar71]

your right, the gold and light blue dont go together very well.

 

[hikaricloud]

The Atom/Celeron/Pentium/Inside logos look the best with the blue die...too bad they all couldn't be like that.

 

[philbar71]

i think the i7 extreme edition looks the best. then the centrino one looks pretty good too. the core 2 ones look the worst. i wish they hadent done teh die part, or changed the color.

 

[hikaricloud]

Fair enough, the extreme one does look pretty sweet, since it has the black on it. Oh well, what can you do.