Intel looks to pull the plug on Larrabee

by Stevie Smith - Dec 7 2009, 04:45

Demanding gamers and high-end computing professionals waiting patiently for Intel Corporation to finish developing its much talked about ‘Larrabee’ chip have been hit with disappointment this week after the world’s leading CPU maker revealed an indefinite delay associated with the standalone version of its ambitious multi-core platform.

Designed to be a high-performance all-in-one processing unit incorporating its very own discrete graphics architecture as opposed to separate GPU hardware, Larrabee has been evolving at Santa Clara-based Intel since around 2007 – and the sudden disclosure regarding a possible collapse has certainly come from left field.

“Larrabee silicon and software development are behind where we had hoped to be at this point in the project,” outlined Intel in an e-mailed statement. “As a result, our first Larrabee product will not be launched as a standalone discrete graphics product, but rather be used as a software development platform for internal and external use.”

“While we are disappointed that the product is not yet where we expected, we remain committed to delivering world-class many-core graphics products to our customers,” the company added. “Additional plans for discrete graphics products will be discussed some time in 2010.”

News of the stalled project comes only days after Intel unveiled a new and experimental cloud-computing chip technology it believes could form the foundation of cutting-edge processing for decades to come.

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