Intel Nova Lake CPUs will feature Xe3 graphics and not Xe4 as previously expected, but will offer Xe3P Media & Display engines.
Intel Nova Lake CPUs Combine Xe3 & Xe3P Graphics Capabilities, Not Going Xe4
Last year, it was reported that Intel's Nova Lake CPUs would leverage a hybrid GPU architecture approach, combining Xe3 with Xe4, but that doesn't seem to be the case anymore.
As per the latest update by Jaykihn, it looks like Intel will rely on its Xe3 and Xe3P graphics architectures for Nova Lake CPUs. The two architectures are different, but they are also used for different purposes. The Intel Xe3 "Battlemage" architecture will form the basis of the graphics tile on the Nova Lake CPUs. For the Media and Display Engine, Intel will leverage the same IPs as its upcoming Xe3P "Celestial" architecture.
The Display & Media engine was already expected to offer an IP upgrade from the existing Xe3 design. Even if it's not Xe4, the Xe3P Display & Media engine block will offer newer capabilities that aren't seen with the existing Xe3 SoCs.
From what we know, Intel's Nova Lake-S "Desktop" and Nova Lake-HX "Laptop" CPUs will feature up to 2 Xe3 iGPU cores, whereas the rest of the lineup will scale up to 12 Xe3 cores. This is similar to existing 12Xe Panther Lake SKUs. There could be certain optimizations for Nova Lake's Xe3 iGPU tiles, but they won't bring a huge performance update. The Display and Media Engine is something that we can't wait to see.
Intel has already promised its Xe3P family will be the successor to the Xe3 "Arc B-Series", & will be offered under a new Arc family, likey Arc C-Series for Celestial. We expect to see Xe3P in both integrated and discrete offerings since the company has confirmed the architecture for its Crescent Island AI Inference GPUs. Xe3P is expected to launch later this year, so we look forward to what the new architecture has to offer.
Nova Lake CPU Configurations (Source: @Jaykihn)
| Die SKU | P-Cores (Coyote Cove) | E-Cores (Arctic Wolf) | LP-E Cores (Arctic Wolf) | Xe3 GPU Cores (Battlemage) | TDP |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nova Lake-X | 16 | 32 | 4 | 2 | ~200W |
| Nova Lake-S | 8 | 16 | 4 | 2 | ~125W |
| Nova Lake-HX | 8 | 16 | 4 | 2 | ~55W |
| Nova Lake-HX | 4 | 8 | 4 | 2 | ~55W |
| Nova Lake-H | 4 | 8 | 4 | 12 | ~28W |
| Nova Lake-H | 4 | 8 | 4 | 4 | ~28W |
| Nova Lake-U | 4 | 0 | 4 | 4 | ~28W |
| Nova Lake-U | 2 | 0 | 4 | 2 | ~15W |
About the author: A Software Engineer by training and a PC enthusiast by passion, Hassan Mujtaba serves as Wccftech's Senior Editor for hardware section. With years of experience in the industry, he specializes in deep-dive technical analysis of next-generation CPU and GPU architectures, motherboards, and cooling solutions. His work involves not only breaking news on upcoming technologies but also extensive hands-on reviews and benchmarking.
Follow Wccftech on Google to get more of our news coverage in your feeds.
