Intel wants to push CPU Krypton: spend money to unlock additional features, and the Linux kernel is the first to support it

The Linux 5.18 kernel to be launched next will launch a number of new features, not only supporting Intel's 12th generation Core's size core scheduling mechanism, but also supporting another feature of Intel CPU processors - software-defined silicon chip SDSi, users can spend money to unlock more functions of the CPU.

The full name of software-defined silicon chip SDSi is Software Defined Silicon, which simply means that different functions on Intel's CPU processor can be customized by customers, and additional functions can be unlocked at the cost of money, mainly for data center customers.

At present, Intel has not officially announced the processor that supports SDSi functions, and the first product is likely to be released in the first half of this year, the Sapphire Rapids processor, which is a 12th-generation Core data center processor with the same architecture, with a maximum of 64 cores but actually unlocks 56 cores, supporting DDR5 memory, PCIe 5.0 and CXL 1.1 and other new features.

Kryptonian features such as SDSi are mainly for enterprise users, who can spend money to unlock additional functions according to their own needs, but it may also appear on consumer-grade Core processors in the future, such as unlocking more cores, L3 caches and even overclocking functions for Core i5, which are technically possible.