In order to welcome the mass production of Intel's 12th generation Core (mobile version), the price of many 11th generation Core veterans has also been loosened. If you often pay attention to the promotion of e-commerce, it is not difficult to find that there is a notebook equipped with an "11th generation processor" that is as long as 2,000 yuan or even lower. Is this ultra-low price 11th generation notebook really reliable?
The origin of the 11th generation processor
Intel's Core processors (specifically for mobile versions of notebooks) undergo an iteration every year, such as the 10th generation Core Ice Lake in 2020, the 11th generation Core Tiger Lake in 2021, and the just-released 12th generation Core Alder Lake. Each iteration will result in enhanced performance due to architectural upgrades, so consumers tend to prefer notebooks with the latest generation of processor platforms.
It is to seize this psychology of consumers, many notebook manufacturers have played a "word game", Zhang Guan Li Dai. Take the 2,000 yuan price of the "11th generation notebook" on the market as an example, most of the processors they carry belong to the Intel Jasper Lake platform, and this platform happens to use the 10nm process, and it is also listed in the same period as the 10th generation Core Tiger Lake, and even appears in the same PPT released by Intel.
As a result, Jasper Lake has been named "11th generation processor" by many manufacturers.
True and false 11th generation processors
First of all, the conclusion is that Jasper Lake and the 11th generation of Core Tiger Lake are not related by blood, and their only commonality is that the time node of the listing is similar. In fact, when any first-line notebook brand launches a product equipped with a Jasper Lake platform processor, it will only call them "the new generation of Celeron/Pentium", and will never go beyond the thunder pool.
Below, let's "pick a peek" at the real identity of the Jasper Lake platform processor.
Intel's Pentium and Celeron processors, the desktop version of the prefix is usually J, such as Pentium J, Celeron J series; mobile terminals correspond to Pentium N, Celeron N series.
As we all know, the current Intel processor has two sets of low-level CPU core paths, the first set is the high-performance Core core that we are familiar with, focusing on high performance; the second set is the increasingly well-known Atom core, focusing on high energy efficiency. That's right, the big and small cores in the "big and small core architecture" featured by 12th Generation Core Alder Lake are the latest in these two sets of cores.
The Jasper Lake platform uses the Atom core architecture code-named "Tremont", mainly for the budget-sensitive low-power X86 platform (including notebooks and fanless mini desktop PCs, etc.), and its products are named after Pentium (silver) and Celeron, including Pentium Silver N6005, Pentium Silver N6000, Celeron N5095, Celeron N5105, Celeron N5100, Celeron N4505 and Celeron N4500 sub-models (Table 1).
So, is there a real sense of "11th generation Pentium and Celeron"? The answer is yes, they are the Pentium Gold 7505 and the Celeron 6305/Celeron 6305E.
Through the comparison of the processor parameters in the two tables, I believe that you can already see many problems.
The Jasper Lake platform uses Intel's early 10nm process, and the integrated CORE graphics are also older versions. The true 11th-generation Pentium and Celeron use an enhanced 10nm SuperFin process, the same Willow Cove CPU core architecture as the 11th-generation Core, the latest core graphics technology, and 48 EU execution units.
Don't look at them as just two-core/four-threaded, but the actual performance is far superior to the four-core/four-thread Jasper Lake platform processor.
In addition, these 11th generation Pentium and Celeron processors also add support for AVX2, AVX-512 VNNI instruction set (deep learning acceleration), retaining the characteristics of the 11th generation Core's main Thunderbolt 4 controller, Gauss and Neural Network 2.0 accelerator, and the gap between the Core processor and the core processor in the same period has been further narrowed.
In the past, due to the lack of AVX instruction sets in early Pentium and Celeron processors, they were both "wiped out" after star citizen updated the Alpha 3.11 patch, and the 11th generation Pentium and Celeron processors will perform better in such games.
Jasper Lake survival status quo
As the so-called "existence is reasonable", the reason why Intel retains the Pentium and Celeron brands and is constantly updating the Atom core architecture is because the entry-level notebook, minicomputer and all-in-one machine market needs this inexpensive and affordable processor to meet the purchase needs of individuals or small and medium-sized enterprises with limited budgets.
As far as the Jasper Lake platform is concerned, its Pentium Silver N6000 and Pentium Silver N6005 are very niche, the former is only hunted by mini notebooks such as GPS P2MAX and GPS Pocket3, while the latter is commonly found in the asus PN41 parasy system, which is not in the scope of this article.
As can be seen from Table 1, the main difference between the Pentium Silver Medal and the Celeron is that the main frequency is higher, and it is also equipped with a core display of 32 groups of execution units, and the comprehensive performance is a little stronger. Note that just a little bit of perception in the everyday office and gaming environment is less intense, so The Celeron, owned by the Jasper Lake platform, can also meet the (light) office and entertainment (non-large games) needs of the vast majority of consumers. However, dual-core processors like the Celeron N4505 and Celeron N4500 are not recommended at all, and their performance is too low and has a big impact on the experience.
Jasper Lake Shopping Analysis
Relatively speaking, the Celeron N5095, Celeron N5100 and Celeron N5105 are still worthy of our attention. Judging from the model suffix, these processors seem to be stronger in turn, but this is not the case. Or refer to Table 1, Celeron N5095, Celeron N5100 and Celeron N5105 TDP are 15W, 6W and 10W respectively, Celeron N5100 is subject to the lower TDP its default frequency is only 1.1GHz, almost half of the other two processors, so its CPU performance is relatively weak.
The Celeron N5100 has the highest TDP and theoretically performs better, although it is classified by Intel as a desktop platform, but it is still hunted by many notebooks. Unfortunately, Intel has weakened its core display with only 16 execution units, and the 3D performance is the worst of the three processors. Therefore, the Celeron N5105 is actually the most comprehensive performance of the three.
Judging from the running score data of the theoretical test, the comprehensive performance of the Jasper Lake platform Celeron can probably reach 80% of the level of the 8th generation Core i3-8145U, which is used for daily Internet access, editing documents, watching videos, and playing "League of Legends" in 1080P+ medium and low quality. However, if you need to retouch or video rendering and have to endure longer wait times, it is recommended to increase your budget a little and choose a notebook with the 11th generation Core i3.
Because first-line notebook brands do not attach much importance to the price market of 1500 yuan to 3000 yuan, this price point is basically occupied by less well-known third-tier brands, and the Jasper Lake platform Celeron processor is the "big customer" of this market. The bargaining power of third-tier brands is not high, so there may be problems with mixing and matching different batches of processors, and in this case, we need to give priority to models equipped with Celeron N5105 batches.
brief summary
Whether the entry-level notebook equipped with the Jasper Lake platform is worth buying depends mainly on whether you have a clear understanding of such products. If you need a cheap, larger screen, sex-ready "netbook," Jasper Lake is definitely up to par. But if you really need an all-round notebook, Jasper Lake is naturally not qualified, and can only wait for the new 12th generation Core to be listed, and see if the 11th generation Core veteran has any hope of generally falling below the price of 3,000 yuan.