Intel Lunar Lake starts mass production with TSMC N3B and N6 nodes to challenge Qualcomm Snapdragon X Elite chips

Intel announced its next-generation laptop architecture last month, hot on the heels of Qualcomm Snapdragon X series-powered machines like the Surface Pro 11 (curr. $1,399.99 on Amazon). In short, Intel shared various details about Lunar Lake, which it will offer first as the Core Ultra 200V series. Please see our Computex 2024 article and our explainer video below for more details about how Intel hopes to challenge AMD and Intel with Lunar Lake.

While Intel even let us try out a Lunar Lake reference device last month, it has not committed to a full Lunar Lake release date yet. Instead, it has only stated that Core Ultra 200V processors will officially launch sometime in Q3 2024. However, new reports suggest that the first batches of Lunar Lake processors have now entered mass production.

For reference, the news comes from DigiTimes, which cites unnamed industry sources. Thus, we would recommend taking its report with a hint of scepticism for now. Nonetheless, its assertions are within expectations. Incidentally, Intel is sourcing TSMC N3B and N6 nodes for the Lunar Lake architecture, which will showcase the company's new Lion Cove P and Skymont E cores. The full quote from DigiTimes is as follows:

Intel will start the conversion of the new and old NB platforms in the second half of the year as scheduled. It will launch the Lunar Lake and Arrow Lake series at the end of the third quarter and fourth quarter, respectively. The biggest highlight is the first release of Compute Tile from TSMC. Finally, it has used the 3nm customized process technology that TSMC has deployed for a long time, and has recently begun production.