Dual Core Processors - Why Now?

The final topic is overclocking and once again, the problems with increasing the frequency. According to the speaker, overclocking on a dual core chip means that better cooling is not a choice but will be mandatory as current draw goes up significantly and the thermal threshold will exceed current levels. The speaker also stressed that all dual core solutions, AMD or Intel will face the same issues. My interpretation on this comment is that there may not be a huge amount of headroom available in frequency scaling and that we should expect the same general trend of 200 Mhz jumps every six months or so. There was also a quick comment on quad-core processors and they were expected to debut after AMD makes the switch to 65nm. Coupled along with the comments made about Moore's Law, there seems to be little doubt that AMD's strategy is to double the number of cores and reduce frequency every time they approach the alarming voltage / heat level. While process technologies will not be able to sustain clock speed jumps indefinitely, AMD has proved with SOI and other engineering refinements that they are can manage heat and voltage requirements to a certain degree.