Intel’s Larrabee project was set to result in a general purpose multi-core CPU and GPU chipset that was going to make an appearance sometime next year. Intel had generated much press surrounding the chipset, having partnered with DreamWorks who were apparently so keen to use the Intel hardware, that they were upgrading their software to take advantage of it.
At recent public demonstrations the chipset was seen in action rendering 3D graphics from the game Quake Wars. On November 17, Intel CTO Justin Rattner showed off an overclocked Larrabee pushing one TeraFLOPS, which he claimed was the first public demonstration of a single chip solution performing such a feat.
It came as a surprise that over the weekend it was announced that Larrabee has been cancelled as a discrete hardware graphics solution, and will now be refocused as a software development platform.
Offering an explanation via an e-mail sent to numerous international news sites, an Intel spokesman said:
“Larrabee silicon and software development are behind where we had hoped to be at this point in the project. While we are disappointed that the product is not yet where we expected, we remain committed to delivering world-class many-core graphics products to our customers. Additional plans for discrete graphics products will be discussed some time in 2010.”
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