The Pentium III brand refers to Intel's 32-bit x86 desktop and mobile microprocessors based on the sixth-generation P6 microarchitecture introduced on February 26, 1999. The brand's initial processors were very similar to the earlier Pentium II-branded microprocessors. The most notable differences were the addition of the SSE instruction set (to accelerate floating point and parallel calculations), and the introduction of a controversial serial number embedded in the chip during the manufacturing process.
The Pentium III Katmai
The first Pentium III variant was the Katmai (Intel product code 80525). It was a further development of the Deschutes Pentium II.
The Katmai contains 9.5 million transistors, not including the 512 Kbytes L2 cache (which adds 25 million transistors), and has dimensions of 12.3 mm by 10.4 mm (128 mm^2). It is fabricated in Intel's P856.5 process, a 0.25 micrometre CMOS process with five levels of aluminum interconnect. The Katmai used the same slot-based design as the Pentium II but with the newer SECC2 cartridge that allowed direct CPU core contact with the heat sink.
Intel Pentium III 450 MHz
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450 MHz Specification Details |
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Intel Pentium III 500 MHz
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500 MHz Specification Details |
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Intel Pentium III 600 MHz
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600 MHz Specification Details |
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The Pentium III Coppermine
The second version, codenamed Coppermine (80526), was released on October 25, 1999.
In terms of overall performance, the Coppermine held a slight advantage over the AMD Athlons it was released against, which was reversed when AMD applied their own die shrink and added an on-die L2 cache to the Athlon. Athlon held the advantage in floating-point intensive code, while the Coppermine could perform better when SSE optimizations were used, but in practical terms there was little difference in how the two chips performed, clock-for-clock. However, AMD were able to clock the Athlon higher, reaching speeds of 1.2 GHz before the launch of the Pentium 4.
Intel Pentium III 550 MHz
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550E MHz Specification Details |
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Intel Pentium III 600E MHz
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600E MHz (SECC2) Specification Details |
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Intel Pentium III 667 MHz
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667 MHz (SECC2) Specification Details |
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667 MHz (FCPGA) Specification Details |
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Intel Pentium III 750 MHz
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750 MHz (SECC2) Specification Details |
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Intel Pentium III 800 MHz
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800 MHz (SECC2) Specification Details |
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800EB MHz (FCPGA) Specification Details |
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Intel Pentium III 866 MHz
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866 MHz (FCPGA) Specification Details |
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Intel Pentium III 900 MHz
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900 MHz (FCPGA) Specification Details |
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Intel Pentium III 933 MHz
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933 MHz (SECC2) Specification Details |
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933 MHz (FCPGA) Specification Details |
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Intel Pentium III 1000 MHz
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1BGHz (FCPGA) Specification Details |
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The Pentium III Tualatin
The third revision, Tualatin (80530), was a trial for Intel's new 0.13 µm process. Tualatin-based Pentium IIIs were released during 2001 until early 2002 at speeds of 1.0, 1.13, 1.2, 1.26, 1.33 and 1.4 GHz. Tualatin performed quite well, especially in variations which had 512 KB L2 cache (called the Pentium III-S). The Pentium III-S variant was mainly intended for servers, especially those where power consumption mattered, i.e., thin blade servers.
Tualatin-based Pentium III CPUs can usually be visually distinguished from Coppermine-based processors by the metal integrated heat-spreader (IHS) fixed on top of the package. However, the very last models of Coppermine Pentium IIIs also featured the IHS.
Intel Pentium III 1266 MHz
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1.26GHz-S Specification Details |
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The Mobile Pentium III
Intel Mobile Pentium III 700 MHz
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700 MHz Specification Details |
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Unlisted models:
- Katmai: 550, 600, 533B, 600B
- Coppermine FCPGA: 500E, 533EB, 600E, 600EB, 650, 700, 733, 750, 850, 1133
- Coppermine SECC2: 550E, 533EB, 600, 600E, 650, 700, 733, 850, 866, 1000
- Tualatin: 1000A, 1133A, 1200, 1333, 1400
- Tualatin-S: 1133, 1400
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