Silvermont

Silvermont is a microarchitecture for low-power Atom, Celeron and Pentium branded processors used in systems on a chip (SoCs) made by Intel. Silvermont forms the basis for a total of four SoC families:[1]

  • Merrifield and Moorefield  – consumer SoCs intended for smartphones
  • Bay Trail – consumer SoCs aimed at tablets, hybrid devices, netbooks, nettops, and embedded/automotive systems
  • Avoton – SoCs for micro-servers and storage devices
  • Rangeley – SoCs targeting network and communication infrastructure.
This article is about the Intel microarchitecture. For the home in North Carolina, see Silvermont (Brevard, North Carolina).
Silvermont
Intel Mobile Celeron N2830
General information
LaunchedFrom 2013
Common manufacturer(s)
  • Intel
Architecture and classification
Technology node22 nm
Instructionsx86-32, x86-64
Extensions
Physical specifications
Cores
  • 2–8
Products, models, variants
Brand name(s)
History
Predecessor(s)Bonnell
Saltwell
Successor(s)Airmont (die shrink),
Goldmont (new microarchitecture)

Silvermont is the successor of the Bonnell, using a newer 22 nm process (previously introduced with Ivy Bridge) and a new microarchitecture, replacing Hyper Threading with out-of-order execution.[2]

Silvermont was announced to news media on May 6, 2013, at Intel's headquarters at Santa Clara, California.[3] Intel had repeatedly said the first Bay Trail devices would be available during the Holiday 2013 timeframe, while leaked slides showed that the release window for Bay Trail-T as August 28 – September 13, 2013.[4] Both Avoton and Rangeley were announced as being available in the second half of 2013. The first Merrifield devices were announced in 1H14.[5]

According to the Tick–tock model Airmont is the 14 nm die shrink of Silvermont, launched in early 2015 and first seen in the Atom x7-Z8700 as used in the Microsoft Surface 3.[6] Airmont microarchitecture includes the following SoC families:[7]

  • Braswell  – consumer SoCs aimed at PCs
  • Cherry Trail  – consumer SoCs aimed at tablets.

Silvermont based cores have also been used, modified, in the Knight's Landing iteration of Intel's Xeon Phi HPC chips.

Design

Silvermont was the first Atom processor to feature an out-of-order architecture.[8]

Technology
See also: Intel Graphics Technology

Errata

Intel revealed in its Q4 2016 quarterly report that there were quality issues in the C2000 product family, which had an effect on the financial performance of the company's Data Center Group that quarter.[12] An erratum named AVR54 published by Intel; state there is a defect in the chip's LPC clock, and affected systems "may experience inability to boot or may cease operation".[13][14][15] A workaround is available requiring platform hardware changes. The SoC failures are thought to have led to failures in Cisco and Synology products,[16] though discussion of the C2000 as the root cause of failure has been reported to be under a non-disclosure agreement for many vendors.[17]

Intel released a new C0 stepping of the C2000 series in April 2017 which corrected the bug.[18]

In July 2017 Intel published that a similar quality issue affects also Atom E3800 series embedded processors. The erratum named VLI89 published by Intel state, similar to issue with Atom C2000, that there is a defect in the chip's LPC clock and affected systems "may experience inability to boot or may cease operation".[19] Issues extend also to USB bus and SD card circuitry and should happen "under certain conditions where activity is high for several years". In April 2018 Intel announced it is releasing a new D1 stepping to fix the issue.[20]

The LPC, USB and SD Card buses circuitry degradation issues also apply to other Bay Trail processors such as Intel Celeron J1900 and N2800/N2900 series;[21] also to Pentium N3500, J2850, J2900 series; and Celeron J1800 and J1750 series—as those are based on the same affected silicon.

Cisco stated failures of Atom C2000 processors can occur as early as 18 months of use with higher failure rates occurring after 36 months.[22]

Mitigations were found to limit impact on systems. Firmware update for the LPC bus called LPC_CLKRUN# reduces the utilization of the LPC interface what in turn decreases (but not eliminates) LPC bus degradation - some systems are however not compatible with this new firmware. USB should have a maximum of 10% active time and there is a 50TB transmit traffic life expectancy over the lifetime of the port. It is recommended not to use SD card as a boot device and to remove the card from the system when not in use.

Bay Trail issues on Linux

It has been widely reported that Bay Trail CPUs (and possibly their derivatives including Airmont/Braswell/Cherry Trail) experience random freezes / lock-ups on various Linux kernels. Reference Linux bug report 109051 on Kernel.org Bugzilla, first reported Dec-2015. Workaround seems to be setting the Linux kernel flag intel_idle.max_cstate=1, which while eliminating the system freezes/lock-ups, results in increased CPU power/battery usage by preventing the CPU from entering higher power-saving C-states. Systems running Windows-OSes apparently do not experience these lockup/freeze issues.

Bay Trail issues on FreeBSD

A potential fix is to set hw.acpi.cpu.cx_lowest=C1 and dev.cpu.<n>.lowest via /etc/sysctl.conf.

Airmont issues

14 nm Airmont architecture processors are also affected by the design flaws as noted in the Braswell Specification Update under CHP49 errata.[23] In addition to LPC and SD Card circuitry degradation issues those 14 nm designs also have issues with Real Time Clock (RTC) circuitry degradation, their USB buses are however not affected. Unspecified firmware changes are required to mitigate RTC circuitry degradation. Intel does not plan to release a new stepping for Braswell. Intel admitted the issue stating the impact on consumers depends on use condition.[24]

List of Silvermont processors

Desktop processors (Bay Trail-D)

List of desktop processors as follows:

Target
segment		 Cores
(threads)		 Processor
branding and model		 GPU model TDP Turbo
(GHz)		 GPU freq.
(MHz)		 L2
cache
(MB)		 Release
date		 Price
(USD)
1-core Base Turbo
Value 4 (4) Pentium J2900 HD Graphics
(4 EU)		 10 W / 2.41 GHz 2.67 688 896 2 Q4 2013 $94
J2850 — 792 Q3 2013
Celeron J1900 10 W / 2.0 GHz 2.42 854 Q4 2013 $82
J1850 — 792 Q3 2013
2 (2) J1800 10 W / 2.41 GHz 2.58 1 Q4 2013 $72
J1750 — 750 Q3 2013

Server processors (Avoton)

It has been found that a bug in the blueprint of the C2000 CPUs family may cause failure of its embedded Ethernet ports.

List of server processors as follows:[25]

Target
segment		 Cores
(threads)		 Processor
branding and model		 GPU model TDP CPU
Turbo
(GHz)		 Graphics clock rate L2
cache
(MB)		 Release
date		 Price
(USD)
1-core Normal Turbo
Server 8 (8) Atom C2750 — 20 W / 2.4 GHz 2.6 — — 4 Q3 2013 $171
C2730 12 W / 1.7 GHz 2.0 $150
 4 (4) C2550 14 W / 2.4 GHz 2.6 2 $86
C2530 9 W / 1.7 GHz 2.0 $70
 2 (2) C2350 6 W / 1.7 GHz 1 $43

Communications processors (Rangeley)

List of communications processors as follows:[26]

Target
segment		 Cores
(threads)		 Processor
branding and model		 GPU model TDP CPU Turbo
(GHz)		 GPU freq. Intel
QuickAssist		 L2
cache
(MB)		 Release
date		 Price
(USD)
1-core Normal Turbo
Communications 8 (8) Atom C2758 — 20 W / 2.4 GHz — — — Yes 4 Q3 2013 $208
C2738 No
C2718 18 W / 2.0 GHz Yes $182
4 (4) C2558 15 W / 2.4 GHz 2 $104
C2538 No
C2518 13 W / 1.7 GHz Yes $91
C2508 9.5 W / 1.25 GHz Q2 2014 $98
2 (2) C2358 7 W / 1.7 GHz 2.0 1 Q3 2013 $60
C2338 No
C2308 6 W / 1.25 GHz — Yes Q2 2014

Embedded/automotive processors (Bay Trail-I)

List of embedded processors as follows:[27]

Target
segment		 Cores
(threads)		 Processor
branding and model		 GPU model TDP CPU Turbo GPU freq.
(MHz)		 L2
cache		 Release
date		 Price
(USD)
1-core Base Turbo
Embedded 4 (4) Atom E3845 HD Graphics
(4 EU)		 10 W / 1.91 GHz — 542 792 2 MB Q4 2013 $52
 2 (2) E3827 8 W / 1.75 GHz 1 MB $41
E3826 7 W / 1.46 GHz 533 677 $37
E3825 6 W / 1.33 GHz — $34
 1 (1) E3815 5 W / 1.46 GHz 400 512 KB $31
 2 (2) E3805 — 3 W / 1.33 GHz — 1 MB Q4 2014

Mobile processors (Bay Trail-M)

List of mobile processors as follows:

Target
segment		 Cores
(threads)		 Processor
branding & model		 GPU model TDP CPU
turbo
(GHz)		 GPU freq.
(MHz)		 L2
cache
(MB)		 Release
date		 Price
(USD)
Base Turbo
Value  4 (4) Pentium N3540 Intel HD Graphics
(4 EU)		 7.5 W / 2.16 GHz 2.66 313 896 2 2014-07-20 $161
N3530 2.58 2014-02-23
N3520 7.5 W / 2.166 GHz 2.42 854 2013-11-03
N3510 7.5 W / 2.0 GHz — 750 2013-09-11
Celeron N2940 7.5 W / 1.83 GHz 2.25 854 Q3 2014 $107
N2930 2.16 2014-02-23
N2920 7.5 W / 1.86 GHz 2.0 844 2013-11-03
N2910 7.5 W / 1.6 GHz — 756 2013-09-11
 2 (2) N2840 7.5 W / 2.16 GHz 2.58 311 792 1 Q3 2014
N2830 2.41 313 750 2014-02-23
N2820 7.5 W / 2.13 GHz 2.39 756 2013-11-03
N2815 7.5 W / 1.86 GHz 2.13
N2810 7.5 W / 2.0 GHz — 2013-09-11
N2808 4.5 W / 1.58 GHz 2.25 311 792 Q3 2014
N2807 4.3 W / 1.58 GHz 2.16 313 750 2014-02-23
N2806 4.5 W / 1.6 GHz 2.0 756 2013-11-03
N2805 4.3 W / 1.46 GHz — 667 2013-09-11

Tablet processors (Bay Trail-T)

List of tablet and hybrid processors as follows:

Target
segment		 Cores
(threads)		 Processor
branding & model		 SDP[28](W) CPU freq.
(GHz)		 L2
cache
(MB)		 GPU model GPU freq.
(MHz)		 Memory Max display resolution Socket Release
date		 Price
(USD)
Base Turbo Base Burst Type # channels Max speed Max bandwidth Max supported
Value 4 (4) Atom Z3795 2 1.66 2.39 2 HD Graphics (4 EU) 311 778 LPDDR3 2x64b 1067MT/s 17.1 GB/s 4 GB FCBGA1380 Q1 2014 $40.00
Z3785 2.2 1.49 2.41 313 833 1333MT/s 21.3 GB/s Q2 2014
Z3775 2 1.46 2.39 311 778 1067MT/s 17.1 GB/s Q1 2014 $35.00
Z3775D 2.2 1.49 2.41 792 DDR3L-RS 1x64b 1333MT/s 10.6 GB/s Q1 2014 $35.00
Z3770 2 1.46 2.39 667 LPDDR3 2x64b 1067MT/s 17.1 GB/s 2560×1600 11 September 2013 $37.00
Z3770D 2.2 1.5 2.41 313 688 DDR3L-RS 1x64b 1333MT/s 10.6 GB/s 2 GB 1920×1280
Z3740 2 1.33 1.86 311 667 LPDDR3 2x64b 1067MT/s 17.1 GB/s 4 GB 2560×1600 $32.00
Z3740D 2.2 1.83 313 688 DDR3L-RS 1x64b 1333MT/s 10.6 GB/s 2 GB 1920×1280
Z3735F 311 646 10.6 GB/s 1920×1200 FCBGA592 Q1 2014 $17.00
Z3735G 1x32b 5.3 GB/s 1 GB 1200×800
 2 (2) Z3680 2.0 1 667 LPDDR3 1x64b 1067MT/s 8.5 GB/s 1280×800 11 September 2013 —
Z3680D 688 DDR3L-RS 1x64b 1333MT/s 10.6 GB/s 2 GB 1920×1280

Smartphone processors (Merrifield)

List of smartphone processors as follows:

Model sSpec
number		 Cores Clock rate GPU
frequency		 L2
cache		 I/O bus Memory Voltage TDP Socket Release date Part
number(s)		 Release
price (USD)
Atom Z3460
  • SR1WR (B1)
  • SR20G (B1)
  • SR20U (B1)
 2 1.6 GHz 400–457 MHz 1 MB 2 × LPDDR3-1066 March 2014
  • FG8065201850100
Atom Z3480
  • SR1WS (B1)
  • SR20F (B1)
 2 2.13 GHz 457–533 MHz 1 MB 2 × LPDDR3-1066 March 2014
  • FG8065201850200

Smartphone processors (Moorefield)

List of smartphone processors as follows:

Model sSpec
number		 Cores Clock rate GPU
frequency		 L2
cache		 I/O bus Memory Voltage TDP Socket Release date Part
number(s)		 Release
price (USD)
Atom Z3530
  • SR1YR (B0)
 4 1.33 GHz 457 MHz 2 × 1 MB 2 × LPDDR3-1600 H2 2014
  • GA8066301896101
Atom Z3560
  • SR1WW (B0)
  • SR1WX (B0)
 4 1.83 GHz 457–533 MHz 2 × 1 MB 2 × LPDDR3-1600 H2 2014
  • GA8066301600200
Atom Z3570 4 2.00 GHz 457–640 MHz 2 × 1 MB 2 × LPDDR3-1600 Q4 2014
Atom Z3580
  • SR1WU (B0)
  • SR1WV (B0)
 4 2.33 GHz 457–533 MHz 2 × 1 MB 2 × LPDDR3-1600 H2 2014
  • GA8066301600100
Atom Z3590 4 2.50 GHz 457–640 MHz 2 × 1 MB 2 × LPDDR3-1600 H2 2015

List of Airmont processors

Desktop processors (Braswell)

List of desktop processors as follows:

Target
segment		 Cores
(threads)		 Processor
branding and model		 GPU model TDP Turbo
(GHz)		 GPU freq.
(MHz)		 L2
cache
(MB)		 Release
date		 Price
(USD)
Brand name &
model number		 EU 1-core Base Turbo
Desktop 4 (4) Pentium J3710 HD Graphics 405 18 6.5 W /
1.6 GHz		 2.64 400 740 2 January
2016		 N/A
Celeron J3160 HD Graphics 400 12 6 W /
1.6 GHz		 2.24 320 700
2 (2) J3060 2.48 2
[note 1]

Mobile processors (Braswell)

List of mobile processors as follows:

Target
segment		 Cores
(threads)		 Processor
branding and model		 GPU Model TDP Turbo
(GHz)		 GPU freq.
(MHz)		 L2
cache
(MB)		 Release
date		 Price
(USD)
Brand name &
model number		 EU 1-core Base Turbo
Mobile 4 (4) Pentium N3710 HD Graphics 405 16 6W /
1.6 GHz		 2.56 400 700 2 Q1 2016 $161
N3700 HD Graphics (Braswell)[note 2] 2.4 Q1 2015
Celeron N3160 HD Graphics 400 12 2.24 320 640 Q1 2016 $107
N3150 HD Graphics (Braswell)
[note 2]		 2.08 Q1 2015
2 (2) N3060 HD Graphics 400 2.48 600 2[note 1] Q1 2016
N3050 HD Graphics (Braswell)
[note 2]		 2.16 Q1 2015
N3010 HD Graphics 400 4W / 1.04 GHz 2.24 Q1 2016
N3000 HD Graphics (Braswell)
[note 2]		 2.08 Q1 2015
  1. Some initial reports stated that the processor has 1 MB L2 cache; see Anthony Shvets. "Notes below Specifications". CPU World.
  2. Klaus Hinum (January 26, 2016). "Intel HD Graphics (Braswell)". Notebookcheck Publishing GmbH.

Tablet processors (Cherry Trail)
Further information: List of Intel Atom microprocessors § "Cherry Trail-T" (14 nm)

List of smartphone and tablet processors as follows:

Target
segment		 Cores
(threads)		 Processor
branding and model		 SDP
(W)		 L2
cache
(MB)		 CPU freq.
(GHz)		 GPU Socket Release
date		 Price
(USD)
Brand name EU Freq. (MHz)
Base Turbo 1-core Base Turbo
Tablet 4 (4) Atom x7 Z8750 2 2 1.6 2.56 HD Graphics 16 200 600 FCBGA1380 Q1 2016 $37
Z8700 2.4 Q1 2015
Atom x5 Z8550 1.44 12 $27
Z8500 2.24
Z8350 1.92 500 FCBGA594 Q1 2016 $21
Z8330
Z8300 1.84 Q2 2015 $21

Other uses

Silvermont based processor cores have been used in Knights Landing versions of Intel's Xeon Phi multiprocessor HPC chips, with changes for HPC including AVX-512 vector units.[29][30]

See also

References
  1. "Intel Launches Low-Power, High-Performance Silvermont Microarchitecture". Intel.com. Retrieved 2013-05-06.
  2. "Deep inside Intel's new ARM killer: Silvermont". The Register. 2013-05-08. Retrieved 2014-04-08.
  3. "Intel Launches Low-Power, High-Performance Silvermont Microarchitecture". Newsroom.intel.com. 2013-05-06. Retrieved 2014-04-08.
  4. "Intel Bay Trial-T launches August 28 – September 13". guru3d.com. Retrieved 2013-07-04.
  5. "Intel reveals Merrifield processor". engadget.com. Retrieved 2013-06-04.
  6. Joel Hruska (March 31, 2015). "Intel quietly launches 14nm Braswell, Bay Trail's successor". ExtremeTech.
  7. Michael Kan. "Intel plans new 'Braswell' chip for PCs, over 20 Chromebooks". PCWorld. Retrieved 2014-04-08.
  8. Anand Lal Shimpi. "Intel's Silvermont Architecture Revealed: Getting Serious About Mobile".
  9. "Download Intel® Graphics Driver for Windows 7* and 8.1*, and Windows® 10 [15.33]". Drivers & Software.
  10. "Intel HD Graphics Drivers v10.18.10.3621 with one new OpenGL Extension". Geeks3D. Retrieved 2014-06-05.
  11. "OpenGL ES Conformant product list". Khronos Group. 11 January 2014. Retrieved 11 January 2014.
  12. Alcorn, Paul (31 January 2017). "CPU Failures Hurt Intel's Bottom Line". Tom's Hardware. Retrieved 7 February 2017.
  13. Hellstrom, Jeremy (7 February 2017). "Intel's Atom C2xxx processors may just make like a banana and split". PC Perspective. Retrieved 7 February 2017.
  14. Calburn, Thomas (6 February 2017). "Atom C2000 chips are bricking products – and it's not just Cisco hit". The Register. Retrieved 7 February 2017.
  15. "Intel Atom Processor C2000 Product Family Specification Update" (PDF). Intel Atom Processor C2000 Product Family Specification Update. Intel. Retrieved 7 February 2017.
  16. Kampman, Jeff (7 February 2017). "Report: Some embedded Atom CPUs can brick their host systems". Tech Report. Retrieved 7 February 2017.
  17. Kennedy, Patrick (7 February 2017). "The Intel Atom C2000 Series Bug – Why It is So Quiet". ServeTheHome. Retrieved 28 February 2017.
  18. Robinson, Cliff (23 April 2017). "Intel Atom C2000 C0 Stepping Fixing the AVR54 Bug". Serve the Home. Retrieved 25 April 2017.
  19. "Intel Atom® Processor E3800 Specification Update" (PDF). Retrieved 2018-04-13.
  20. "Product Change Notification 116196 - 00" (PDF). 2018-04-09.
  21. "Intel® Celeron® Processor J1900, N2807 & N2930 for Internet of Things Platforms Specification Update Addendum" (PDF). Retrieved 2018-04-14.
  22. "Clock Signal Component Issue". Cisco. Retrieved 2018-04-14.
  23. "N-series Intel® Pentium® Processors and Intel® Celeron® Processors Specification Update" (PDF). Retrieved 2018-04-15.
  24. "Another Atom Bomb Intel Atom E3800 Bay Trail VLI89 Bug". ServeTheHome. 2018-04-13.
  25. "Intel® Atom™ Processor for Server". Ark.intel.com. Retrieved 2014-04-08.
  26. "Intel® Atom™ Processor for Communications". Ark.intel.com. Retrieved 2014-04-08.
  27. "Products (Formerly Bay Trail)". Ark.intel.com. Retrieved 2014-04-08.
  28. "Intel® Atom™ Processor Z36xxx and Z37xxx Series: Datasheet, V.1". Intel.com. Retrieved 2014-04-08.
  29. Sodani, Avinash, Knights Landing (KNL): 2nd Generation Intel® Xeon Phi™ Processor (PDF), Intel, p. 5
  30. Smith, Ryan (26 June 2014), "Intel's "Knights Landing" Xeon Phi Coprocessor Detailed", www.anadtech.com
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