When it comes to laptops, "Penryn" is the successor to the Merom core which is currently used for the Core 2 Duo range of CPUs found in today's notebooks.

While the Merom core used in Core 2 Duo processors was based on 65nm technology, "Penryn" would be based on 45nm fabrication process entirely.  These "Penryn" based Core 2 Duo processors will refresh "Santa Rosa" platform in Q1 2008.

Intel has four new Penryn-based Core 2 Duo processors lined up for release early next year. Although Intel has not revealed the model names for these mobile processors, Intel did provide the clock speeds, FSB and L2 Cache details. All the four mobile Core 2 Duo processors are expected to feature the same 800MHz FSB like the second generation Meroms. It is interesting to note that, Intel does not intend to provide FSB of 1066 MHz or 1333 MHz like its desktop counterparts on these processors.

Let's get back to some of the improvements in the "Penryn". Intel claims to have improved the existing Wide Dynamic Execution, Advanced Smart Cache, Advanced Digital Media Boost and Intelligent Power Capability in the "Penryn" processors. Intel Advanced Smart Cache technology receives additional enhancements, besides the increased L2 cache. Penryn-based mobile Core 2 Duo processors will have up to 6MB of L2 Cache. It will also see the inclusion of the new Intel SSE4 instruction set. SSE4 introduces 47 new instructions to improve performance of video accelerators, graphics building blocks and streaming load. Intel claims a 2x performance gain in video acceleration tasks. There are 14 new instructions for video accelerator performance enhancement. Intel improves compiler auto-vectorization performance with 32 new instructions.

Mobile Penryn processors receive enhanced power saving technologies. New to the mobile Penryn is a deep power down state. In the deep power down state, the processor lowers the core voltage, more so than in the C4 state, and turns off the L1 and L2 caches. Intel claims significant power savings in idle modes for extended battery life with the new power state.

According to latest reports, Penryn-based notebook processors will debut in the first half of 2008 for use along with Santa Rosa platform. Later on, newer Penryn-processors will be coupled with the next-gen Montevina notebook platform.