Intel revives Haswell-era Pentium G3420

The Haswell Pentium G3420 was discontinued by Intel over four years ago. Amid severe supply shortages, though, they're bringing the ancient Pentium back to the market. Intel stated in a Product Change Notification (PCN) that it is "canceling this Product Discontinuance completely per new roadmap decision and enabling the product long term once again."

Per the PCN, the processor will be available to customers until May 2020. Final shipments  are slated to go out in December. The G3420 features two Haswell cores at 3.2 GHz, with hyperthreading and a locked multiplier. It's built on the obsolete 22nm process. With AMD's Ryzen family already on the 7nm node, this is a part that is far, far behind the curve.

Considering that this is a dual-core Haswell part that slots into outdated LGA 1150 boards, few consumers are likely to buy it. The Athlon 3000G offers higher IPC, higher clockspeeds, better integrated graphics, and an unlocked multiplier at $49: The G3420 simply isn't an attractive proposition for end users.

The processor may prove popular with OEMs, though. A cheap, dual-core Haswell Pentium offers just enough performance to power basic machines for office and school work. And, importantly, it may help alleviate Intel's well-documented supply problems.

The Pentium's Lazarus-like relaunch raises an important question, though: is this the last we'll see of Haswell? Or might Intel re-spin performance parts like the 4770K, too?

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