ATI has confirmed that Intel is preparing a processor codenamed 'Allendale' in the 'Conroe' timeframe, though its reference, tucked into a description of its SB600 South Bridge, to the new chip provides no clue as to the part's features.

Allendale is believed to be a version of Conroe half that chip's usual 4MB of L2 cache. Like Conroe, Allendale shares its 2MB of cache between each of its two cores. Roadmap leaks sprung late last year suggested Allendale would be accompanied by 'Milville', a single-core part with 1MB of L2 cache - an Allendale sliced in two, in other words.

There may be a Merom-derived version of Allendale and even Milville, but if so their codenames are not known. Together with Allendale and Milville, they're likely to form the basis for future Celeron D and Celeron M processors, at a guess, and Core 2 Solo parts.

ATI's SB600 description doesn't mention Milville. In addition to Allendale, it mentions Conroe and Merom but these next-generation Intel architecture parts have both been announced by the chip giant. They will both ship under the Core 2 Duo brand. ®