I don't see how any of that substantiates "Panther Lake and 18A are just cost cutting efforts vs. Lunar Lake". It mostly just sounds like another boring platform flame.
Again, you're talking about the design of Panther Lake, the CPU IC. No one cares, it's a CPU. The news here is the launch of the Intel 18A semiconductor process and the discussion as to if and how it narrows or closes the gap with TSMC.
Trying to play this news off as "only cost cutting" is, to be blunt, insane. That's not what's happening at all.
I'm not GP, but I think that it really doesn't matter if Intel is able to sell this process to other companies. But if they're only producing their own chips on it, that's quite a valid criticism.
And for the fourth time, it may be a valid "criticism" in the sense of "Does Intel Suck or Rule?". It does not validate the idea that this product release, which introduces the most competitive process from this company in over a decade, is merely a "cost reduction" change.
It's only as exciting as a cost reduction because they're playing catch-up by trying to not need to outsource their highest performance silicon. Let me know when Intel gets perf/watt to be high enough to be of interest to Apple, gamers, or anyone who isn't just buying a basic PC because their old one died, or an Intel server because that's what they've always had.
Every single performance figure in TFA is compared to their own older generations, not to competitors.
