Intel CEO Paul Otellini was not shy to talk about the upcoming 45nm process nodes the company has planned for the second half of 2007.  At the center of this new process evolution is the Fab D1D in Hillsboro, Oregon.  Intel's D1D Fab in Oregon is already producing test wafers, and will be the first CPU facility at Intel to ship 45nm silicon. The D1D facility is a lean 220,000 square feet and Intel's first 45nm Fab.

However, Intel has two more 45nm fabs coming online within the next 18 months.  Intel Fab 32 in Arizona is expected to come online in late 2007. A third 45nm fab, dubbed Fab 28 in Israel, is coming online in 2008.  

Going from 65nm to 45nm is very prominent on Intel's roadmap. Intel CEO Paul Otellini said that Intel currently has 15 45nm products in development, and designs for several of them will be completed next year. Until 2008 however, 65nm technology will still be the most prominent technology. Intel said that its first 45nm processor will be Nehalem, which will go into production sometime in 2007 and be introduced in 2008.

The move to 45nm will also bring along such features as higher clock speeds, more cores per processor and more cache per processor. Intel is also claiming that 45nm processors will achieve a 300% increase in performance-per-watt.

Otellini outlined that the first 45nm processors from the company would run off the production lines in late 2007, but the actual product family will ship in 2008.  The Nehalem product family will ship in 2008 and replace the existing "Core" family of processors shipping today on the 65nm node.