Intel has drawn a line in the silicon. Its next major server processor will pack 192 physical cores yet deliver fewer threads than predecessors. The company calls it optimization. Critics see a risky departure from two decades of design wisdom. The Register first outlined the plan in detail on June 1. Diamond Rapids Xeon processors will hit 192 cores, a 50 percent jump from current high-end models. But they drop simultaneous multithreading entirely. Threads fall by roughly a quarter. Intel intends to restore the feature in the follow-on Coral Rapids generation expected in 2028. ( The Register ) So what changed? SMT, introduced in 2002, long served as a reliable way to extract extra throughput from each core. Intel phased it out first in client chips. Server Xeons followed suit in this upcoming design. The decision reflects a broader architectural bet. More physical cores. Simpler execution pipelines. Higher clock potential in some workloads.…