[Dylan16807]

Huh? From the very start through gen 7 the tiers were 2 cores with hyperthreading, 4 without, 4 with. And sometimes more at the very top, in different forms.

The first two generations of core processors had a different pattern, but those were "core [2] solo/duo/quad", they had no i and no tier numbers.

(And before that was pentium 4/D.)

[ethbr0]

So we're talking about Nehalem and Westmere as the first two i* releases.

Nehalem desktop had: Celeron P1053 (1 core HT), i5 750/760 (4 core no HT), i7 860-960 (4 core HT)

Westmere desktop had: Pentium/Celeron G59XX/G1101 (2 core no HT), i3 530-560 (2 core HT), i5 650-680 (2 core HT), i7 970-980 (6 core HT)

Links in sibling post above.

So really... the HT / no HT really only lasted one release (Nehalem), and that didn't even have an i3.

[Dylan16807]

Okay, I was slightly off because there were a few 2 core 4 thread models that snuck into the low end of i5, but in general they were 4 core 4 thread. And Nehalem/Westmere worked together as the first generation, so they didn't make the bigger desktop sizes using Westmere. Westmere shouldn't be analyzed as a standalone release.

But those Celerons are simply a different product line. I'm pretty sure they never released an i processor with less than 2 cores and 4 threads.