Intel CEO Paul Otellini says the company's much talked about GPU project, Larrabee is on track and volume shipments are to start early next year.

During Intel's first-quarter earnings conference call Monday afternoon Otellini said that the Larrabee silicon showcased at IDF Beijing last week was a high-end version, and that other version with fewer cores and lower price points will be available as well.

"What you saw is the 'extreme' version, let me put it that way," said Otellini, adding that the GPU is in the debug stage now. "I would expect volume introduction of this product to be early next year."

Intel still faces an uphill struggle convincing developers to embrace the new GPU, which brings along a lot of x86 baggage.