Intel’s Austin Chip Design Team Looking Beyond Atom
April 1, 2009
The Austin-American Statesman has taken a fairly comprehensive at the Intel Corporation’s chip design center in Austin, Texas, along with the chip design team responsible for the Intel Atom.
The article mentions that Intel is aggressively looking to push Atom-based technology into other markets, not just laptops/netbooks. It also mentions “Lincroft”, which is the second-generation version of the Atom, and which is geared towards Mobile Internet Devices (MIDs) as well as smartphones.
Lincroft is a major step up from the first generation Atom, as it offers built-in graphics processing as well as memory control, along with lower power requirements. All of that adds up to a smaller size for the platform as well.
In the midst of a lot of high-tech companies cutting back in various areas, Intel’s mobility group in Austin team is doing well, thanks to the Atom:
Despite a tough industry downturn, Intel now has more than 900 workers in Austin, more than ever at its 11-year-old design center.
The reason is the Atom family of low-power, low-cost processors, which Austin designers created and which has become a major new product for Intel.
Atom fueled a boomlet in the infant market for netbooks — small, affordable mini-notebook computers — in 2008.
Read: Austin-American Statesman
Intel Gets Aggressive with CULV
March 25, 2009
DigiTimes is reporting that Intel is getting extremely aggressive in promoting the upcoming CULV platform. CULV - Consumer Ultra Low Voltage, is expected to shake up the ultraportable laptop/notebook market.
Up until now, typical Ultra Low Voltage (ULV) laptops were fairly pricey - normally starting at well over $1000 (although that’s changed in recent months). With the introduction of the CULV platform, Intel plans to change that. They will be offering deep discounts, as low as $65 per unit for HP, Acer, and Dell, with $70-$75 USD for Asustek and MSI, according to DigiTimes’ sources. The lowest tier is probably Celeron-based, as dual-core mid-range and high-end CPUs are being listed at over $300 USD.
MSI’s 13.3-inch X-Slim X340 will be one of the first ultraportables based on the CULV platform and is expected to start somewhere between $700 and $1000.
Netbooks/sub-notebooks revealed that there is a huge market for small/ultraportable laptops at a lower price than traditional laptops. Intel would probably rather sell CULV CPUs than their Atom CPUs that are found in most netbooks, since the price-per-unit for the CULVs is substantially higher. This will be an interesting launch to watch.
The official CULV launch will be on April 19, 2009.
Read:
- DigiTimes
Intel Reported to Postpone Menlow Atom CPUs
March 23, 2009
DigiTimes is reporting that Intel will be temporarily postponing two of its upcoming Menlow-based Atom CPUs to sometime in mid-April.
These are primarily intended for Mobile Internet Devices (MIDs), however they could find their way into other devices such as netbooks. The CPUs affected are:
Intel Atom Z550
- 1.2GHz
- Supports Intel US15W chipset
- Features Burst Performance Technology (BPT) which can automatically adjust core frequency depending on performance and can reduce power consumption.
Intel Atom Z515
- 2.0GHz
- Supports Intel US15W chipset
- Also supports Intel UL11L chipset (a low-power/ultra-low-power chipset)
Both CPUs are listed as having an average power consumption of 0.22W, with a Thermal Design Power (TDP) of 2.4W. Intel would not comment on the release dates.
Read: DigiTimes
Intel’s GN40 Chipset and High Definition
March 11, 2009
Given all of the interest in the NVIDIA Ion platform and its abilities to handle HD content, as well as some of things being said as well as the rebuttals, Intel has discussed the performance of it’s upcoming GN40 chipset when paired with its Atom CPUs.
Fudzilla has Intel’s official statement on HD content and the GN40 chipset:
GN40 is designed to do 1080P HD playback for typical broadband internet content; it is not designed to enable full Blu-ray capability where the bitrates and demands of multi-layer content are significantly higher than that of internet HD content.
As Fudzilla points, out, there won’t be any netbooks with 1080p displays for a long time (although the Dell Inspiron Mini 10 has a 720p-capable display). There’s also a huge difference between Blu-ray decoding and “HD playback for typical broadband internet content”.
There are netbooks with HDMI outputs coming out (such as the Inspiron Mini 10), and you could hook those up to HDTVs or HD-capable displays, but you aren’t going to be copying Blu-ray movies over to them and then playing them out to an HDTV, even if they could handle BRD movies.
Instead, many of us are wanting smoother playback of things like Hulu.com in 480p, as well as movie trailers, etc., (and don’t forget YouTube has been adding HD content).
Read: Fudzilla
Intel to Push Ultra Low Voltage Tech into Mainstream
March 8, 2009
Channel Register posted some comments made last week during CeBIT 2009 by Intel’s mobile marketing director, Karen Regis, as well discussing the roadmap Intel is laying out for some of its mobile platforms.
First, the Montevina Plus platform, sequel to last year’s Montevina, would be rolled out by Intel starting sometime in the second quarter. This platform would see Intel Penryn CPUs clocking in at 3GHz or faster. High Definition content/video would also see a boost from Montevina Plus.
Next, and most important to those of us interested in smaller laptops/notebooks and other ultraportables, Intel would be making it’s Ultra Low Voltage (ULV) technology available to mainstream devices. The best example of Intel’s current ULV deployment includes the 13.3-inch Apple MacBook Air and Samsung X360, with the upcoming MSI X-Slim X340 being an example of the newer deployments.
Intel wants to get ULV tech into cheaper platforms, with the MSI X340 being a prime example - Intel wants to see these in systems costing around $599 - $1,000 USD. These are full systems and not scaled-down ultraportables like “netbooks” or MIDs.
Read: Channel Register
NVIDIA to Intel on the Ion: Where’s Your HD Now?
February 26, 2009
Recently, there’s been some heated rhetoric from Intel over the upcoming NVIDIA Ion platform. Intel made a lot of arguments (and the NetbookNews.it covers the Intel slides) against using the NVIDIA Ion platform, ranging from the age of the chipset to costs and performance.
NVIDIA has responded in kind, although it’s a more positive response - they are playing up their benefits and making it clear that these are
Some of NVIDIA’s points/rebuttals:
- Validation: Ion has been validated by OEMs and Microsoft, and products are now shipping
- Value: Endorsed by Microsoft, many developers, and the tech media
- Advantages: Ion is faster and offers a faster, more feature rich, better experience vs. Intel netbooks, nettops, and notebooks
- Performance vs battery life: 10X performance at similar battery life
On the issue of Intel saying that the window of opportunity for the Ion platform is short, NVIDIA responds:
Next gen Atom (Pineview) forces customers to use Intel graphics (with minor improvements). Coming Q4′09: Second-generation ION expands CPU support, performance, and features.
NVIDIA makes it clear that they feel that Atom/Pineview will not offer the performance people are going to be wanting, while at the same time, NVIDIA will be rolling out a second-generation Ion platform in that time period.
As we get more and more into HD-formatted content (TV/movies), and we move beyond “netbooks” as a simple way to access the internet, and we see more and more netbooks/ultraportables with HD-capable displays (such as future models of Dell’s Inspiron Mini 10), HD-capable chipsets/graphics will become important.
Read: NetbookNews.it (Italian)
via SlashGear
MSI and Asustek to Showcase CULV Laptops at CeBIT
February 26, 2009
We’ve known about the MSI X-Slim X320 since CES 2009, although not too much, at least as far as pricing and release dates. We also know that MSI has been showing off the X-Slim X340 and X600 ahead of next week’s CeBIT 2009 in Germany.
What we didn’t know before now, and this is information from DigiTimes, is that Asustek would also be showing off a similar laptop/notebook.
All four devices are based on Intel’s Consumer Ultra Low Voltage (CULV) platform. The CULV platform is designed for ultra-thin and ultra-portable devices. Apparently, at least in the case of MSI, the X340 and X600 and maybe the X320 fit into Intel’s plans for CULV, as far as breaking the CULV platform out into three distinct segments. As far as the X320, it’s been listed as having an Atom, and Intel’s lowest tier of the CULV platform is centered around a Celeron. It could be that the Atom takes the place of that, however, the Celeron and Core 2 Solo and Core 2 Duo CPUs available for the CULV are all compatible with the same CPU socket, whereas the Atom has a different architecture.
However, DigiTimes mentions that Intel has listed around 20 different configurations, and that Hewlett-Packard (HP) will also be joining Asustek and MSI in the CULV market.
The article (and DigiTimes’ sources) make a good argument that the CULV platform may end up having an impact on the netbook market, since the 10-inch netbook market is quickly heading towards very low prices (the Asus Eee PC 1000HE and 10.1-inch Acer Aspire One come to mind with their sub-$400 prices). For those manufacturers that want to compete with ultraportable laptops, but don’t want to get into a race to the bottom with the 10″ netbooks, the CULV platform makes a lot of sense.
Read: DigiTimes
Ars Technica: The State of the Netbook, Part II
February 25, 2009
Earlier this month Ars Technica published the first part of their “State of the Netbook” series. The first part covered around 15-20 years prior to 2008/2009.
Yesterday they published part two, aptly named “The State of the Netbook, Part II: The Inevitable Eeeruption” which covers Asustek kick-starting things with their Asus Eee PC line as well the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) and Classmate projects, which spurred Asustek into action, along with the Nanobook concepts and Intel’s platforms. The HP 2133 was mentioned for its role in getting VIA into the game.
Ars Technica believes the netbook is here to stay, and their view mirrors that of the great Wired article that gets into how netbooks are something that people want, not something they are necessarily being told they need, and the technology is finally delivering:
Is it possible that, after all this sound and fury, the netbook trend may yet turn out to be a tale told by an idiot?
It seems unlikely. This attempt has escalated into a Greek epic of coordinated technological and economic effort by a huge variety of players. From dedicated processors and chipsets from multiple vendors, to cheap LCD screens and memory to tiny hard disks (and SSDs) capacious and fast enough to store and deliver the media users demand, the technology has arrived, and it is being delivered in a dedicated form, engineered for this wave of devices. This is finally it.
Part III will cover the Intel Atom and how it’s both helped and hurt the PC market in general.
Read: Ars Technica
