The new chips can get by on 50 times less power than previous Atom chips and provide twice the computing power of similar devices in the market today. The message for consumers: if you’re impressed with performance of Apple iPhones and iPads today, you haven’t seen anything yet.
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They could run music for two days straight and run smartphones with screens that are 3.8-inches diagonally. Tablet computers can use a 1.9-gigahertz version of the chip — that’s far faster than the ARM-based A4 chip that Apple created for its iPad tablet computer (using Samsung as a manufacturer). Those tablets can be as thin as 15 millimeters.
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Intel has very high hopes for the market. Anand Chandrasekher, senior vice president and general manager of Intel’s Ultra Mobility Group, said at a press event that Intel believes there will be 10 billion connected devices and a billion new connected users by 2015.
In a demo, Intel showed that it could run a full video conference on an Avaa Mobile prototype smartphone at the same time it is playing a high-definition video. Intel contends that the graphics performance is two to four times better than today’s devices. The chip can run games such as Quake III at 100 frames per second — a pretty speedy performance for a portable computing device.
The new Atom chip incorporates things that were in separate chips before. It integrates 3D graphics from Imagination Technologies. It also has video and display processing built into the microprocessor. In demos, the company showed that a prototype phone with the chip could do good quality 3D graphics.
Pricing for the chips hasn’t been disclosed. Smartphone platforms typically are produced for $175 and Intel says its prices will be low enough to fit within that kind of platform.
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Analyst Tom Halfhill said the chip means that Intel can finally get into the party in the smartphone business, but it faces tough competition from Qualcomm and Texas Instruments, as well as other strong players such as Broadcom, Nvidia and Marvell.
The new Atom chips will be able to run the Moblin version of Linux as well as MeeGo. It will also run the Android operating system. But, interestingly enough, will not run the Windows Mobile operating system of longtime partner Microsoft.
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