Surfing on the move
Intel president and CEO Paul Otellini used his keynote speech at CES to stress that he thinks the convergence of the IT and telco industries is the key technological trend going into 2008 and beyond.
“Increasingly, computing and communications are coming together, bringing a new level of capabilities and intelligence to the Internet experience,” he said. “The personal Internet of tomorrow will serve you – delivering the information you want, when you want it, how you want, wherever you are."
Intel pioneered the UMPC (ultra-mobile PC) concept back in 2006. The first UMPCs were still too big to fit in a pocket, so their advantage over notebooks was unclear, but Intel’s new ultra mobile platform, expected to ship in the first half of this year, intends to remedy that.
Codenamed Menlow, it’s comprised of a chipset with a single chip design, codenamed Poulsbo and a processor, codenamed Silverthorne, which comes in a package that is five times smaller and consumes 10 times less power than ultra low voltage mobile processors introduced in 2006.
Otellini also demonstrated for the first time Intel's first Intel Architecture-based system-on-a-chip product optimised for a new generation of set-top boxes, media players and TVs. It is designed to enable easy migration of Internet applications and services to TVs, thus facilitating technologies like IPTV.
Codenamed Canmore, it will be available in the second half of this year and will pair a PC-class processor core with a dedicated A/V processing that can play 1080p video with 7.1 surround sound, a 3-D graphics unit for cool user interfaces and online games, and technologies to enable broadcast TV.
Lastly, he touted the advantages of WiMAX compared to other wireless broadband technologies in delivering a global Internet network. He predicted that nearly 150 million people will be connected via WiMAX by the end of this year.
But in case you think Intel’s abandoned its core market in favour of shiny mobile gadgets, don’t forget it also launched about a zillion processors while Otellini was talking.
