All day battery life now scheduled for 2008 arrival.
All day battery life now scheduled for 2008 arrival.
Intel has increased its investments in a low power processor that aims to deliver all day battery life to portable devices like the Ultra Mobile PC (UMPC).
The chipmaker previously had promised to deliver the chip by then end of this decade, but is now accelerating development for the chip to be ready by 2008, Intel chief executive Paul Otellini said at the Intel Developer Forum in San Francisco.
Intel's ultra mobile processor aims to deliver a reduction in power consumption by a factor 10 over the technology that was available in 2005, enabling 7 hours of battery life. The chip will measure one seventh of the size of today's models, said Otellini.
"The idea of getting all day life out of a highly portable, highly functional, highly featured device is now very much upon us," Otellini told delegates.
"This offers a new opportunity to all you developers to take advantage of
this silicon development and find new opportunities for products."
Otellini promised that the chip will be capable of running a full desktop operating systems including Windows Vista.
The first ultra mobile PC units started shipping earlier this year. Reviewers were disappointed by the system's limited battery life, small screen size and its tweaked Windows XP operating system.
In a demonstration at the developer show, Intel showed off a future UMPC device with Wi-Fi and Wimax wireless technology that is capable of connecting to the onboard computer system of a prototype Volkswagen. This enables the car's stereo to play streaming audio off the internet and allowed the driver to serve video from the UMPC to LCD screens in the back.