Perhaps nothing will change the processor game so much, however, as the integration of graphics into the CPU, which may spell the beginning of the end of discrete graphics.
Surprisingly, it's Intel leading this charge, with the coming "Clarkdale" desktop and "Arrandale" mobile processors, both manufactured using 32nm processes.
Clarkdale and Arrandale both have two cores as well as a GPU packaged into a single chip. These processors will be sold under the Desktop or Mobile Core i3, Core i5 and Core i7 brands, as well as the Pentium G6xxx.
The Atom is also getting an integrated GPU early this year in the new "Pineview" model, enabling even smaller (and hopefully cheaper) netbooks and nettops.
Don't expect these products to overtake discrete graphics chips immediately, of course. For a start, it's Intel, which doesn't have the best graphics technology going, and Intel certainly isn't pushing these as high-performance parts.
At best, they're going to be equivalent to chipset graphics, and mostly these processors are about reducing the number of parts in a device and thus cost, not about performance.
They're also not integrated chips, as we'll see from AMD's Fusion later in 2011. They're two separate dies packaged into the same chip: a 32nm processor die and a 45nm die that contains the GPU and major "north bridge" components such as the memory and PCI controller.
A single die with both GPU and CPU integrated (the GPU perhaps replacing one or more processor cores) is not likely to appear this year, but we know that both Intel and AMD are working hard on such a solution for 2011.
Even so, Arrandale and Clarkdale should be a major blow for discrete graphics in 2010, providing system-on-a-chip solutions for mainstream computing and driving down the cost and size of both netbook and desktop computers.
Other titles in the series also include:
Number 20: Better WiFi
Number 19: Hybrid-cars
Number 18: DSLR Movies
Number 17: Wireless Power
Number 16: IPTV/ video on demand
Number 15: GPS on your phone
Number 14: Cloud computing
Number 13: Ebooks
Number 12: 100 megabit broadband