It has been just over a month since Intel introduced its Medfield mobile-Atom SoC in the form of the Z2460 and, towards the close of MWC, Intel announced two new models, the low-end Z2000 and the high-end Z2580.
The Z2460 that had previously been announced ran at 1.3GHz with a now adjusted turbo of 2.0GHz, in comparison the Z2000 will run at 1GHz and feature no turbo, whilst the Z2580 will be dual-core at 1.3GHz with a turbo of 1.8GHz.
Both the Z2000 and the Z2460 include PowerVR 540 graphics cores, with the Z2460 clocked 80MHz greater at 400MHz. The Z2580, however, will feature a more powerful PowerVR 544 MP2 core, clocked at 533MHz.
Whilst the Z2000 is expected to form the bulk of sales, as it's cheap and power-efficient enough to enter lower-end mobiles, the Z2580 features support for Intel's XMM7150 LTE modem.
Whilst components will begin sampling towards the end of 2012, we don't expect to find any devices sporting these chips until the first half of 2013, though with the performance working its way up to dual-core and entry-level laptop-like graphics, we're beginning to see a potential future for Windows 8 docking and desktop functionality on devices sporting high-end x86 Medfield SoCs.
On another note, Intel has confirmed that it's already working on building chips on a 14nm process, thanks to its Tri-Gate technology.
