Mobile Computing : Centrino
Several key points were mentioned by Anand within this keynote, which intel believe is what is important for the consumer. These are the 4 vectors of mobile computing:
- Connectivity
- Battery Life
- Cutting Edge Performance
- Sleek, and stylish design
The largest segment of the market is the sleek and slimline sector this is one of the most important factors users are concerned about. But there is a need for people to have the other factors, but one of the most important is the slimline design.
Within the world there are many different ways of connecting to the internet or sending files to other products – these are via dialup, wireless, Bluetooth, infra-red, and many other different protocols. The key sections which Intel has been concentrating on are the slim line, but also wireless connectivity. They have developed and validated 802.11b with Bluetooth as an integral part of the Centrino solution. In certain laptop solutions which have the Bluetooth and the Wireless networking “added” to them there has been problems with collisions when they are both in use – this is due to them running on the same frequency – Intel have worked on this and thus developed a solution to this problem – the Centrino platform has this already enabled within it.
The next step on Centrino platform there is a CPU which is based on the Intel 90nm process and is built on the 300MM wafers. This CPU is called the ‘Dothan’, this CPU will be launching around Late '03'.
Intel did a demonstration of the performance of the 1.6GHz Centrino solution. They compared the Intel Pentium 3M 1.2GHz, vs the Pentium 4 2.4M CPU vs the 1.6GHz Centrino. Under full load running intensive applications the speed of the Centrino showed through and we saw it beating both the P3 and the P4 mobile units. The power consumption is comparable with that of the Pentium 3 unit, but since it is faster it spends more time idle, thus using less power overall.
