Intro
AMD today confirms its plans for future-generation mobile PC technology based around the Griffin CPU and Puma chipset rival to Centrino.
The news comes less than a fortnight after NVIDIA introduced its GeForce 8M next-generation family of graphics processors for portable PCs - see this headline,
NVIDIA tightens stranglehold with GeForce 8M mobile GPU intro.
However, while what NVIDIA unveiled on May 8 were real products starting to come available that week, today's revelations by AMD come in the form of a "technology announcement" - in essence, a statement of intent and something that the company won't be able to put in the bank and spend.
AMD's plans were explained to HEXUS in a one-to-one with AMD Fellow - and CPU-veteran - Maurice (Mo) Steinman who formerly held senior posts at Intel, HP, Compaq and DEC.
AMD
Fellow Maurice Steinman
Mr Steinman is chief of development and design for AMD's next-generation mobile microprocessors. He's responsible for mobile-optimized, on-die northbridge and microprocessor architecture - from planning to implementation.
With last year's acquisition of GPU specialist ATI - NVIDIA's deadly rival - the effort he heads involves even more design-centres than before. They're spread around Boston, California, Colorado and Texas in the USA; Toronto in Canada; and Dresden in Germany.
Rather than risk losing key staff by cutting down on the number of design offices, the company has instead rationalised areas of design, so that some centres concentrate on one or more specific areas of functionality, such as caching or in/out control.
Setting the scene for the developments that are needed, Mr Steinman says that customers - the PC builders that AMD supplies - are increasingly demanding more functionality for less money. And precisely what that entails, he explains on page two...
