CES: HP demos Android smartbook
The nascent smartbook market got a big nudge forward on Friday, courtesy of Hewlett-Packard, the world’s biggest personal computer maker.
Todd Bradley, executive vice president of HP’s PC division, turned up on stage at the Consumer Electronics Show during a keynote address by Qualcomm CEO Paul Jacobs to demo a device based on Qualcomm’s Snapdragon chip and running Google’s mobile Android software.
There was no formal product unveiling, but HP showed off a smartbook with multitouch capability, and Bradley spoke with apparent interest on the category, which is just beginning to build steam.
“We’re not going to make any announcement today but you know how interested and focused and frankly committed we are to this space,” Bradley said.
Smartbooks run on low-power ARM-based processors like Snapdragon or Nvidia’s Tegra, as opposed to netbooks, which run on Intel’s x86-based Atom platform.
There was certainly some buzz around smartbooks at CES, following the unveiling of Lenovo’s innovative Skylight device, and its IdeaPad U1 (which also run on Snapdragon.) Nvidia showed off a number of prototype mobile computing devices, but made no formal announcements about any products, as some had anticipated.
Intel likely isn’t sweating just yet; its dominance of the traditional PC CPU market isn’t under imminent threat. It remains to be seen how consumers will react to the smartbook phenomenon. The battery-friendly devices offer less processing power than Atom, but plenty of juice to do things most folks want to do, like surf the Web and watch movies.
AMD gains on Intel as intrigue swirls
New data from research group IDC shows Advanced Micro Devices gained on arch rival Intel in the first quarter PC microprocessor market. There is of course still a huge gap between the two — Intel earned a 77.3 percent unit global market share, a loss of 4.7 percent, while AMD held 22.3 percent, a gain of 4.6 percent — but it’s all the more interesting given the intrigue swirling around the two companies.
EU antitrust regulators are expected to issue a ruling Wednesday that Intel illegally paid PC makers to postpone or cancel the launch of products using chips made by AMD, sources have told Reuters. The European Commission believes the violations occurred during a period stretching back eight years, the sources said. Intel could be hit with a sizable fine.
Intel, with revenue of $37.6 billion in 2008, dominates the microprocessor market. AMD posted revenue of $5.8 billion in 2008.
Also of note in the IDC research is fresh data on Intel’s Atom netbook processor. Shipments fell 33% quarter-over-quarter, indicating that equipment manufacturers held plenty of Atom inventory coming into the new year, IDC said. The group estimates Atom made up 21 percent of Intel’s mobile PC processor shipments in the quarter and 6.5 percent of its mobile PC processor revenue.
Overall, PC microprocessor unit shipments declined 13 percent from last year, while market revenue slid 25.1 percent, IDC said.
The news is that the European Commission imposed a record €1.06 billion fine on chip maker Intel, Intel supposedly gave illegal rebates to customers and tried to squeeze rival AMD out of the European market.
Acer, Nvidia unveil pint-sized desktop PC
Nvidia and Acer on Tuesday unveiled a low-cost, full-featured desktop computer the size of hardback book, the first device based on Nvidia’s Ion platform.
The new Acer AspireRevo features an Nvidia graphics processing unit along with Intel Atom microprocessor. (Although they might sit comfortably together in the new PC, Intel and Nvidia continue to be bitter rivals in the chip world and battle each other in court.)
Nvida says the AspireRevo uses one-quarter the power of standard desktops and is 10 times faster than comparably priced PCs. The system can do most things a full-sized PC can, including play high-definition video and games, share digital pics and Web surfing.
Although Acer hasn’t yet announced a price for the PC, Nvidia says it expects Ion-based desktops to sell for less than $300. Ion-based notebooks are expected in the second half of the year, with price points expected to be below $500.
CES: “Green” envy on Day 2
Several exhibitors took up the “green” theme at CES 2009 as the “Pre” party continued. Any chance Dell had to upstage Palm disappeared in a cloud of secrecy with the “Adamo” laptop it briefly presented, but gave no details about.
Fuji said its EnviroMAX alkaline batteries were made of more than 90 percent recycled materials, had no mercury, cadmium and were PVC free.
Singapore-based Horizon Fuel Cell Technologies said their “HydroPack” water-activated and portable power system HydroPak could provide 4 to 5 hours of 50 watt emergency power without pollution or noise.
Design conscious Areaware showed off a retro and playful radio called “Magno”, that it said was made in Indonesia with sustainable harvest timber.
And Greenpeace held a press conference praising gadgets by Lenovo, Sharp, Samsung, Nokia and Toshiba in its 2008 Green Electronics Survey.
Intel rolled out the next generation of its netbooks aimed at the education sector and emerging markets. The third generation Classmate PC netbook is actually a netbook tablet, adding a touch screen and powered by Intel’s Atom processor.
ARM Holdings is a rising star in the field of Micro Processors to power the Mobile Internet Device. ARM have an advantage over it competitors such as AMD and Intel. ARM only design it the processors and the license the technologies to host of other vendors, such as ST Micro Electronics, Toshiba, Nokia, Apple, Nvida and to many, many more companies. The list can really go on and on.
Source:
http://www.contract-mobile-phones.org