Intel, on behalf various netbook manufacturers including Acer, ASUS, Fujitsu, Lenovo, LG, Samsung, MSI, and Toshiba took the lead in announcing the new or forthcoming release of a dozen new netbooks based on Intel’s new dual-core Intel® Atom™ processor N550.
The new dual-core processor will have 4 threads and run at a 1.5Ghz clock speed, with 1MB of L2 cache. The new chip is expected to help offer comparable battery life to similar units running a single-core, 2 thread Intel® Atom™ processor N450 (1.6Ghz, 512k L2 cache), while offering substantially more under the hood. The N550 doesn’t have Intel’s Turbo Boost Technology as found in the Intel Core “i” series chips found in some full-sized PC notebooks and MacBook Pros, but it does feature its Hyper-Threading Technology allowing for parallel processing and faster throughput.
Better, faster and more efficient processors for netbooks are certainly overdue.
A Netbook’s raison-d’etre
Originally, the whole idea of a netbook was to offer a light, portable go anywhere device that allows you to be connected while still offering the notebook experience you’d expect. Of course, one of the chronic complaints about them was their sluggishness. In the past, it might have been OK to not have the “full- experience” on the road as at home or at the office, but today, that is no longer acceptable. Plus, on the road, people today are not “just” surfing the net. They’re doing all the same things; working, playing games, doing FaceBook, running applications from the cloud and watching YouTube – sometimes all at the same time.
According to Intel, since the first Atom-based chip launch in 2008, they have shipped more than 70 million of these chips. And while the faster N550 dual-core Intel Atom processor based netbooks will certainly offer better performance it’ll be interesting to see whether the lure of the tablet computers and devices like the iPad will keep people from embracing N550 based devices.
Greg Gazin is the Real Canadian Gadget Guy.
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