Intel and Mobile Computing

The UltraBook
If you are anything like me you want a powerful laptop that not only looks great but has a long battery life.  Intel is developing technologies to bring a new category of laptops in to market which will be called Ultrabooks.  Intel actually owns the trademark “Ultrabook” so they are going to create specifications for the Ultrabook and if a vendor like Dell or Lenovo want to call their notebook an Ultrabook it has to meet the specifications.  I really like this idea, because it will create a standard and Intel can tell consumers to go out and buy Ultrabooks.  Ultrabooks will be based on Intel’s Core processors starting with the Core i3 and going all the way up to Core i7.

Intel showed us the Samsung Series 9 notebook, which is an early version of an Ultrabook.  It is less than 0.8 inch thick with battery life of more than 7 hours, but has the processing power to play the latest 3D games, edit High-def videos and photos and multitasking.  The Samsung notebook has a price starting from approximately $900.

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Ultrabooks are being made to be ultra-responsive, ultra-secure and to even have touch-screen features.  They are also working on a way for them to fast boot in to the actual Windows operating system within 8 seconds.  They are doing this by using an piece of flash that tricks the OS in to thinking it is in hibernate mode, but the system itself is completely off.  So when you turn it back on it is super fast and you haven’t drained any of your battery.  Intel wants to see 40% of the mobile computing market using Ultrabooks by the end of next year and most models will start at under $1000.

Intel AppUp
In January 2010 Intel launched the beta version of the AppUp Center, by June 2011 the AppUp center had reached more than 1 million downloads.  Intel’s AppUp center is much like Apple’s App store, except it is made for laptops and netbooks and is optimized for the Intel Atom Processor.  I first got a look at the Intel AppUp center this past year at CES.  Some of the great features of the AppUp center include the ability to try before you buy, you can use any app for a 24-hour period to see if you like it, there is a thorough validation process so you will not see any malware or spyware, you are also able to register your applications on up to 5 devices.

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The AppUp center has all of the apps you would expect to find on other devices and even some great ones you won’t find anywhere else.

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