There have been some interesting announcements from the
International Solid-State Circuits Conference in San Francisco this
week. Texas instruments, for example, introduced its new cellular
chip.
Intel also unveiled
its new Silverthorne processor aimed at ultra-mobile PCs.
Intel says the processor is a full x86 CPU that can handle active
work at levels as low as 600mw. Projections claim that the
Silverthorne processor will eventually hit 2GHz at a maximum
2-watt dissipation.
Silverthorne takes advantage of Intel’s new 45nm
technology. Justin Rattner, CTO of Intel said, “What has a lot of
OEMs excited is the dynamic range of this processor. It can be active
at less than 1 W, but when it has a workload in front of it--like
interpreting some Java byte codes to render a Web page--it can really
crank."
Silverthorne performance is said to be on par with the
performance of the Intel Pentium M processors that powered the
original Intel Centrino notebooks. Intel says that Silverthorne
uses multiple power management techniques and can switch in and out
of a new C6 deep-sleep-state in a mere 100 microseconds.
As efficient as Silverthorne is according to Intel, it
still has a long way to go to compete with cellular based processors
used in smartphones. Processors used in smart phones have total power
budgets in the range of only 600 milliwatts whereas Silverthorne
is in the 2 watt range.
That means that the first generation of Silverthorne
devices will be considerably larger than current generation smart
phones, though the processor will give the muscle needed to run full
versions of Windows Vista. InformationWeek quotes Nathan
Brookwood of Insight64 saying, “Silverthorne probably won't
appear in anything much smaller than a paperback book. But a
follow-on design with lower power consumption in 2009 could very well
appear in smart phones.”
The Silverthorne processor
is one of the core components in the Intel
Menlow platform that DailyTech reported on in September of
2007.