AMD roadmap

Next year chip maker AMD is expected to launch its answer to Intel’sultrabook platform. Ultrabooks are basically thin and light laptops that weigh less than 3 pounds, have starting prices under $1000 and have Intel chips. But really, they’re just thin and light laptops — which is why I’m dubious that the name will really catch on.

Because let’s face it, if a big name PC maker releases a 13 inch notebook next year that looks like a MacBook Air, but which runs Windows and has an AMD processor — most people aren’t going to be able to tell it apart from the laptops that Intel has arbitrarily decided are ultrabooks.

OK, now that my nomenclature rant is out of the way, it is pretty exciting to see chip makers focusing on powerful processors for super-thin laptop computers. There’s not a lot of room for fans and other traditional cooling mechanisms in a laptop that’s less than 0.8 inches thick, which is why in the past we’ve tended to see ultraportable laptops with low power Intel Atom processors or computers like the classic Toshiba Libretto line which were small, but thick.

According to a product roadmap that was leaked this summer, AMD’s upcoming Krishna processor will have a TDP of 9W, while the upcoming Wichita platform will run at 20W.

Digitimes reports AMD’s new chips for ultraportable laptops will start to hit the streets in the summer of 2012, replacing the current AMD C-series and E-series chips.

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5 replies on “Ultrathin notebooks with AMD chips coming in 2012?”

  1. i still think the slim 11.6″ form factor is the perfect compromise, and from that perspective the 20W Wichita APU looks to be perfect.

    i may hold off on buying a laptop until they arrive…….. well, i may buckle if a 25W dual-core Llano APU arrives in a dinky chassis first.

  2. I keep aksing why we cant have an atom based ultrabook which would have super long battery life. 

    1. because Ultrabooks are supposed to give you GOOD Performance in a slim Computer……if you slap the Slowpoke Atom Chips in there, you don’t get an Atom-Ultrabook, you get an Aluminum Netbook.

      And if an Aluminum Netbook is what you want, google “Asus Eee PC 1018P”, available since early 2010.

    2. There actually is an “Atom ultrabook” called the ASUS X101.  Ultrabook thin, netbook cheap.  Won’t run Windows, however (8gb is not enough space for Windows 7, and Microsoft doesn’t sell XP any more).

  3. I think AMD’s best chance is to aim for the same niche Intel aims for with the Atom chip…now that the netbook craze has come and gone, computer makers are not putting as much focus on the Atom chip…which gives AMD a chance to be in low cost laptops and subnotebooks (OK, netbooks) that have comparable CPU and far better GPU performance than Intel’s low-cost offerings.

    I personally think ASUS X101H and similar computers will be the true low-cost answers to the Macbook Air.

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