Portable Power

A flurry of activity this week in the Mobile market aims to vault portable technology forward. New technology aimed at making laptops perform as well as their desktop counterparts are making their way to the market.

Intel has announced the new Centrino line, which combines the low power Pentium-M with the circuitry for 802.11 wireless networking with a new chipset to control it all.

Not to be outdone, AMD announced the new “Barton” line of processors, their own brand of high speed, low powered chips. The much anticipated TM8000 processor from Transmeta was also released this week. These low power packages are designed to increase battery life and lower prices in new notebooks.

Meanwhile, both ATI and NVidia have announced new video chipsets for notebooks. ATI has released a new Mobility Radeon series, while NVidia announced two new chips based on their GeForce FX line. These new chips pack more graphics performance, and better power management using less power than the standard lines.

All this adds up to better performance, longer battery life and lower prices for the next generation of notebook PC’s. The latest Intel Centrino ads show a deskbound computer user being zapped outside with the freedom given by his new notebook. But do you really want to work on a diving board or at a golf range?

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