Are you looking to buy a laptop, notebook or portable computer? Do you want to know if the top of the line machine you are looking at is going to be replaced the day after you buy it? Do you want to time your purchase with the market to get the most speed for the least money? Pay attention road warriors, we have just what you need.
This article will outline what we believe are Intel's future mobile plans for CPUs and chipsets, compiled after speaking with multiple sources close to Intel and filtered through our own knowledge of the industry.
Also included are projected pricing and some handy bits of notebook buying advice.
Remember as you read that plans change. Changing market conditions require Intel to adapt. These are what we believe to be Intel's current mobile plans. We will start with what we see are major trends in Intel's roadmap, then we will move on to give specifics about each of Intel's consumer market segments.
As with desktop systems, overall mobile CPU speeds will increase as the year goes forward. No surprise there. Current Mobile Pentium III CPUs are running at up to 650MHz. A 700MHz version will be released this month (April 2000). They should hit 850MHz by the end of the year, and 900MHz or higher by Q1 2001.
Mobile Celerons for the low-end space are currently running at up to 500MHz. Faster Celerons are on their way. They will hit 700MHz in Q4 2000 and 733+MHz in Q1 2001. SSE will be included with new Celerons, starting with the 600MHz model in Q2 2000.New Celerons should ramp up to being manufactured on a .18 micron process in June of 2000, bringing their process technology up to par with current mobile Pentium IIIs.