Intel demonstrates low-powered CPU that draws power from red wine

The closing day of Intel’s annual Developer Forum is typically reserved to highlight future-looking projects and this year was no different. In-house anthropologist Dr. Genevieve Bell demonstrated a processor that is so efficient that it can draw the power it needs from a glass of red wine.

The wine glass in question used two electrodes that reacted with the acetic acid in the red wine to power a low-powered processor and accelerometer. It’s similar in theory to the potato battery that children have used in science fairs for years although Bell wanted to show that even the slightest bit of power could run Intel silicon.

Through the demonstration Bell said it is possible to start to imagine a world of incredibly low-power devices that also offer high performance. This will help unburden people – especially those in developing countries – and give us a pathway to wearable technology with the ability to power things like constant sensing, communication and computing – all of which are necessary for our mobile future, she said.

Elsewhere, Lama Nachman, principal engineer at Intel Labs, joined Bell to demonstrate a few other nifty ideas in mobile. One involved voice recognition to unlock a phone while the other used the accelerometer in a handset to record a user’s gait while walking which was then used to unlock the phone. When movements were mimicked by another person, the phone noticed the subtle differences and locked the system down.

Technology like this is still likely years away but it’s neat to get a glimpse into what the future may hold.

Intel's 14nm Skylake platform to support DDR4, PCIe 4.0, SATA Express

A leaked Intel Xeon roadmap purportedly sheds some light on what the chip maker has in store for Skylake, the successor to the yet-to-be-released Broadwell platform. Chips aren’t slated to hit the market for a couple more years but when they do arrive, they’ll be carrying an array of new tech with them.

Leaked Intel roadmap pegs Broadwell for 2H 2014

A leaked Intel roadmap has revealed the company's next line of processors, codenamed 'Broadwell', are scheduled for release in the second half of 2014. Broadwell is the 14 nm shrink of the current 'Haswell' fourth-generation Core processors, however according to this roadmap Intel will be focusing on mobile parts at the expense of desktop.

AMD slashes Q2 revenue guidance, shares slide

Shares of Advanced Micro Devices (AMD) fell as much as 9% in early trading after the chip vendor slashed its second quarter sales outlook, which is now expected to fall 11% from the first quarter. The company originally expected revenue to be flat to up as much as 6% in its prior quarterly forecast.

The difference from the old guidance to the revised guidance issued Monday is $222 million. Its full second-quarter results are due on July 19.

AMD blamed “a weaker consumer buying environment” and “softer-than-expected channel sales” in China and Europe for the decline. Indeed a slowing world economy has affected consumer sales but the magnitude of AMD’s revenue miss is worrying. According to analysts the company is more exposed to a consumer slowdown than rival Intel because a higher percentage of its sales are to consumers.

But the mounting pressure from rivals is playing its part too. On the CPU side AMD has struggled to compete with Intel’s last few processor architectures and instead focused on the value proposition of its chips — they make a good argument but that isn’t scoring them many design wins in the all-important laptop market.

Meanwhile, competition with Nvidia on the GPU front remains as strong as ever, but the later recently gained a significant edge over AMD by securing multiple deals with Apple for the MacBook Pro. Nvidia is also doing way better in the mobile space with its Tegra 3 SoC, which powers a range of tablets and smartphones, including the $199 Google Nexus 7 and the upcoming Surface tablet from Microsoft.

AMD's shares have lost 40% of their value after a year-high in March and are currently trading at $5.05.

Intel to launch 22nm Ivy Bridge processors on April 8

Intel is reportedly preparing to launch the upcoming 22nm Ivy Bridge series of processors on or around April 8. The company is expected to release a total of 25 Ivy Bridge chips during this time frame, according to PC makers in Taiwan as reported by DigiTimes.

17 of the CPUs set for launch are desktop models while the remaining eight will be designated for notebook and ultrabook use. Desktop parts include quad-core Core i7-3770K, 3770, 3770S, 3770T, and Core i5-3570, 3550 and 3450 models with prices ranging from $184 to $332. The Core i5-3470T should be available in May for $184. Desktop chipsets on the agenda include Z77 ($48), H77 ($43), Z75 ($40) and B75 ($37), with Q77 ($44) and Q75 ($40) coming on May 13, the sources said.

Notebook processors Core i7-3920Qm, 3820QM and 3720QM will be ready in April for $1,096, $568 and $378, respectively. Other models including Core i5-3520M, 3360M, 3320M and ultrabook-specific Core i7-3667U and Core i5-3427U will be unveiled at a later date. Accompanying notebook chipsets HM77 ($48), UM77 ($48), HM76 ($43) and HM75 ($40) are coming in April. QS77 ($53) and QM77 ($48) are expected in May.

Intel’s Ivy Bridge processors were originally rumored for a March 2012 release, according to a tip from motherboard manufacturers but it seems that Intel (or board makers) weren’t able to meet that deadline. The chips are expected to offer a 20 percent overall performance boost over comparable Sandy Bridge CPUs on the processing side. A reworked internal GPU will produce 30 to 60 percent better overall graphics performance with DirectX 11 and OpenCL 1.1 support.a

Intel ships 'Cedar Trail' Atom processors for netbooks

Intel has officially started shipping its next-generation low-power Atom processor for netbooks. Part of the Cedar Trail platform, which already saw two chips released in September for low-powered desktop solutions, the new Atom N2600 and N2800 processors are based on Intel's 32nm Cedarview architecture and will replace the existing N455 and N475 Pine Trail models on small and cheap laptops.

This third generation of Intel Atom processors reportedly offers double the graphics performance of its predecessor thanks to a new PowerVR SGX 545 engine sourced from Imagination Technologies. There's only mention of DirectX 9 support on the press presentation for the new chips, which seems to validate rumors that they failed Microsoft's certification for DirectX 10.1.

They do offer a dedicated media engine for hardware-accelerated decoding of motion video, including support for 1080p H.264, in addition to support for Intel Wireless Display technology -- though the latter will be available depending on the system and price point according to AnandTech.

The move to a 32nm process allows for reduced power consumption in spite of the more powerful GPU. The N2600 is clocked at 1.6GHz with a TDP of just 3.5 watts, while the N2800 is clocked at 1.86GHz and it has a TDP of 6.5W. Both are dual-core, four-thread parts and are meant to be paired with the company's pre-existing NM10 chipset. Intel claims netbooks based on the new chips will feature up to 10 hours of battery life.

Intel is expecting the vast majority of Cedar Trail netbooks to be sold in the $199 - $229 price point, while models featuring Intel's WiDi and potentially fanless designs could arrive later in 2012 for around $399.

Intel 'Ivy Bridge' desktop chip prices leak

We already have a pretty good idea of what the initial Ivy Bridge lineup is going to look like when Intel releases its next chip refresh in the first half of 2012. Now, the folks at CPU World are spilling the beans on yet another piece of the puzzle: pricing. For the most part it looks like Intel will maintain similar pricing to their current Sandy Bridge products. The Core i7-3770K, for example, will replace the Core i7-2700K at the same $332.

This will be the fastest and most expensive Ivy Bridge part at launch. Three remaining SKUs from the Core i7 family -- i7-3770, i7-3770S and i7-3770T -- will be priced at $294 in 1K quantities. Further down the ladder the unlocked-multiplier Core i5 3570K is priced at $225 while the i5-3500 and the energy-efficient i5-3570T and i5-3550S models are all priced at $205. Lastly, the Core i5-3450, i5-3450S, and i5-3470T are listed for $184.

Ivy Bridge i5 processors will continue on from Sandy Bridge offering four physical cores, 6MB of L3 cache and no hyper-threading, except for the i5 3470T which is a dual core unit with two hyper-threaded cores. Their Core i7 siblings are also running four physical cores, but can handle eight simultaneous threads and have 2MB more cache available. The table below contains a summary of the upcoming chips' specs and prices:

Model	Cores	Threads	Frequency	Turbo Frequency	L3 cache	TDP	Price	Sandy Bridge CPU / price
Core i5-3450	4	4	3.1 GHz	3.5 GHz	6 MB	77 Watt	$184	i5-2400 / $184
Core i5-3450S	4	4	2.8 GHz	3.5 GHz	6 MB	65 Watt	$184	i5-2400S / $184
Core i5-3470T	2	4	2.9 GHz	3.6 GHz	3 MB	35 Watt	$184	i5-2390T / $184
Core i5-3550	4	4	3.3 GHz	3.7 GHz	6 MB	77 Watt	$205	i5-2500 / $205
Core i5-3550S	4	4	3 GHz	3.7 GHz	6 MB	65 Watt	$205	i5-2500S / $205
Core i5-3570K	4	4	3.4 GHz	3.8 GHz	6 MB	77 Watt	$225	i5-2500K / $216
Core i5-3570T	4	4	2.3 GHz	3.3 GHz	6 MB	45 Watt	$205	i5-2500T / $205
Core i7-3770	4	8	3.4 GHz	3.9 GHz	8 MB	77 Watt	$294	i7-2600 / $294
Core i7-3770K	4	8	3.5 GHz	3.9 GHz	8 MB	77 Watt	$332	i7-2700K / $332
Core i7-3770S	4	8	3.1 GHz	3.9 GHz	8 MB	65 Watt	$294	i7-2600S / $294
Core i7-3770T	4	8	2.5 GHz	3.7 GHz	8 MB	45 Watt	$294	N/A

Intel set to release Core i5-2550K quad-core unlocked CPU

Intel is planning to release another Sandy Bridge CPU before Ivy Bridge is launched next year. The Core i5-2550K will feature an unlocked clock multiplier and four CPU cores, according to an investigative report from CPU World.

A new entry in the Material Declaration Data Sheets database revealed the BX80623I52550K box part number, CM8062301213000 OEM part number and SR0QH S-spec code. Because the part was just recently added to the database and the i5-2550K isn’t on Intel’s roadmap, it is believed that the decision to launch this processor was only recently made.

Aside from a slightly higher default clock speed, likely 3.4GHz, the chip will be functionally identical to a Core i5-2500K with the aforementioned unlocked multiplier, HD 3000 graphics, 6MB of L3 cache, Turbo Boost support and a 95 watt TDP. One could speculate that the 2550K will be priced slightly higher than existing 2500K models and perhaps overclock higher based on better binning.

No launch date or price has been issued yet but the CPU will likely drop around the same time as the next round of AMD FX-Series CPUs are released. Perhaps Intel didn’t get the recent memo from AMD spokesperson Mike Silverman when he went on record with the San Jose Mercury News proclaiming that AMD is no longer trying to compete with Intel. Either way, more products on the market at different price points means more options for the end user.