Asus is not giving up on netbooks yet, readies Eee PC 1225B

Samsung and Dell may be ready to ditch netbooks in favor of higher-margin products, but small and affordable  mini notebooks are not dead yet. Asus, the company largely responsible for popularizing the form factor in 2008, is planning to release a new Eee PC model based on AMD's Brazos platform.

The Eee PC 1225B is a follow up to the company's 1215B model and will arrive in two flavors: a dual-core AMD E450 APU clocked at 1.65 GHz and a dual-core AMD C60 APU clocked at 1.0 GHz. The system features an 11.6-inch (1366 x 768) LED-backlit display, 2GB or 4GB or RAM, Radeon HD 6320 or Radeon HD 6290 graphics with DirectX 11 support, and Windows 7 Home Premium pre-installed.

Other specs include hard drive capacities of 320GB, 500GB or 750GB, 802.11 b/g/n connectivity, optional Bluetooth 3.0 + HS, a 0.3MP camera, and a 6-cell 56Wh Li-ion battery promising up to 7 hours. There's one USB 2.0 and a couple of USB 3.0 ports, as well as Ethernet, an SD/SDHC/SDXC/MMC card reader, VGA, and one HDMI output for 1080p full HD video playback on external displays.

The Asus Eee PC 1225B should be available in a variety of colors, including grey, red, silver, black and white. There's no mention of price or an actual launch date in the product page, but Asus will need to aim for a low starting price if it wants this netbook to be noticed in today's Ultrabook-focused market.

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.

Samsung to abandon netbook market in 2012

Once the rising stars of the personal computing industry, netbooks have fallen out of grace as of late, replaced in consumer's hearts by more portable tablets or more powerful ultra-slim laptops. Their future is uncertain and at least one manufacturer seems ready to ditch the category altogether and focus on more expensive ultraportable laptops and ultrabooks instead, if an email allegedly sent to trading partners is to be believed.

The email is quoted by French site Blogeee and reads: "Following the introduction of our new strategy in 2012, we will discontinue our 10.1-inch (netbook) product range in Q1 2012, in favor of ultraportables (11.6 and 12 inches) and ultrabooks to be launched in 2012."

Samsung's NF310 netbook was featured in our Q3 2011 laptop buying guide

The low cost of netbooks combined with their ability to handle most basic tasks made them quite successful for a few years. They were perfect as affordable travel companions or secondary systems. However, the form factor never really evolved that much. Every device was running pretty much the same underpowered hardware under the hood -- an Intel Atom chip, up to 320GB of storage and up to 3GB of RAM -- and there wasn't a lot that OEMs could do to differentiate due to their increasingly thinner profit margins.

Meanwhile, tablets have taken over the $200-$500 price range excelling at things like web browsing, email, some gaming, and a lot more through native apps -- all while offering unrivaled battery life.

It shouldn't be that surprising to see Samsung discontinuing netbooks in favor of more profitable products. They've already moved into tablets with their relatively successful Galaxy Tab line, while ultrabooks are being heavily pushed by Intel as a way to boost PC sales amid declining growth in the industry.

Benchmarks for Intel's Cedar Trail netbook platform leaked

Earlier this month we heard that Intel would be delaying the launch of its next-generation netbook platform until Novemberdue to a graphics driver issues. Nevertheless those looking forward to Intel's upcoming 32nm Cedar Trail Atoms can now have a first look at their expected performance thanks to some leaked slides posted by VR-Zone.

Cedar Trail-M includes two new CPUs, a 32nm-based Atom N2800 operating at 1.86GHz and the N2600 at 1.6GHz. The core architecture remains unchanged, so clock for clock CPU performance should be the same as previous Atom processors, only with higher clock speeds and lower power consumption due to the die shrink.

According to the slides, this gives the N2800 only a slight advantage over the dual-core Atom N570 while the Atom N2600 is slightly slower. Compared to the Pine Trail Atom N450/455 both Cedar Trail chips will perform considerably faster, but of course that is to be expected, as the older Atoms are single-core parts.

In terms of graphics performance the lone 3DMark06 benchmark shows that both new chips are superior to their predecessors, though the N2800 is by far the more impressive. VR-Zone says the higher score is mostly a factor of GPU clock speed, as the Atom N2600 and N2800 will reportedly have GPU clocks 2-3 times higher than Pine Trail.

Unfortunately, there are no side-to-side comparisons with AMD's Brazos platform but it doesn't seem like Intel will catch up on the graphics front -- not to mention the 28nm Krishna and Wichita APUs should push AMD further ahead in this segment sometime next year. Where Intel's Atom should deliver is in its improved battery life and better power consumption; two key features for anyone considering a netbook.