Just like Microsoft, Intel is also passing through a defining moment in history. With the shift towards mobile devices, the processor king has been a bystander as its rival rose to meteoritic heights.
Sure ARM Holdings only has revenue touching $1 billion a year, while Intel rakes in many times this amount every twelve months. But in terms of mobile market share, Intel does not command an inspiring presence — smartphones and tablets overwhelmingly utilize the ARM architecture.
And Intel looks set to change that.
The company has made some inroads with newer Atom processors (at least on Microsoft’s platform), and several companies are now bringing to market affordable Windows 8.1 tablets powered by Atom processors.
But the technology world is already looking forward to the Bay Trail architecture, which Intel has been hyping up for quite a while now. This new platform is set to see action in the coming months.
Intel has put up a press release that details the Bay Trail processor family, and confirms that the Atom Z3000 processor series (also known as Bay Trail-T) will come with four cores and 2MB of L2 cache. Both Android and Windows 8.1 notebooks, tablets and hybrids can be powered by this new Atom CPU.
OEMs like Asus, Acer, Dell, Lenovo and Toshiba are already in on the act, and are expected to release a new wave of products based on the Atom Z3000 starting in the fourth quarter of the year.
Prices are expected to be in the range of $199 and up.
Intel further states that it has worked extensively with software companies to ensure that popular programs like Skype, Netflix and more are optimized for this new Atom chip.
And finally, the company also plans on bringing 64-bit support to tablets in nearly 2014.
