Intel says their next mobile processor and chipset, the Napa platform, will boost average performance 68 percent beyond that of its current Sonoma platform, while reducing power consumption an average of 28 percent, extending battery life to around 5-hours. Built on Intel’s new 65 nanometer technology, it is expected that Napa machines will run at between 1.5 GHz to 2.16 GHz.

The dual-core Yonah Pentium processor, on the Napa platform, will consume about 3 watts of power on average, compared with about 4 watts consumed by the leading competitors, according to Intel’s product specifications. Napa also improves wireless bandwidth and can help cut the size of a notebook by 30 percent versus today’s machines, the Santa Clara, Calif., company said. E-Week, Zdnet, Notebookreview, Newsfactor, and EE Times have more.

Intel first launched Centrino in 2003, and in early 2005 it updated the platform to include a higher-performance version of its Pentium M and mobile chip set. Intel executives expect Napa to accelerate the already growing adoption of mobile notebook technology when it arrives in January.

The chip cuts power by completing tasks faster and employing a new feature termed Dynamic Power Coordination, which allows its two cores to be power-managed independently, making it possible for one core to shut down while the other performs the heavy lifting.

Benefts include:

• Better wireless performance from Intel 3945abg card, plus the card has a 30% smaller form factor than current Intel wireless cards
• Demo of Quake 4 gave a 76 FPS rate, that was versus a 41 FPS of the same notebook with the same graphics processor but a Sonoma processor (2.26GHz) — they’re finding an average of 50 — 70% improvement in FPS of dual core over the highest end Sonoma processoron such games using the dual core.
• Faster 667MHz Front Side Bus, this is compared to 533MHz on the current Sonoma and 400MHz on the Dothan
• PCMark2005 — 31% improved performance on high-end dual-core Yonah processor (compared to 2.26GHz Sonoma)
• 3DMark05 - 105% faster on high-end dual coreYonah (compared to 2.26GHz Sonoma)

Yonah also benefits from a shared cache or on-board pool of memory that holds data close to a processor core for quicker access. Dubbed Smart Cache, the design element allows one processor core to access the chip’s entire 2MB Level 2 cache, Intel has said.

The Smart Cache is important to performance, allowing one core to store as much data as it can in the cache. The feature is also a key part of power management, as a single core can access the entire cache when the other is shut down, while running on battery, the company has said.

The company is expecting more than 230 Napa notebook designs from various manufacturers in 2006, more than was supported by the Sonoma release. Napa will also be fully functional with Microsoft Corp.’s next operating system, Windows Vista, and is working with Cisco on network capabilities that can be easily deployed and managed.

Yonah also powers Intel’s Viiv platform for home entertainment, which the company hopes will make the Viiv computer an integral part of the family room and conference room.

Posted by Sam Churchill on Wednesday, December 14th, 2005 at 5:24 am.