14 DAY TRIAL // Intel's Atom, Celeron and Pentium brands used to only define central processing units, but the time has long passed since it, and Advanced Micro Devices, only released such processors.
And we aren't referring to how Advanced Micro Devices assimilated ATI and became a power on the video card industry, rivaling NVIDIA.
While that graphics expertise did play a part in prompting Intel's latest action, it wasn't as relevant as the advent of tablets and superphones.
Long story short, Intel has embraced the concept of SoC (system-on-chip) device, even if only by necessity.
Thus, the Bay Trail series of SoCs was born, although they haven't exactly come out yet. They should debut at some point this quarter though (Q3 2013).
Ronny145 user in 3DCenter.org forum recently posted details on the soon-to-be-released product collection.
There will be twelve of those SoCs, branded Atom, Celeron or Pentium and featuring between 1 and 4 x86 CPU cores, integrated graphics, and TDPs of 5 to 10 watts.
The Atom E chips (Bay Trail-I) have 1, 2 or 4 cores each, clocked at 1.33 GHz to 1.91 GHz. They also get 400 MHz to 782 MHz graphics frequency and 5W to 10 W thermal design power.
The Celeron chips (Bay Trail-D/M) come in 4.5 – 10 W packages and have 2-4 cores at 1.46 GHz (low voltage) to 2.41 GHz.
That leaves the Pentium units, and there are only two of them. The first is a Bay Trail-D SoC with 2.41 GHz clock, and four cores, plus 792 MHz graphics, all on 10 W of power. The other is a Bay Trail-M unit with, again, four cores, 2 GHz speed, 750 MHZ graphics, and a 7.5 W TDP.
The table included up on the left has all the details for all twelve SoCs, courtesy of CPU World. As always, there is a chance that this is a false rumor, but previous leaks seem to corroborate at least the Bay Trail-I lineup.