14 DAY TRIAL // As you already know by now, Intel has finally rolled out its latest mobile platform, the Intel Centrino 2. And, from the looks of it, what we are being offered right now is not all that the new platform is capable of - in fact, upcoming releases will bring us WiMAX and smaller chips for thinner notebooks like the MacBook Air.
Even if the new Intel Centrino platform has just been released, the Santa Clara-based chip manufacturer is rumored to be working on the development of a new version of the Centrino 2 chip package. We're talking here about a version that will take up less space and will allow manufacturers of portable computers systems to built thinner and higher on portability notebooks designs, like Apple's MacBook Air. It is yet unclear why Intel hasn't rolled out this version of the chips during the Intel Centrino 2 Launch but, even so, it is nice to know that there's much more to the capabilities of the new mobile platform than meets the eye.
Due in August, the new chips are known under the dubbing of the Small Form Factor version of Centrino 2, which is pretty understandable since they will take up less space than the current version. The SFF model is said to use the same chip-packaging technology that Intel has used for the Core 2 Duo processor in the MacBook Air. "We will launch Small Form Factor [chips] ... in the third week of August," said Sujan Kamran, regional marketing manager of client platforms at Intel in Singapore.
And there's even more in store for us with the new platform: because WiMAX is continuing to grow in popularity all around the world, Intel plans to offer WiMAX support later this year. However, it will not be included in all notebooks, being more of an optional upgrade, for the reason that the technology isn't enabled in all parts of the world. US and Taiwan will probably be the best markets for these WiMAX, Intel Centrino 2-enabled notebooks, as it is these two countries that are closest to having a nationwide WiMAX network.