Netbooks Based on Intel Cedar Trail Chips Delayed

Netbooks may not be getting as much attention now as they did a year ago, but they are by no means disappearing, although the next generation might have hit a certain snag.

Entry-level is a term that seems to be used a bit loosely in the case of netbooks, since their performance level has increased substantially since their first appearance.

Then again, quality and performance rose for all segments of IT, and one might even say that netbooks have an extra reason to improve (tablets).

Intel is the company whose CPUs are found in the vast majority of netbooks, and makers of laptops have been waiting for the Cedar Trail platform.

Two dual-core processors are in the pipeline, the Atom N2600 (which has a clock speed of 1.6 GHz) and the N2800 (1.86 GHz).

Both have integrated graphics with support for DirectX 10.1, are made on the 32nm process and can play full HD (1,080p) video.

Unfortunately, it appears that laptop suppliers will have to put off their plans for a next-generation batch of low-end laptops, for a while anyway.

This is because, according to a certain report, Intel isn't going to deliver the Cedar Trail platform as soon as some had hoped.

This news comes after the Cedar Trail had already gone through a delay of a few months, though there is a silver lining to it all.

The Santa Clara, California-based company supposedly added some extra perks to the Atom series, like the Smart Connect function, which identifies which apps need updates and performs them automatically, while the computer is in sleep mode.

The other asset is the Rapid Start technology, which resumes from hibernation in about seven seconds or less.

What remains is to see if there will be any real AMD-Intel competition in this area this time, since Advanced Micro Devices didn't quite have anything for this segment until Fusion came around.