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Among the new chips introduced on Monday is a Pentium III-M that operates at 1.2 gigahertz, which is the fastest mobile processor currently available. The company also announced that it is introducing an "ultra low voltage" processor designed to operate at under one volt while consuming less than half a watt of power when in battery-optimised mode. In all, six new Pentium III-M chips and six lower-cost Celeron mobile chips were announced.
The new products introduced by the company are the newest indications of Intel's increased efforts in the mobile processor market in recent quarters amid competition from its rivals. The Pentium III-M processors were first introduced in July, and were the company's first chips to be built using 0.13-micron process technology. The company's new micron process technology refers to the size of the circuits that are printed on the silicon chips.
By shrinking the size of the circuits, Intel has been able to include more power and architectural enhancements into a smaller device. Using the technology the company has also been able to yield more chips per silicon wafer produced, reducing its overall manufacturing costs.
Other advancements in the Pentium III-M chips include a larger memory cache, used to temporarily store data which is used repeatedly. The chips also use a technology called SpeedStep, which enables the processors to operate at lower speeds when the computer is running on battery power and higher speeds when plugged into a socket.
Frank Spindler, vice president and general manager of Intel's mobile platforms group, said the chips would bring the Pentium III-M to even the smallest notebook PCs.
However, competition among mobile microprocessor makers has increased in recent months as sales in desktop PCs have slumped. Transmeta has emerged as a major competitor to Intel with its low-power Crusoe processors.
Meanwhile AMD, Intel's old archrival, has stepped up the power and speed of its Athlon and Duron processors in both the laptop and desktop markets. On the same day that Intel introduced its new chips, AMD announced a 1.1GHz Duron processor for the PC market.
AMD's new chip matches the clock speed of Intel's 1.1GHz Celeron, and industry watchers have said that the new Duron chip could offer better overall value.
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