Posted 02/17/10 at 08:06:17 PM by Ryan Whitwam

It hasn’t been that long since Intel released their updated Pine Trail Atom chips, but already there are some indications they may be refreshing the Atom platform. The word is that Intel’s new core is called “Oak Trail”. These new chips would replace the ailing ultra low-power Atom Z series. These are the Z5xx chips we’ve seen in the likes of the Sony Vaio P and Asus Eee PC T91MT tablet.
 
Atom N450 and N470 are the most common versions of the Pine Trail chips, most often found in netbooks. The Atom N series chips are higher power and not in danger of being replaced. The Oak Trail chips are said to consume much less power, but still remain capable of running a Windows device. Still no firm details, but it’s probably still safe to buy products running the N series Atom chips.

Read More

Posted 02/08/10 at 09:07:22 PM by Ryan Whitwam

Asus is apparently making plans to release their first Pine Trail powered all-in-one PC. The Eee Top ET1610PT will come equipped with the fairly new Intel Atom D410 single core CPU, and of course, Intel integrated graphics. The PC will have a 15.6 inch touchscreen display with a resolution of 1600x900. It will also come equipped with 802.11n Wi-Fi, which is a nice feature on a low end machine.

Strangely, this new PC will come with Windows XP preinstalled. You read that right, no Windows 7 on this bad boy. The presence of that touchscreen display makes the decision to go with XP just that much more baffling. The machine is expected to go for 400 Euros when is ships.

Read More

Posted 02/02/10 at 04:50:18 PM by Bart Salisbury

Netbooks may be crippled laptops, but that doesn’t mean a little more performance can’t be squeezed out of them. Intel’s new Pine Trail Atom processor is a step in that direction. Another step is a Pine Trail that supports faster DDR3 memory. Intel has obliged, not with one, but two new Atoms.

Intel’s two new processors are the 1.6GHz N455 Atom and the 1.83GHz N475 Atom. The N455 will have a TDP of 5.5W, while the N475 will have a TDP of 6.5W, making them comparable to the N450 and N470, respectively.

While DDR3 is faster, Fudzilla doesn’t see it as making all that much of a performance difference in netbooks. However, Fudzilla says, because DDR3 is getting cheaper, the price of notebooks could become cheaper as well.

Netbook Choice is expecting that DDR3 netbooks will start rolling out in the third quarter  of this year.

Read More

Posted 12/31/09 at 03:00:54 PM by Bart Salisbury

Acer has announced its move into the Pine Trail market: the Aspire One AO532h. And while it wasn’t first, it so far is the cheapest with a $299 price tag.

As netbooks go, this new Aspire One isn’t all that different from its predecessors, save for it sporting an Intel Atom N450 CPU, GMA 1350 graphics, and a promised 10-hours of battery life. The N450 has a speed of 1.66 GHz, with a 512 KB L2 cache, and a 667 MHz front-side bus. The integrated GMA 3150 will power a 10.1-inch WSVGA “CrystalBrite” backlit LED display, which Acer says uses 22.2 percent less power than a regular LCD.

Rounding out the features are the usual: 1Gb of DDR2 667 MHz memory (no word on expandability), a 160 GB SATA hard drive running at 5400 RPM, a digital media card reader, three USB 2.0 ports, 802.11b/g/draft-n WiFi, 10/100 fast ethernet, a webcam, and stereo speakers. Mobile power is from a 6-cell Li-ion (4400 mAh) battery. Windows 7 Starter is the operating system of choice.

The 2.76 pound, 1-inch thick netbook will be available in Onyx Blue, Garnet Red, and Silver Matrix.

Read More

Posted 12/21/09 at 04:10:40 PM by Bart Salisbury

There’s going to be a steady stream of these announcements, so might as well get ready for them. MSI, following closely on the heels of Dell, has announced it too will be manufacturing netbooks with new Intel “Pine Trail” Atom processor.

MSI’s offerings, the Wind U130 and the Wind U135, will use the N450 processor. The N450 is designed to be more energy efficient, and promises to extend battery life by about 15 percent. Each netbook will come with a 1024 x 600, 10-inch LED backlight screen, 802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, 3.5G WiMax, stereo speakers, and a 1.3 megapixel webcam. The U130 will have a 160GB hard drive; the U135 a 250 GB hard drive.

These two netbooks will be on sale in January. Gizomodo is reporting prices for the UK market of £229 and £279 respective. (That’s about $370 and $450.)

Read More

Posted 12/18/09 at 08:23:05 AM by Paul Lilly

Yesterday we posted a blurb referencing comments Nvidia made to news and rumor site Fudzilla, in which the graphics chip maker talked up its upcoming Ion 2 platform as being a faster solution than an Atom platform built around Intel's upcoming Pine Trail architecture. So does that mean you should hold off on buying a netbook?

Not at all, Nivida's Ken Brown says, who got in touch with us to clarify a few points. Regarding the performance benefits of Ion 2 over Pine Trail, Brown said all of that is correct, but that "is also true for current generation Ion-based PCs. Pine Trail will not deliver a significantly better experience than current-generation Atom-based PCs (link). Ion based systems which are available today will provide a much better experience than Pine Trail for HD video, games, media conversion, and other applications that people want to run."

In addition, Brown stated that first-generation Ion parts will also deliver anywhere from 5-10x faster graphics performance than Pine Trail, so for anyone who needs a graphically-charged netbook today, waiting isn't necessary.

Read More

Posted 11/09/09 at 10:45:45 AM by Paul Lilly

Expect to see quite a few netbook and nettop deals this holiday shopping season, especially if Intel forges ahead with plans to fast track the introduction of its upcoming Pine Trail platform.

"Intel is planning for a fast transition to Pine Trail. To generate excitement for the platform ahead of launch, Intel is planning a press release in late December publicly disclosing the details of the platform," X-bit Labs claims to have read in an Intel document.

Should Intel aggressively push Pine Trail ahead of its launch, consumers could see a fair number of pre- and post-Christmas day sales on older Atom platform-based netbooks and nettops. And look for plenty of coverage at next year's Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.

Intel's Pine Trail platform will include a bunch of next-gen Atom Pineview processors, which will come with an integrated graphics core, a built-in DDR2 memory controller, a new core-logic set, and other goodies.

Read More

Posted 08/28/09 at 05:42:49 PM by Pulkit Chandna

MSI has confirmed it is working on a convertible touchscreen netbook based on Intel’s upcoming Pine Trail platform. The confirmation comes a few days after a report on Digitimes had hinted at such a product. MSI hopes that its touchscreen netbook, called the Wind U150, will be the first to feature the Pine Trail platform, which it believes will debut at CES in January, 2010.

However, the word from the horse’s mouth is that Pine Trail will be shipped to customers before the sun sets on 2009. The U150 will feature a 10-inch touchscreen and run Windows 7. Pine Trail is the codename for the next generation of the Intel Atom.

It will have the CPU, GPU and memory controller on the same die. This chip, codenamed “Pineview”, will be clubbed with a second chipset codenamed “Tiger Point”. Being a two chip solution, it will be more energy efficient than its predecessor.

Read More