Gartner: Intel reigns, Qualcomm gains

Qualcomm is gaining in global chip rankings by revenue, while Intel still sits comfortably at the top, according to market researcher Gartner.
Worldwide semiconductor revenue totaled $255 billion in 2008, down 5.4 percent, or a decrease of $14.5 billion from 2007 revenue, according to the final market share analysis released by Gartner on Wednesday.
"While sales held up fairly well in the first half of 2008, in the third quarter the industry started to soften as the economy slowed, and by the fourth quarter sales were deteriorating quickly, causing revenue growth to go into negative territory," said Peter Middleton, principal research analyst at Gartner, in a statement.
Intel held the No. 1 position for the 17th consecutive year, increasing its market share to 13.3 percent in 2008, although revenue declined by 0.5 percent, a result of spinning off its NOR flash memory business, Gartner said. "The company outperformed the industry average due to the strong performance of its notebook business in which the company gained share throughout the year," according to Gartner.
(Credit: Gartner)
Reports on Thursday say Intel, whose shares have been gaining over the last month, may fare better than expected when it reports earnings on April 14. "We think the first-quarter results will beat Intel's internal forecast and consensus estimates and expect second-quarter guidance to reflect modest growth," The Wall Street Journal reported Thursday, quoting Wedbush Morgan analyst Patrick Wang.
The Santa Clara, Calif.-based chipmaker, however, should probably keep an eye on its flourishing California rival, San Diego-based Qualcomm--the "best performer" among the 2008 top 10 in Gartner's market share analysis. The world's largest supplier of cell phone silicon saw growth of 15.3 percent, driven by a strong first three quarters of the year. It jumped in ranking from No. 11 in 2007 to No. 8 in 2008.
Samsung, the No. 2 chip vendor, was among the hardest hit because its main products lines are memory, a chip category that saw steep declines in 2008. The company's revenue fell 15 percent in 2008 as a result of oversupply and consequent price drops in DRAM (used as the main memory in PCs) and NAND flash (used as storage in cameras, digital music players, and solid-state drives).
No.3 Toshiba saw revenue fall 10.3 percent in its lines of chips for consumer, wireless, and automotive electronics due to a market free-fall in the second half of 2008, Gartner said.
Broadcom led the rankings in 2008 for "Relative Industry Performance"--which measures the difference between industry-specific growth for a company and actual growth, indicating which companies are outperforming (or underperforming) their business segments. Broadcom benefited from solid performance in the set-top box business, helped by Blu-ray and digital TV products and the sale of digital converter boxes for the DTV conversion in the United States, Gartner said. Broadcom also fared well in Ethernet switches, broadband modem chips, Bluetooth, Wi-Fi and GPS.

Intel, the Intel logo and Intel Atom are trademarks of Intel Corporation in the U.S. and other countries.
* Other names and brands may be claimed as the property of others.
All products, platforms, dates, and figures specified are preliminary based on current expectations, and are subject to change without notice.

Intel VP: Netbooks not for adults

Remember those first 7-inch Asus Eee PCs advertised with kids tapping on chicklet keyboards? Well, Intel apparently wants us to return to those Netbook glory days.

HP Pavilion dv2 laptop starts at about $700: Will upcoming cheap ultra-thin notebooks kill the Netbook?(Credit: CNET Reviews)
In short, Netbooks are not for adults, according to Anand Chandrasekher, Intel senior vice president and general manager of the Ultra Mobility Group, speaking during a keynote speech at the Intel Developer Forum in Beijing, streamed on Intel's Web site.
"There are things that you would do on a notebook you wouldn't dream of doing on a Netbook...For a kid, a Netbook is fantastic, as an adult you probably want a notebook. So, there are very simple ways of positioning and thinking about it."
(Hmm...what about all those big people with Netbooks? I guess it's time to trade it in for a grown-up computer.)
Now, contrast this with what Stu Pann, vice president in Intel's sales and marketing group, said back in November of last year at a Raymond James IT Supply Chain Conference.
"We originally thought Netbooks would be for emerging markets and younger kids, and there is some of that. It turns out the bulk of the Netbooks sold today are in Western Europe, North America, and for people who just want to grab and go with a notebook," Pann said.
And Pann added: "If you've ever used a Netbook and used a 10-inch screen size--it's fine for an hour. It's not something you're going to use day in and day out."
What Intel may be doing now is trying to reposition the Atom-processor-based Netbook so it doesn't cannibalize the more lucrative notebook market. This strategy may get a boost when Intel offers non-Atom ultra-low voltage (ULV) mobile processors later this year for ultra-thin notebooks, priced roughly between $500 and $1,000. (AMD is already offering its Neo processor--which is the chip inside the HP Pavilion dv2--for this market.)
But is the Netbook tsunami something Intel really wants to tamper with? Acer just announced an 11.6-inch Aspire One with a 160GB hard disk drive. Is this a Netbook? That's what everyone is calling it. And HP continues to build its Netbook portfolio along with Dell and Asus.

Intel, the Intel logo and Intel Atom are trademarks of Intel Corporation in the U.S. and other countries.
* Other names and brands may be claimed as the property of others.
All products, platforms, dates, and figures specified are preliminary based on current expectations, and are subject to change without notice.

Intel adds new chips as Atom turns 1

Intel celebrated the first anniversary of the Atom processor by introducing two new models, while confirming the arrival of Nehalem-based mobile processors later this year and disclosing a new chip dubbed "Jasper Forest."
The chipmaker also did a live demonstration for the first time of the next-generation Atom-based platform, code-named Moorestown. The platform will include a new Moblin software version that will enable a PC-like Internet experience along with cellular voice capabilities, Intel said.

Intel senior vice president Anand Chandrasekher did a live demonstration of the upcoming Moorestown Atom chip in Beijing(Credit: Intel)
Intel announced two new Atom processors for mobile Internet devices, or MIDs: the Z550 and Z515. The Z550 extends the performance of the Atom line to 2GHz. The Z515 incorporates the Intel Burst Performance Technology (Intel BPT), which enables the processor to run at 1.2GHz when performance is needed, Intel said.
Anand Chandrasekher, Intel senior vice president and general manager of the Ultra Mobility Group, in a keynote speech at the Intel Developer Forum in Beijing, discussed upcoming processors for laptops based on the Nehalem architecture that will be available in the second half of this year as part of the "Calpella" platform. These processors will be more powerful than their predecessors by including such technologies as Intel Hyper-Threading Technology and Intel Turbo Boost Technology.
Chandrasekher also touched on Intel's ultra low-voltage (ULV) processors and how they are creating a category of ultra-thin laptops less than 1-inch thick. Intel is slated to offer lower-priced versions of these processors by early summer that are expected to engender a class of low-cost ultra-thin laptops, which some have described as a MacBook Air for the masses.
Pat Gelsinger, Intel senior vice president and general manager of the Digital Enterprise Group, disclosed, for the first time, the Nehalem EP-based processor code-named Jasper Forest that is specifically designed for embedded and storage applications "to deliver optimal performance per watt...Jasper Forest will be offered in single-, dual- or quad-core designs; ranging from 23 watts to 85 watts," Intel said.

Intel, the Intel logo and Intel Atom are trademarks of Intel Corporation in the U.S. and other countries.
* Other names and brands may be claimed as the property of others.
All products, platforms, dates, and figures specified are preliminary based on current expectations, and are subject to change without notice.

Intel launches new chip logos, rating system

Intel has revamped its processor badging and rating system. Consumers are the main target, though business systems will get new badging too.
The new badges include a die (the chip minus the packaging) accent in the upper right hand corner, a prominent main brand (e.g., "Core"), and the modifier (e.g., "i7").
Intel has also instituted a star system that rates chips from five stars (best performance in class) to one star (lowest performance). "So when a consumer goes into a Best Buy store they can distinguish between Centrino, Core, Celeron, Core 2 Duo, Core 2 Quad," said Intel spokesman Bill Calder.
That may be a little easier said than done, however. Some consumers (but not including "tech savvy" Giampaolo, of course) will still need help from the sales person to decipher the badging. A daunting challenge in the case of consumer laptops, which are typically plastered with a hodgepodge of stickers from Intel, Nvidia, Advanced Micro Devices, AMD's ATI graphics chip unit, and other companies.
Intel is in the process of moving to a "pretty aggressive brand simplification plan," Calder said. "When we launched Core i7, we said we're moving to a single primary client brand, which is Core. We're moving in that direction," he said.
The Atom processor will not get a modifier. In the future, the Nehalem server processor, currently branded only as "Xeon" with a letter and number suffix, may also get new branding to make it more readily identifiable as part of the Nehalem architecture like its desktop sibling the Core i7, Calder said.

Intel, the Intel logo and Intel Atom are trademarks of Intel Corporation in the U.S. and other countries.
* Other names and brands may be claimed as the property of others.
All products, platforms, dates, and figures specified are preliminary based on current expectations, and are subject to change without notice.

Acer PC joins Nvidia's 'Ion' with Intel's Atom

Acer launched a PC Tuesday that attempts to bring PC-class performance to Atom-processor-based PCs.

The Acer AspireRevo, about the size of a hardcover book, combines Nvidia graphics with the Intel Atom processor.(Credit: Acer)
The Acer AspireRevo is the first Atom-based PC from a major PC supplier to use Nvidia's Ion chipset that packs GeForce 9400M graphics, the same graphics used in the Apple 13-inch MacBook and MacBook Air.
By design, Atom is a more power frugal and, concomitantly, slower processor than Intel's mainstream Core 2 chip architecture.
The AspireRevo's marquee external feature is the diminutive size: the desktop is comparable in size to a laptop (though slightly thicker, about the size of a typical hardcover book). Internally, the device will test Nvidia's thesis that devices, such as Netbooks, that pair the Atom processor with Nvidia graphics offer much better performance than Intel-only (i.e., Atom-with-Intel-chipset) platforms.
This won't be quite the slam dunk that it was before, however. Intel recently started shipping the Atom N280 and the accompanying GN40 chipset, which for the first time on an Intel Netbook platform delivers 1080p HD playback.
"The AspireRevo...is perfectly suited for the living room, because Nvidia Ion provides a brilliant graphics experience with digital photos, watching video, and playing family-friendly games," said Gianpiero Morbello, corporate vice president of marketing for Acer, in a statement.
Nvidia listed the following capabilities for the Ion-based AspireRevo:
Ability to run Windows Vista Home Premium
1080p HD video with true-fidelity 7.1 audio
Popular games including Spore, Call of Duty 4, and Sim City 4 *
DirectX 10 graphics with advanced digital display connectivity
Accelerated video enhancement and transcoding using Nvidia CUDA technology

Intel, the Intel logo and Intel Atom are trademarks of Intel Corporation in the U.S. and other countries.
* Other names and brands may be claimed as the property of others.
All products, platforms, dates, and figures specified are preliminary based on current expectations, and are subject to change without notice.

As Intel's Atom gains, Apple still holdout

Intel's Atom is proving to be a very popular chip. But is it too low-rent for Apple?
First the news. iSuppli reported Monday that Intel gained share, based on revenue, in the global microprocessor during every quarter of 2008 to finish up with 80.5 percent of the total processor market--a 1.6 percent gain over rivals--partly due to the success of its Atom chip in Netbooks.

Would a hypothetical Apple Netbook be a high-end product like Sony's Vaio P line? (Credit: Sony)
"Intel's low-priced Atom has become increasingly popular as the Netbook market has gained steam," Matthew Wilkins, principal analyst, compute platforms research, for iSuppli, said in a statement.
Worldwide unit shipments of Netbooks soared by more than 2,000 percent in 2008 and are expected to rise by about 68 percent in 2009, iSuppli said.
Not surprisingly, every major computer maker has announced a Netbook--some, like Toshiba, begrudgingly--and others, like Dell, seemed, at least initially, to put a product out there just in case.
Hewlett-Packard--one of the early leaders in the market--came out (back in April 2008) first with an upscale business-class "Mini-Note" Netbook, but since then HP has added a lower-cost consumer-focused HP Mini 1000 series too. All HP Netbooks now use the Atom processor after a brief flirtation with a Via processor (used because HP developed its Mini-Note before Atom was available).
Sony finally chimed in this year with the a luxury Netbook--the Vaio P series, which ranges in price from $900 to $1,499 with a 128GB solid-state drive and 2GB of memory--both atypical for an Atom-based system.
But not Apple. Now about a year after Intel rolled out the Atom brand. A Russian magazine has posted a pretty compelling mock-up of what an Apple Netbook could (should?) look like. The magazine even proffered some believable specs that were slightly off-kilter--a typical Apple product strategy: a 1.86GHz Atom Z540 (typically not used in Netbooks, most vendors default to the 1.6GHz N270), a 64GB solid-state drive (not unheard of in Netbooks but certainly not common), and, most interestingly, an Nvidia chipset and Nvidia graphics.
One of the challenges Apple faces with a luxury Netbook configuration like this is that it comes uncomfortably close to its pricey MacBook Air, which also offers Nvidia graphics and solid-state drives. This, of course, could change if Apple updates the Air with a more upscale configuration.
Or Apple could bring out an un-Netbook (Apple, of course, will dare not speak the name "Netbook") like Sony but trump Sony by using an inexpensive Intel Core 2 ultra-low-voltage (ULV) processor (due by early summer) that keeps it up-market but far enough below MBA territory.
That said, if Apple goes the Atom-based Netbook route, it will not be immune from the inevitable cannibalization that Atom brings with it.
Some potential MacBook Air buyers would look at a 10- or 11-inch Apple Netbook and say why pay the $1,000 premium? Maybe too many for Apple's taste. We'll see.

Intel, the Intel logo and Intel Atom are trademarks of Intel Corporation in the U.S. and other countries.
* Other names and brands may be claimed as the property of others.
All products, platforms, dates, and figures specified are preliminary based on current expectations, and are subject to change without notice.

Needs of big firms foretell Intel, Nvidia battle

As Intel prepares to invade Nvidia turf, large companies at the Intel server chip rollout Monday stated--in some cases quite objectively--what graphics chip suppliers need to do to make this technology more palatable for high-performance computing.

Lincoln Wallen, head of research and development at DreamWorks Animation(Credit: Screen capture by Brooke Crothers)
Besides competing in the gaming graphics market, Intel is eying large high-performance computing customers such as Dreamworks Animation (whose "Monsters vs. Aliens" opened last weekend to large box office numbers) for its future Larrabee graphics chip.
Nvidia is already a player in the so-called General Purpose GPU space, which applies graphics processing units (GPUs) to high-performance computing. As described by Nvidia, high-performance computing on the GPU uses a CPU and GPU together in a heterogeneous computing model, with the "sequential" part of th

e application running on the CPU and the computationally-intensive part running on the hundreds of processing cores built into the GPU.
Application developers have to modify their application to take the compute-intensive kernels (core components of an operating system) and map them to the GPU. The rest of the application remains on the CPU.
At the Intel "Nehalem" server chip event on Monday, a panel of representatives from large companies addressed the issue of CPU versus GPU. Currently, these customers are using CPUs to do their data crunching.
Keith Gray, manager, high performance and technical computing at oil giant BP, spelled out why he has hesitated to use GPUs to date while expressing interest in adopting them in the future. "Our business is about accelerating our development of new seismic imaging research algorithms. At this point we actually believe the level of programming difficulty (and) lack of standardization of application development tools make the move to accelerated computing a bit risky," he said.

CPU (left) versus GPU(Credit: Nvidia)
Gray continued. "We are watching the evolution of the programming interfaces. Once those are better standardized, once the issues of moving data back and forth from the general purpose system to an accelerator is addressed, we'll be very interested in taking advantage of it," he said.
Lincoln Wallen, head of research and development at DreamWorks Animation, is also looking into exploiting power of the GPU for tasks such as rendering. "We're looking forward to exploit more flexible compute models, perhaps involve more of the graphics processing functionality but tightly coupled with very powerful CPUs to address the particular way in which we generate images, very soft body, lots of geometry generation," he said.
Wallen continued that, as he sees it, Larrabee offers an advantage because of its tight coupling between the CPU and GPU. "The promise of Larrabee with that tight coupling and the programming model offers a great opportunity to start to explore that type of architecture for our particular workloads," he said.

Intel, the Intel logo and Intel Atom are trademarks of Intel Corporation in the U.S. and other countries.

* Other names and brands may be claimed as the property of others.

All products, platforms, dates, and figures specified are preliminary based on current expectations, and are subject to change without notice.

Intel's 'GPA' points to Larrabee

Behind the release this week of Intel graphics software looms Larrabee, Intel's future graphics chip.

Intel is preparing to become a graphics powerhouse too.(Credit: Intel)
First, the news. Intel announced the release of Intel Graphics Performance Analyzers (GPA), a suite of software tools that enables PC game developers to analyze and optimize game performance on Intel Integrated Graphics. This is part of the Visual Adrenaline program, launched at the Intel Developer Forum in San Francisco in August, which provides tools, resources and information for game developers, artists, and animators, according to Intel.
But let's be clear about one thing: not a lot of people in gaming circles are going to get too excited about gaming on Intel integrated graphics. Intel graphics--at least to date--haven't provided anything more than a minimal gaming experience--and they have been priced that way, coming virtually free on PCs. While upcoming technologies like Intel's Moorestown system-on-a-chip may create some new opportunities on small devices like high-end smartphones, it will still be limited in its graphics capabilities.
All of this will soon (this year?) be eclipsed by Larrabee. In response to a question about what kind of Larrabee support GPA offers, I got this elliptic but telling response. "In the future, GPA will also support upcoming Intel graphics and many-core related products. There are some absolutely exciting features we are currently developing which will change the way people think about performance tools, and which will allow developers to truly harness unbridled computing power," said Aaron Davies, senior marketing manager, Visual Computing Software Division, Intel.
Think Intel isn't getting ready for Larrabee--and, generally, for a bigger presence in graphics? Take a look at this Visual Adrenaline Web site. And in particular, this page: "As multi-core gives way to many-core architectures, graphics processing tasks can be performed faster and more efficiently. Visual computing and parallelism share a common playbook. Developers, artists, and digital content creators, who have tapped the many multi-core and threading resources available from Intel, will reap additional many-core benefits."
Sounds like Larrabee to me.
GPA is also, of course, targeted at Intel chipsets, allowing developers to pinpoint performance bottlenecks and optimize games for Intel-based desktop PCs and laptops. But I'll wait for Larrabee, as I think many at Intel are doing too.

Intel, the Intel logo and Intel Atom are trademarks of Intel Corporation in the U.S. and other countries.

* Other names and brands may be claimed as the property of others.

All products, platforms, dates, and figures specified are preliminary based on current expectations, and are subject to change without notice.

Intel: Our graphics silicon is gaining in gaming

Any gamer worth his or her salt is quick to decry gaming on Intel graphics silicon. But wait. The platform is taking off, according to Intel.

Empire: Total War(Credit: The Creative Assembly)
"So you want to know what's so compelling about making sure your game runs on Intel integrated graphics?" Aaron Davies, a senior marketing manager in the Intel Visual Computing Software Development group, asked in a video on the Intel Software Network Web page. "Here's your answer: Mercury Research showed that in 2008, for the first time, integrated graphics chipsets outsold discrete (graphics chips), and in 2013, we expect to see integrated graphics chipsets outsell discrete by three to one," Davies said.
Intel is the leading supplier of integrated graphics--which are integrated into its chipsets--while Nvidia and Advanced Micro Devices' ATI unit are leaders in the discrete (standalone) graphics chip market. Discrete chips are the most powerful engines for running games but Intel is the leading supplier, based on market share, of graphics silicon for laptops.
Davies said he wants to help developers "capture" where the mobile-game market is going to be in 2013.
"There are games actually targeting integrated graphics chipsets at this time," according to Davies. "We found through engaging with these Triple A (AAA) game studios that within a relatively short amount of time, they can identify graphics bottlenecks in their code and resolve that to have their games running on integrated graphics chipsets."
Davies mentioned a few of the beta members: Terminal Reality, which is slated to come out with Ghostbusters later this year; Gas Powered Games, which is building Demigod, and Empire Total War, which is put out by The Creative Assembly.

Intel, the Intel logo and Intel Atom are trademarks of Intel Corporation in the U.S. and other countries.

* Other names and brands may be claimed as the property of others.

All products, platforms, dates, and figures specified are preliminary based on current expectations, and are subject to change without notice.

MSI hybrid netbook promises 12-hour battery life

MSI has unveiled another contender in the netbook market which combines a solid state drive (SSD) with a standard hard drive, and boasts a battery life of up to 12 hours.
The MSI Wind U115 Hybrid is built on Intel's Menlow platform, and has an energy saving LED backlit display to help reduce the power draw. It features a 10in screen with a 1,024 x 600 resolution, and runs on a 1.6GHz Intel Atom Z530 with 1GB of DD2 memory and Intel's US15W graphics chipset.
The storage is split between an 8GB SLC SSD and a normal 160GB hard drive, which can be easily turned off to save power. The operating system is installed on the SSD drive, which helps save power as well as improving performance and speeding up boot times, MSI said.
Weighing in at around 1.3kg, the Wind U115 also packs in all the usual netbook features, such as Windows XP Home edition, a 1.3-megapixel webcam, a four-in-one card reader, three USB ports, Bluetooth 2.0 and 802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi.
MSI said that to get the 12 hours of use from the six-cell battery users will have to disable the hard drive, Wi-Fi, Bluetooth and webcam, set the speakers to 'mute' and have the power saving mode set to maximum.
The MSI Wind U115 Hybrid will be available from May at £499

Intel, the Intel logo and Intel Atom are trademarks of Intel Corporation in the U.S. and other countries.

* Other names and brands may be claimed as the property of others.

All products, platforms, dates, and figures specified are preliminary based on current expectations, and are subject to change without notice.