Intel Pushes Plans for Mobile Pentium 4

SAN JOSE, CALIFORNIA -- Intel's mobile Pentium 4 processor will be released during the first half of next year, along with a specialized companion chip set called the 845MP, Bob Jackson, principal engineer with Intel's Mobile Platforms Group, said here on Monday at the Microprocessor Forum.

Jackson reaffirmed Intel's plan to bring a 1.5-GHz mobile Pentium 4 processor to market in the first half of 2002, and to follow it with a 2-GHz version by year's end. Intel will also launch the 845MP chip set to go along with the processor, which will support many of the features available from the equivalent desktop chip set, he said.

For example, the 845MP will include a 400-MHz processor-system bus and Intel's NetBurst architecture, and will support the DDR SDRAM memory type, Jackson said. The chip set will also carry some low-power additions, including a sleep mode designed to save more power than settings on other chip sets, he said.

The mobile Pentium 4 will also include an enhanced version of SpeedStep, Intel's technology for dropping the clock speed of a chip to conserve power when a laptop is running on batteries.

"We support a mode where you can move from battery operated to maximum performance with rules you choose for yourself," Jackson said. Settings could include running the processor in a lower voltage mode when system utilization is less than 75 percent, but when usage runs higher than 75 percent, the processor would move into maximum performance mode, he said.

Jackson was less forthcoming with details about Banias, Intel's low-power mobile processor to be introduced in 2003, but he did throw the audience a few tidbits. "It will consist of a mobile-specific processor and a mobile chip set," he said. "Again, these are two pieces of the platform."

He added that Banias will include technology not used in previous processors, including the mobile Pentium 4. "Fundamentally, it's designed for mobile from the ground up," he said. "We're going to implement a lot of new things here."