Intel’s Arrandale Chips: Tightening The Gap Between Mainstream and ULV?

Mainstream, low/ultra-low voltage, and ultrathin laptops will all benefit from Intel’s new “Arrandale” chips, which form the base of the new Core brands — Core i7 and Core i5 being the first. The chips will feature “two 32nm cores with 4MB of cache that sit next to a memory controller and integrated graphics built on a separate, neighboring 45nm chip,” according to Intel. A first for the company, the Arrandale-powered chip packages don’t look set to offer huge performance deltas. However, the lower power consumption and smaller price could give ULV systems a performance boost without compromising size or battery power. Core i7 and Core i5 chips aren’t just meant for ultraportables, they’re also destined for mainstream systems. We’re eager to see if Arrandale’s advances in chip technology improve battery life in the mainstream notebook category, where the average is still only a little more than 3 hours. Hat Tip: nanotech blog