PCR Tech and IT retail, distribution and vendor news
Industry gossips have shed some light on Intel’s plans for the upcoming Ivy Bridge upgrade for the firm’s ultrabook platform, suggesting that the chip maker will cut processor prices to boost demand.
Notebook manufacturer sources quoted by the Taiwan-based DigiTimes said that Intel had upped the storage speed specification for the next version of the ultrabook platform. The move appears aimed at banning traditional mechanical hard drives from the platform.
Chins wagging in the industry said that manufacturers looking to produce ultrabooks priced under US$700 would move towards hybrid hard drives to meet the specification change. Such a move allows them to ship reasonable on-board storage while gaining the benefits of SSD-like flash memory.
The same sources repeated earlier claims that the eventual market penetration of ultrabooks in 2012 would be just 20 per cent, half of Intel’s target of 40 per cent. An earlier report blamed European preference for larger screen notebooks as a key factor in failing to hit the 40 per cent target.
