I know that I sometimes (ha!) drone on and on about this or that tech component and, combined with my poor writing skills, the importance of these things can get buried. One of the things I've been writing about for a while is the successor to today's "Haswell" CPUs - upcoming line of Intel "Broadwell" chips. Terms like Ivy Bridge, Haswell and now Broadwell are "families" and what we'll see listed in most computer specs will be the actual model numbers. The upcoming tablets, convertibles, 2-in-1's, etc. will feature chips marketed as "Core M" (as mentioned in my previous post.) There will (essentially) be 3 initial variants divided into a "regular" version and a version targeted at Enterprise users. The regular one comes in two sub-versions and there is one Enterprise version. The Enterprise version has things like V-Pro, TPM and other things that most Enterprise users want/need/require, while the other two vary by a few sort of esoteric parameters which target performance vs. battery life vs. bandwidth, etc. With the previous Haswell, we saw the regular version pop out first and the Enterprise trailed by about 6 months, which is why the Enterprise tablets I favor came to market later. This time around, it looks like the first tablets (at least those just announced) are going for the Enterprise version first, which I am glad to see. "The Press" will carry headlines with something like the upcoming $699 Core M tablets, but initially, the ones aimed at corporate/Enterprise users will be closer to $1,000 - $1,200, plus accessories.
For those who are interested in what Core M brings, there is a pretty good article at the link below. The writer describes things in a better style than mine, so you may want to check this out to get a handle on why I keep mentioning this. The article is a 5 - 7 minute read, not super-techy and doesn't go into all that much detail covering the differentiators, etc.
http://www.computerworld.com/articl...ps-slated-for-20-windows-tablets-hybrids.html
Basically, we'll see a few more Core M device announcements from "The Usual Suspects" - HP, Dell, Lenovo, Acer, etc. - this and next quarter, and things will ramp up in the lesser Core M stuff as we get closer to CES in January, 2015. Today, Tablets seems to grab most of the headlines, but there are also several really nice (on paper) laptops already announced, and more are expected this year. I expect further announcements then, and sort of culminating in some revised/tweaked device offerings in Q2 2015, coinciding with the release of "Threshold" -aka "Windows 9" (?) Following Intel's well-established "Tick-Tock" release schedule, we won't see another major CPU for another two years and it'll essentially be a refinement on Broadwell chips.
In similar fashion, for the lighter weight devices, we went from Clover Trail to Bay Trail and the next one will be Cherry Trail. Again, these are "families" and today they are not just the Atom chips commonly seen, but include re-used terms like "Celeron" and "Pentium." I know it can get confusing, but basically the Atom chips are SoC types (System on a Chip) meant to duel with other SoC offerings commonly seen in iPads, Android tablets, etc., where the Pentium and Celeron offerings are built using separate components, much like more traditional systems of yore, just smaller, faster, more efficient, etc. Mostly, most fee appraisers won't run into many systems with Bay Trail Celeron and Pentiums as they are typically found in specialty devices meant for targeted markets (which we are not a big player in.) Hence, most of the Bay Trail devices I write about here are Atom based, though I will continue to mention a Celeron or Pentium device, if appropriate. Generally, those will be for folks in "less than moderate" environments. By the time that Cherry Trail devices come out (next year), we'll truly have some very, very compelling devices. The current Bay Trail Atom devices with 4GB of RAM and running the 64-bit OS are actually quite nice for most mobile scenarios and paired with software optimized for mobile use, they make for a compelling option for many of our customers. I would expect we'll see a series of software announcements next Spring, to coincide with Win9 where some developers will suddenly embrace Windows Tablets. That will be good - choices are good
Hope this helps! Let me know if you need further detail/focus on a particular aspect.
-Randall Garrett-
+Apex Software+
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