Intel Atom targets Internet consumers

By Alexander Villafania INQUIRER.net MANILA, Philippines â Intel Atom, the much awaited ultra-mobile PC (UMPC) proce ssor, is making waves worldwide. However, it is just about to test the waters i n the Philippines, where a majority of portable PC buyers would want to spend a s little as possible. It was expected that the Atom, a low-power chip for basic computer requirements, will supply the budget-conscious PC market with low-cos t computers. So far, two brands have introduced Atom-powered notebook computers in the Phili ppines: MSI with its Wind and Acer's Aspire One. Both are currently being distr ibuted and both are priced much lower than their larger, more powerful counterp arts. Being low-energy devices mean that these cannot match the power of notebooks ba sed on Intel's other processors, including the Celeron and the recently-revived Pentium branded Dual Core processors. This is because the Intel Atom is aimed at a different market segment, which ha s not been addressed before. The Atom is made specifically for the UMPC market, where users want to carry around a device no heavier than 1 kilogram or no big ger than an actual 10-inch paper notebook. Of course, Intel wants to rename the concept and would rather want the market t o use the terms "netbooks" and "nettops" for computers that use their processor s. As explained by Intel Philippines Business Development Manager Jermyn Wong, the Intel Atom is targeted at Internet consumers, and not so much the Internet con tent makers. He emphasized on the Internet largely because of a trend among people to use th e Internet for a variety of applications like watching online videos, downloadi ng songs, online chat, voice communications, photo and video uploading, documen t editing, among others. Wong stressed that the Intel Atom will not replace any of their current low-end processors including the Celeron, since these are addressing a different marke t. "The Atom is distinguished by what Internet consumers want, which is online ser vices. For anything beyond these basic services users can turn to the more powe rful processor models,â Wong said. The Atom is 22 millimeters in size, or half that of a typical Intel processor. It is also powered down to consume only 2.5 watts of electricity. In comparison , a Celeron M processor can consume up to 30 watts. Yet despite its low power consumption feature, the Intel Atom can still pack a punch. Like its big brothers, it can still play and render high-definition vide os and sounds, play most casual online games and do some simple photo and video editing. And also because of its small size, the Intel Atom does not use too much space for the processor, giving laptop manufacturers more space to put in more other components. Small form factor notebooks can integrate solid state drives instea d of typical hard drives, more USB ports, WiFi and Bluetooth wireless connectiv ity. Instead of using Microsoft's current Windows Vista operating system, the Intel Atom is best used with either a Linux OS or Windows XP, whose support has been recently revived by the software firm to accommodate the UMPC market.