Intel's new Ultrabook - competes with MacBook Air

[Antony]

For those wanting to have an ultra-portable laptop but simply hates Apple, here's a good news to you. (Don, are you reading?)

Intel has unveiled design guidelines for a new category of thin-and-light laptops, dubbed "Ultrabooks," that take cues from Apple's iPad and MacBook Air.

According to Engadget, Intel detailed the new designs at the Computex trade show. Ultrabooks will have the performance and capacities of a laptop with "tablet-like features" in a "thin, light and elegant design," according to Executive Vice President Sean Maloney.

Intel says Ivy Bridge processor designs will be available at 1st half of 2012, and Haswell in 2013.



Asus UX21 Ultrathin Laptop Hands-on at Computex 2011.

It looks just like Apple's famous MacBook Air, without the Apple logo.

MacBook Air can run Windows either under virtual machine (e.g. Parallels Desktop for Mac) or booting up directly (Bootcamp).

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[Don_HH2K]

In addition to Antony's naming and shaming of the UX21 and shameless plug of the MacBook Air, I'd like to add that the UX21 will apparently be shipping with ultra-low voltage Core i5 and i7 CPUs with onboard graphics chipsets, while the MacBook Air still relies on an outdated Core 2 CPU and a discrete GeForce chip for graphics. There's also built-in USB 3.0 (compared to 2.0 on the MBA), and an HDMI interface for which adapters are much cheaper than the MBA's DisplayPort interface.

On the downside, it appears that they've left USB as the only option for expandability - no removable battery (which would make it great as a travel laptop), and no flash reader, which would prevent having the user carry around cables for digital cameras and phones and the like.

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[Antony]

I failed to see the use of HDMI vs (mini) DisplayPort in the argument.

We all know that (mini) DisplayPort (designed for flat-panels) is, in general, better than HDMI (based on CRT architecture).

Also, what's wrong with "discrete" graphic chip?

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[Don_HH2K]

HDMI, which is the de-facto standard on almost all modern televisions, carries the same video signals as DVI, which is the de-facto standard on almost all standalone LCDs. That makes an HDMI-to-DVI adapter quite inexpensive. DisplayPort on the other hand uses an entirely different signaling method, meaning that a comparatively expensive adapter is required.

Also, since when was HDMI based on CRT architecture? I believe you're thinking of VGA, as I've never in my life seen or heard of a CRT monitor with HDMI on it. HDMI's video signaling is (again) based on DVI, which was designed with digital monitors in mind.

The issue I would see with having a discrete graphics chip on a notebook that size is that it's an inefficient design. Having the CPU and graphics processor on the same die would naturally cut down on power consumption, meaning battery life on such a device would be increased compared to an equivalent unit with two discrete chips.

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[Antony]

Sorry, my wrong wording on HDMI. Still, DisplayPort is a newer standard, and by the design of it, better than HDMI.

That's new, I thought you never been so concerned about the laptop size and the power issue. If I remember correctly, you were not into the integrated graphic unit. Since in general, the "discrete" graphic chip provides more powerful result.

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[richard mitnick]

One article I read said that these new wonder toys are really just netbooks. The first generation of netbooks failed miserably because of slow processors and only 1 gig of DRAM. This includes my Acer 150-1635 which I gave away.

I now have an Asus Eee PC, Atom 450 1.65 gigs, 2 gigs DRAM Win 7 Professional. The thing fairly flies.

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[Don_HH2K]

So why exactly do you say DisplayPort is better? Because it's newer?

I am not "concerned" with it so much as for a device of this nature it's a more logical, power- and space-conscious approach, which are what this thing tailors to.

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[Antony]

So why exactly do you say DisplayPort is better? Because it's newer?

It is designed for the computer display (unlike HDMI), and it can handle much higher rate/bandwidth than HDMI or DVI.

I thought you would simply demand the most powerful one at all costs.

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[Mandrake]

It'll be interesting to see how these devices (particularly the ASUS model) are priced. I felt the MacBook Air was really slick, with a nice price. However, the ~2007 Core 2 Duo CPU and the paltry 4GB of RAM limitation were pretty anemic.

I think these devices will be really great, especially with the increased performance and battery life from the ULV Sandy Bridge CPUs they'll be using. I hope they'll be supporting up to 8GB of memory also.

I think that Display Port is better suited to monitors while HDMI is better for HDTVs. They're both different outputs and neither is really 'better' than the other.

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