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Daily news podcastVIA Technologies is pushing its low-power chips as the ideal platform for the new Ultra-Mobile PC (UMPC) devices, and said that customers will soon see smaller and lighter designs than the first-generation models.
The VIA C-7M ultra-low voltage chip powers the TabletKiosk Eo UMPC, which will ship in the UK from June as the PaceBlade EasyBook P7. The C-7M is better suited to such small devices because it is cheaper and consumes less power than comparable Intel chips, VIA said.
"The low-end Pentium M chips [in other UMPCs] do not have Intel's Enhanced SpeedStep, which is why they don't deliver a good battery life," said Colin Brix, international marketing specialist for VIA's Chipset Platform group.
Brix said that VIA was about to introduce a new chipset, the VX700, which integrates all the circuitry needed for a PC into a single chip. Combined with a C-7M processor, it will enable devices such as UMPCs to be made smaller and lighter, with longer battery life.
Though the TabletKiosk/PaceBlade system is similar to Samsung's Q1 UMPC, Brix said that models in the near future will be lighter and will have greater capabilities.
Such designs will be demonstrated by vendors at the Computex computer show in Taiwan in June, according to Brix. They will include designs half the thickness of current UMPCs, smaller models with 5in displays, integrated keyboards, and UMPCs with integrated telephony functions that can double as phone handsets.
Microsoft also expects future UMPC models to run Windows Vista when it ships later this year or early in 2007.
See also:
The Samsung Q1 Ultra-Mobile PC is easy to carry but slow and short on battery life 23 May 2006
Microsoft and other giants say the UMPC is a revolutionary device, but some pundits do not agree 21 Mar 2006Microsoft had the support of Intel as it launched its UMPC platform for compact tablet PCs last week 13 Mar 2006All Client
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