The battle to deliver more battery power to laptops and personal
digital assistants has started in earnes
Antony SavvasGlobal giant Intel is being challenged by small but well-backed
Transmeta. Intel has launched a two-speed chip while Transmeta's
Crusoe chip - still a year away - promises a more comprehensive
low-power solution.
Both companies, who will undoubtedly be joined by other
contenders, are aiming to address the eternal problem of how to
give mobile users faster processing speeds while offering an
adequate battery supply.
As the number of mobile applications increases, and take-up of
entertainment applications such as games and DVD movies increases,
battery life is key. After all, what's the point of watching The
Matrix on DVD if the laptop conks out just 10 minutes before the
end?
Intel has launched SpeedStep, a chip delivering 600-650MHz when
plugged into the mains, but which automatically slows to 500MHz
when it is run unplugged to save on battery power. Intel says it
wants to give laptops desktop power when plugged in, and
high-performance when on the move.
The chip giant hopes its laptop partners will start offering
SpeedStep from next month. Acer confirmed that its first SpeedStep
machines will be available in February. Peter Lunn, Acer product
marketing business manager, said SpeedStep will add from about £700
to the price of a top-of-the-range machine. In return, users will
get around 20% more battery life with no visible deterioration in
viewing performance, said Lunn.
The cost of this battery improvement is clearly not cheap. This
is why Intel does not see users upgrading laptops to SpeedStep.
Intel points out it wouldn't be easy either, because a machine's
Bios would have to be changed completely.
Although it is pricey, Intel's answer to low battery life will
soon be available, unlike Transmeta's offering. Transmeta's,
however, should be a lot cheaper and use even less juice.
While Transmeta - backed by Linux king Linus Torvalds, financier
George Soros and Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen - admits you won't
be able to enjoy its Crusoe chip for perhaps another year, when it
does come to market products based on the technology could cost as
little as $65 for a simple 333MHz Internet access Web pad. The
price increases to $329 for a 700MHz laptop version.
The Crusoe chip family and SpeedStep both use a "morphing"
technology which cuts down on the processing required to run
applications.
Transmeta claims its system saves more power, however, because
its patented LongRun power management technology fine tunes the
power needed for each application much more regularly than Intel's
chip.
Crusoe also has a niche in its focus on Linux, which is a much
leaner operating system than the Windows-based system that most of
Intel's partners will continue to rely on. The battery power when
running Crusoe therefore goes much further, says Transmeta.
But users will have to wait for independent tests to see exactly
what they will get for their money.