Intel will soon be releasing a new processor, and it is called Atom, and you will easily know why. The chip is only less than 25 square millimeter in size (actual size for unmounted chips is probably smaller than your fingernail), and will consume only 0.6 watts to 2.5 watts.
In fact, it is so small that Intel supposedly can make 2,500 of these processors on a single 300 millimeter wafer. However, it packs over 47 million transistors each, and the power is equivalent to a Pentium 4 processor running from 1 to 2 ghz. These chips are intended to be used for low cost notebooks, which will power a new generation of smaller notebooks which will be called the NetBook or what is called the Ultra Mobile PC category. Some pundits are calling also these products MIDs – mobile internet devices. The initial batch of Atom processors will be single core processors with a 512kb cache, but dual core versions are also being planned.
The Netbook category will likely just have a 7 inch or 8 inch screen, and was most exemplified by the success of the Asus EeePC. As this is released, it is expected to power netbooks that are in the $250 to $300 price range. These are low cost, low power notebooks designed for just basic uses like internet and email.
After I read my pal Max Limpag’s blog, I decided to finally try Twitter ( it is at www.twitter.com). It is a big hit among techies, and it is a great and free. Think about that you could text the TV, and see your text come out onscreen. That is basically what twitter does. It is just like a blog, except that you can blog on it through the web , or through your cell phone. Each note is only upto 140 characters ( just like a text message), but there is all to it.
What you do is get a free account. And then you get your pal a free account. Then you can each follow each others update through the web, or through phone. So if I text to my account, and you are following it, what Twitter will do is send you a free text of what I text to my account. You can also see the update in the web through my Twitter URL, or you can actually see it through your own!
So let us say that I have a twitter account, and that all my friends ( let us say 60 of them) subscribe to it. If I go to SM, and I see that there is a new restaurant opening, I can just text to my twitter account, and all my friends will instantly get updated about that! This is a great way to get in touch.
A twitter account gets you 250 free SMS per week. Which is not bad. Of course, if you do international text, it is expensive, but you get the replies for free. So, what you can do is that you sign up your phone to receive the text, but you can answer or post to your twitter either through the web, or through instant messaging. It is almost like Chikka , but slightly more expansive, since it allows you to be in touch with multiple more people! Anyhow, the best way to experience it is to try it!
For instance, a few dozen techies decided to use it in the South by Southwest Interactive Conference. So everybody was texting to their account what was happening to the conference, knowing what their friends were upto, and who were the good speakers, and what agenda was coming next. Everybody even got updates on their phones which booth was giving freebies, or which venue had better food, or which hotel had bad service.
You would be surprised, but it may be because of Twitter that Americans will finally get into the habit of texting.