Peek To Add SMS To $80 Mobile E-Mail Device; Expands To India

November 19, 2008

Peek is a cheap wireless e-mail device for non-core techies!

Peek is a cheap wireless e-mail device for non-core techies!

Peek co-founder Rob Gray was presenting this week at the Dow Jones Technology Showcase conference.

From the outside, the Oakland, Calif., startup’s mobile device looks like a very thin Blackberry.

And like its larger cousin, Peek can wirelessly send and receive unlimited e-mails from Gmail, Hotmail, Yahoo or AOL (up to 3 though) on the nationwide T-Mobile network. But the similarities stop there.

First, because the Peek device – which got recommended by Oprah – only costs $80 at Target and unlike the Blackberry or the $50 Palm Centro doesn’t require a lengthy subscription (usually 1 or 2 years) to a wireless carrier or a social security number.

However, it costs $20 a month to start using the Peek. $10 more that I would have liked, especially for a device that is limited to email (no voice). “We’re working on adding SMS shortly,” confided Gray.

Peek which is running on an ARM processor, will soon be available overseas, first in India, where Gray sees a huge market for a cheap wireless email device.

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ARM Strikes Back At Intel With Efforts To Bring Flash And Linux To ARM Processors; Company Sees ARM-Based Netbooks In 2009

November 16, 2008
ARM sends broadside at Intel

ARM sends broadside at Intel

ARM said Monday it will take a big step to improve the ability of ARM processors to use Adobe Systems’ Flash online video technology, hoping to defang an argument Intel has used to push its rival Atom chip.

The Cambridge, England,-based chip-technology company also said it will work to bring Ubuntu Linux to the ARM environment, an operating system widely used in netbooks, or low-priced notebooks. The company’s efforts are a clear two-pronged attack at Intel and its campaign to promote Atom as an alternative to ARM chips.

ARM said it plans supports the latest Flash 10 software – used widely on the Internet – by the second half of 2009. It also hopes to support Adobe Air in the future.

ARM also said it’s partnership with open-source publisher Canonical would enable it to port Ubuntu Linux to its processors by April 2009.

Intel has sought to promote its new Atom chip for small laptops and portable Internet devices by claiming it works better than ARM processors with the most common Internet technologies.

The ARM news on Flash “really blows away that argument,” said Kerry McGuire, director of strategic software alliances at ARM. “With this support, you will get the full (Internet) experience.”

She added that with Ubuntu there will be a full desktop software package for ARM. “Our OEM partners will now be able to compete head-to-head with netbooks powered by Intel’s Atom chip,” she said

Up to now, ARM devices have only supported a more limited Flash Lite technology that enables them to display YouTube videos, for instance, but not handle more complicated Flash applications.

McGuire said he expects the first ARM-based netbooks to ship by tne end of 2009.

ARM’s customers presently use its technology to design chips for cell phones, portable Web devices, set-top boxes, televisions, media players and cars. The new Flash support is expected in the ARM11 and Cortex processors.

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Posted by Mark Boslet

AMD Unveils 2009 Netbook Roadmap: Yukon, Congo Platforms; Huron, Conesus, Geneva And Ontario Chips

November 13, 2008
Yukon is AMD's Netbook platform

Yukon is AMD's Netbook platform shipping in first half 2009

After ARM, it’s now AMD to unveil its Netbook strategy.

Next year, AMD will deliver the Yukon platform in the first quarter of 2009 that will built on top of AMD’s current processors but “tweaked” with a lower power implementation; at a sub 25 watts power envelope. That’s lower than just the processor used in AMD’s current mobile platform, Puma.

With Yukon, AMD also claims to solve the poor experience of netbooks, moving up in performance.

“Customers don’t want a compromise PC. We will deliver a low power solution at a lower price point but with the same PC experience,” said Randy Allen, AMD’s processors chief.

Yukon will first ship with a single core processor dubbed “Huron” and then receive the “Conesus” chip, a downscale of the company’s current 45-nm dual-core chip with only 1MB cache. Followed then in 2010 by “Geneva” and the 32-nm Ontario in 2011 that will also integrate a graphics chip.

Those netbook chips could come from “de-featuring” current mobile chips of their cache memory and frequency or from bad chips that are good enough for a netbook.

“Our netbook offering will start with a single core and then move up to dual core but I don’t think it will move beyond that in the foreseeable future,” adds Allen.

The netbook market is now getting pretty exciting with Intel, AMD, VIA and challenger ARM stepping up all their efforts.

AMD's Netbook chips include the 32-nm Ontario processor

AMD's future Netbooks chips include the 32-nm Ontario chip

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Low Power Inherent in ARM’s Frugal Design; Started as Apple Design House for Newton PDA

October 9, 2008
Fireside chat with ARM's CEO, Warren East and Wall Street Journal's deputy bureau chief, Don Clark

Fireside chat with ARM CEO Warren East and Wall Street Journal's deputy bureau chief, Don Clark

Could Apple have possibly co-founded ARM?

Well, in all practicality, yes i.e. according to CEO Warren East in a conversation with Wall Street Journal “Chip” Czar and friend Don Clark at a “fireside chat” during ARM’s developers’ conference.

“ARM was founded as essentially a design house for Apple and Acorn to design microprocessors for both to use. Apple eventually used the ARM chip in its Newton PDA”.

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ARM Dresses Down Intel’s Atom, Vows To Show Cortex-A9 In Silicon By Next Year

October 8, 2008
ARMs Simon Segars

ARM's Simon Segars

Intel’s new Atom processor gets oceans of attention, but it isn’t cut out for its primary job of powering a new generation of handheld Internet devices, competitor ARM said Wednesday.

“Atom today isn’t a solution for anything mobile,” Executive Vice President Simon Segars said at a Santa Clara event for developers.

ARM’s Cortex-A8 can use ¼ the power, can be ¼ the size and, even though it runs slower, doesn’t suffer a significant performance penalty, he said.

Atom has the potential for twice the raw speed, but that power translates into only a 25 percent improvement in Web page loading time, he said. With the extra energy required, the gain is probably not worth it, he added.

Segars took aim at Atom as he said ARM is rapidly working on a new chip architecture to stay out in front of its competitor. Intel released Atom in March and the chip has been greeted with a lot of interest from hardware manufacturers. The processor giant plans to improve upon Atom with the Moorestown design by 2010.

ARM hopes to have the Cortex-A9 in silicon by next year’s developer’s conference, Segars said.

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Posted by Mark Boslet

ARM CEO: Energy Efficiency is the New Killer Feature… Duh!

October 7, 2008
Warren East, CEO, ARM

Warren East, CEO, ARM

At a quite uneventful keynote this morning at the ARM Developer’s Conference held in Santa Clara, ARM CEO Warren East, didn’t say much about his company’s future plan or roadmap.
So, after a long preamble on the first 50 years of the IC (integrated circuit) industry, a slide on “our web-driven society” (all the slides are our Flickr album) and more platitude on macroeconomics factors, East finally touched on what was finally the only interesting part of his keynote: low power!

“What we’re seeing is an opportunity for new market product which help people connect with their consumption of energy… What we’re seeing this year is a lot more is metering, regulation of time and consumption of energy… We think energy efficiency is the new killer feature”.

East also touched on ARM’s graphics chips business acquired 2 years by predicting this could be a 1 billion unit opportunity in 2012. By that time, ARM would have shipped the 2 GPUs it announced previously, the Mali 200 and the multi-core Mali 400.

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ARM To Join Manufacturing Partners Early To Improve Performance and Battery Life on Future 32-nm Chips Production

October 1, 2008
Simon Segars, VP and GM of ARM's Physical IP division

Simon Segars, EVP and GM of ARM's Physical IP division

Fabless semiconductor firm ARM said earlier this week it is collaborating with the Common Platform, a CMOS process manufacturing collaboration formed by Chartered Semiconductor Manufacturing, IBM, and Samsung, to produce future 32-nm and 28-nm RISC SoCs (system on a chip).

The British maker has partnered with the Common Platform companies for several years already, since developing intellectual property to produce 90-nm 32-bit RISC chips.

“The difference today is that we are joining the Common Platform process design phase much earlier on than before, which gives us the opportunity to better optimise the implementation of a processor. This translates in chips with better performance and lower power consumption”, explained in an interview Simon Segars, EVP and general manager of ARM’s Physical IP division.

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