Intel introduces new quad-core Atom with built-in LTE

Intel introduced the first major upgrade to its Atom line of mobile chipsets with the Bay Trail-T SoC, which features a new microarchitecture and Intel's brand new LTE modem.

The new microarchitecture is called Silvermont and is built on a 22nm process, matching Intel's new Haswell chips. It promises either a 3x performance increase or a 5x energy saving over the current Atoms, depending on what's needed.

The performance increase will come in the form of better single-threaded performance and up to 8 CPU cores, though the first chipset will be quad-core.

The Bay Trail chips will be used in tablets (both Android and Windows 8.1) including 2-in-1 tablets that will launch this holiday season at $399, but also entry level laptops and even desktops. The mobile solutions target 8+ hours of battery life on a 30Wh battery and a 10.1" screen (measured by playing a 1080p@30fps video).

Speaking of video, Intel's chips have support for 4K video decoding and promise great performance for 3D games, but there's no info on the GPU itself.

Smartphones are also in the cards with the Merrifield platform, which is also built on a 22nm process. Intel showcased a reference platform at Computex 2013 but gave no timeline for when such smartphones will hit the market.

The new XMM 7160 modem will be built into some Bay Trail chipsets for global LTE roaming at low power usage. That challenges Qualcomm's dominance in the field, though the Snapdragon maker isn’t standing still either.

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