Intel gets set to bring the 'platform' concept to desktops

INTEL WAS WISE enough to declare back in 2001 that megahurtz don't matter. The talk then was of smarter chips rather than simply cranked-up ones and the then nearly-boss of the chip-making corporation, a Mr Otellini, started banging on about clever multi-threading and cleverer multi-cores and, indeed, such things have come to pass.

During the same speech at a San Jose IDF, Otellini also announced a new chip code-named Banias. This chip fitted the "smarter" category because of its low-power, high performance spec. It was to become the central component in what Intel what would go on to brand as its Centrino mobile computing platform.

If megahurtz didn't matter back then, it was likely to be because Intel's marketers figured consumers would eventually wise up to the numbers game. Why move to Megahurtz to Gigahurtz to Biggerhurtz when the performance increase you can expect may be marginal compared to your investment?

So, while Intel was talking about smarter chips, it was also engaged in a search for smarter ways to sell chippery. The solution it stumbled across came not from the all-conquering desktop division but from the upstart mobile division located in far-flung Israel. Under the firm hand and watchful eye of rising star Dadi Perlmutter, the boffins beavering away on Banias developed what Perlmutter describes as a holistic approach to PC building. The emphasis was to shift from the chip to the platform and the platform would include the processor, the chipset, and other bits and bobs bolted to it to provide sound, graphics or wirelessness.

When Banias finally tipped up it was part of the Centrino platform and Intel set about re-educating the assembled masses of hackery at a swanky London launch, to look beyond the chip and focus more on the complete package.

Of course, in selling the complete platform, Intel was able to stretch its considerable muscles in a horizontal direction. No third-party chipset maker was going to be sticking a Banias (Pentium M) chip on a board and flogging it independently. Intel not only wanted to sell more chips - the company mantra - it also wanted to sell more chipsets, more sound wizardry, more integrated graphics silicon, rather than let the pesky Taiwanese flog copy-cat components at a sliver of the price.

The strategy proved mightily successful. Centrino arrived in time to capitalise on the boom in mobile computing and consumers gradually got their heads around the ultimately simplified process of specifying their laptops. The fact that Banias was a fine chip, built from the ground up to keep power consumption to an absolute minimum helped establish the platform by giving it an undeniable edge. And the wireless aspect gave it a novelty value, which is good for years to come as the world is encouraged to become one big hot-spot.

Rumours of rifts between Intel's mobile and desktop divisions have been filtering into INQUIRER ears regularly, but it seems the mobile mob is in the ascendancy. The battle between the two is brought more sharply into focus by rival AMD's success in declaring megahurtz might not matter because bits are better. Rather than eschewing the numbers game AMD just moved it elsewhere.

So later this week we'll see the desktop division attempt to deliver a Centrino-style 'platform' for the desktop PC, while the mobilies will swagger around, sniffing "We told you so!"

So far the branding of the product is the decidedly unsexy "Professional Business Platform", but we understand it will comprise chipset and processor with integrated graphics and sound, plus various other bits and bobs Intel makes so well.

And we expect a variety of different platforms to be introduced for a number of different tasks. We don't expect the chipmaker to start producing DVD drives and tin boxes but we do detect an attempt to ensure that anything inside the box is made by Intel.

The move may be regarded as an experiment, but it will be backed up by enough marketing dosh to ensure its survival. As our Fudo will tell you, it's not the architecture or the marketing that counts. It's the marchitecture. µ

See also:
Megahurtz don't matter says Steely 3.5GHz Otellini