Intel released its next generation of low
power processors late last year, the third generation of Atom processors
codenamed: Cedar Trail. This month we take a closer look at what they stick
underneath the hood of netbooks and compare it to the previous generation.
Manufacturing
The Cedarview family of processors works on
a smaller manufacturing scale than its predecessors. Working on a 32nm scale
has allowed Intel to make the processor more efficient and reduce power
consumption. The extra space was also put to good use to increase heat
efficiency and allow for cooler running on fanless designs. Unfortunately, we
couldn't quite test the power improvements on the new chip is due to it being
installed in a lower end EeePC which had a smaller than usual battery pack.
More goodies
The updated chip comes with a lot more
capabilities than just having a smaller manufacturing scale. There is now
support for the more demanding video formats like Blu-ray 2.0 and full 1080p playback.
Which is great, but one must wonder if the computers Cedarview will end up in
are meant for playing things like Blu-ray; but just in case, Intel has also
included display options for HDMI output and DisplayPort.
More cores
Intel
Atom N2600 Score
Cedarview improves on Pineviewby splitting
workloads over two cores. Now, that doesn't sound very impressive when you
consider that quad-core computing has been around for years; but considering
the size of the computers that these are put in then there is really something
to talk about. Although there are concerns about battery life since dual cores
will definitely soak up more juice. Intel appears to have compensated for this
with more efficient processors.
Performance
The N2600 is at the low end of the
Cedarview family, which still puts its clockspeed at an impressive 1.6GHz. Our
review unit was installed in an ASUS EeePC, which unfortunately was at the low
end of the EeePC spectrum. This prevented us from really testing how much the
processor could do. But a quick benchmark came up at 586 which Isn’t too bad at
all.
