Microsofts project Origami team did quite a good job of raising awareness of UMPC’s didnt they. The team blog shows that it even suprised them! However, the UMPC doesnt appear to be an intel and MS-only category, just a buzzword. There’ll be others that will be introducing products into this market and Via seems to be hot on the tail of the marketing momentum.
VIA has announced a new core logic chip to sit alongside its C7-M processor. The VX700.
‘Core Logic’ is a term they’re using to describe an integrated north/southbridge chip. In summary, these chips perform i/o functions and include memory control and hardware control. The new chip includes 2D/3D graphics acceleration, MPEG2 support, and dual monitor outputs. Importantly, the processor chipset is ultra-low power (1GHz VIA C7-M draws 3.5W during normal system operation, and as little as 0.1W in idle mode) and allows motherboard space-savings due to the reduced space needed for one chip over two. A future version on the chip, the VX700-M, will include hardware acceleration for HDTV and, more importantly, MPEG4.
The combination gives UMPC manufacturers an alternative platform on which to build. Competition is always good and part of the announcement includes a promised device from Paceblade. Mobits and Amtek were also quoted as possible users of the chipset. Availability of chipset is expect in several months.
Its nice to see competition and if these manufacturers are free to work outside any specification, then it gives them more technical and creative flexibility.
Keywords: origami, carrypad, via, umpc
Post updated (V3 now!) to clarify the terms used. UMPC just seems to be a ms-intel-via buzzword right now (I think that VIA are part of the official UMPC development team) but it does have a very rough specification set here:I’ll continue to use the term ‘carrypad’ for my ‘dream device’ as I’ve done since before all the origami buzz. My definition is made pretty clear in the sidebar on my blog site.
I’ve decided to use UMPC to describe the general market segment from the Nokia 770 up to the OQO as this term seems to be entering general use. This could change!!
