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Intel launches 15 Pentium products in India

In what it calls the "broadest launch" in its history, Intel Corporation has introduced 15 Pentium III and Pentium III Xeon processors in India; all built using the 0.18 micron technology.

T O D A Y

• Exports up 37% • New Pentium offerings • Multilingual software

Aware of the growing e-business market in the country, Atul Vijaykar, director, South Asia, Intel, says, "With the Mobile Pentium III processors, you can get fast access to the Internet and to your company intranet. You can process data and graphics at 23-131 per cent greater performance."

This is being claimed due to an advanced transfer cache feature that delivers a performance boost of up to 25 per cent, when compared to earlier Pentium III processors at the same clock speeds.

"New packaging options enable a wide choice of system configurations, including ultra-thin and light PCs and small-form factor desktop PCs," said Vijaykar, adding, "We are delivering a wave of design-enhanced, 0.18 micron processor to all segments of Internet computing: desktop, mobile, workstation and server."

Intel's desperate launch of a 733 MHz version processor is significant in the wake of AMD's launch of the 700 MHz version of its new Athlon chip which unseated Intel whose fastest processor on the desktop was 600 MHz Pentium III.

Asked if the current launch was in response to AMD, Vijaykar said, "At Intel's development labs at least half a dozen microprocessors are under various stages of development. In any case, more than 80 per cent of Internet based servers are based on Intel architecture."

As of now about 60 per cent of the company's shipment is of Pentium-III, while the rest 40 per cent is of the Celeron processor, says Vijaykar.

The launch includes: Intel 840 chipset for the workstation and server market segments, mobile Pentium III processors, now available in 500, 450 and 400 MHz speeds and the smallest mobile Pentium III processor package, called 'ball grid array' or BGA. BAG is about the size of a postage stamp.

The 400 and 450 MHz processor in the mobile Pentium III range comes for $348 and the 500 MHz processor comes for $530.

In the desktop series, the Pentium III processors are available at 733, 700, 667, 650, 600, 550, 533 and 500 MHz.

These are supported by a variety of chipsets, including the Intel 810E, Intel 440BX and Intel 440ZX. These would also be supported by the Intel 820 chipset when it ships later this year.

In the desktop Pentium III series, the prices fall between $239 and $776. The price of Pentium III 500 MHz processor is $250 a chip, while the price of Pentium III 450 MHz processor is $185 a chip.

These two chips were introduced in the market in August this year. So the prices of the processors launched now is more than the ones launched in August, but the speed is more.

Vijaykar said: "Besides high speed, the new processors will bring down the costs of the Intel architecture based notebooks to about $2,000."

Hence, the new processors will grow the market for notebooks as systems manufacturers can now introduce smaller and cheaper versions using faster and better power management features.

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