Intel has been trying to get its processors inside more smartphones and tablets. However, the company isn"t forgetting the fact that it has a long and healthy relationship with Microsoft and its Windows division. This week, as part of its announcements at the Mobile World Congress trade show, Intel announced plans for a new processor and also a chip that could be used inside Windows 8-based tablets.
As reported by News.com, Intel"s new smartphone processor is the Z2580 Atom chip. It"s got two cores, has a clock speed of up to 1.8 GHz and has the PowerVR SGX 544MP2 chip inside for graphics. That chip has the code name Clover Trail L but it likely won"t be made available for smartphones until sometime in 2013.
However, Intel also announced a variant of that chip called Clover Tail W. That chip could be released by the end of 2012 but it only has a single core graphics engine. The story speculates that chip could be used by PC makers to power a Windows 8-based tablet product.
Intel has not officially commented on its plans for Clover Tail W. However, there are rumors that HP will have at least two x86 tablets with Windows 8 by the end of the year. It"s possible that one or both could be using Intel"s Clover Tail W processor.