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I can’t wait for laptops with Apple’s own chips
Apple might be ready to ditch Intel's x86 chips in the Mac in favor of a custom-designed piece of silicon. At least that's the story out of Bloomberg, which believes that a transition by Apple to its own CPUs could begin by 2020. It's just a single, as yet unsubstantiated story, but it's already made a dent in Intel's share price, even if Apple is hardly its biggest customer. And yet it's clear that between Intel's recent problems and Apple's successes, it's time that divorce proceedings begin.
iPhone X may pack a 6-core processor
This weekend's huge iOS 11 leak continues to spill the beans on the iPhone X... and the latest tidbits may be particularly relevant to performance junkies. Twitter user Longhorn has found that the processor in the iPhone X, and likely the step-down iPhone 8 models, will be a six-core chip. It's not clear how many of these will be higher-powered cores versus energy-saving secondary cores (Longhorn suspects only two are high-speed cores), but it looks as if they might all be usable at the same time. That would be a big step up from the A10 Fusion in the iPhone 7, which only allows the high- or low-speed cores to run at any given moment.
One of HTC's first 64-bit phones is a budget model for Sprint
Qualcomm teased us with the prospect of powerful 64-bit smartphones arriving in late 2014 and early 2015, but it looks like you'll have to dial back your expectations for the first wave of devices. New tipster @upleaks has posted details and photos of HTC's A11, a starter smartphone in the Desire line that reportedly uses the more modest (if respectable) 1.4GHz Snapdragon 410 for its 64-bit processing. Other elements are modest, too; you're looking at a 4.7-inch 854 x 480 screen, plain speakers (sorry, no BoomSound here) and both a 5-megapixel rear camera as well as a front 0.3-megapixel shooter. No great shakes, then, although hints of a Sprint launch suggest that you'll see it in the US. There's no word on when the A11 will ship, although it's believed to run the existing Sense 6 interface on top of Android 4.4 KitKat -- that suggests that HTC may deliver its first 64-bit phone well before its usual spring refresh.
Toshiba Portege M780 highlights business laptop refresh to Core i-series CPUs
For some among us, the VAIO E series is the pinnacle of modern mobile computing design. Then there are other, saner individuals, who prefer the understated aesthetics of what are commonly termed business laptops. For that latter group, we have a whole glut of new Toshiba notebooks to look at, highlighted by the delectable looking Portege M780 above. Much in the vein of HP's 2730p, it's a 12.1-inch convertible tablet PC, with a spill-resistant keyboard and rugged features (tested to withstand drops from up to 1 meter), but its biggest attraction will still likely be the Core i5 heart thumping inside. Also undergoing upgrades are the Tecra A11 (already available in the US), M11 and S11, which will come with up to 8GB of RAM, 802.11n wireless, SSD options, and of course Intel Core i7 CPUs. Check them out after the break, and expect them to arrive in Europe, the Middle East and Africa this quarter, with the M780 close behind them with a Q2 2010 release.
Toshiba ships Tecra A11, Core i7-packin' Qosmio X500 and more
These didn't quite make it off the boat before CES, but if it's a new Toshiba laptop you've been searching for, you can still get some satisfaction before the end of this month. The outfit has just announced that four of its machines are available in the US starting right this very moment, including the 15.6-inch Tecra A11 (starts at $879). This one packs an integrated numpad, NVIDIA GPU, an undisclosed new Intel CPU and a charcoal black chassis. Moving on, that Qosmio X500 workhorse that we first heard about late last year finally has its shipping papers (and a $1,549 starting point), bringing with it a Core i7-720QM processor, a GeForce GTS 360M GPU, 8GB of memory, an 18.4-inch display, 500GB (7200RPM) hard drive, a Blu-ray drive and a vivacious color scheme that's guaranteed to polarize. The Satellite Pro L450 and Satellite Pro L500 are also slipping out to the suits in attendance, but with price tags starting at $529, the spec hounds probably won't be drooling much here.
