Intel 'to revolutionise PC industry' with new chipset

The world's biggest chip maker, Intel, has unveiled the chipset it is banking its immediate future on and one it hopes will shake up the market.

The product, code-named Sandy Bridge, is Intel's first architecture to merge a microprocessor and graphics processor onto a single silicon chip.It is designed to cut the time it takes to produce images.

According to BBC News, the company is betting the new technology will win over both PC vendors and consumers. It recently cut sales forecasts because of weaker than expected PC demand.

"Sandy Bridge will revolutionise PCs again," Paul Otellini, Intel's chief executive told its annual developer forum being held in San Francisco. "On one single chip, we've put in place all the critical capabilities for computing. This is a very important chip for Intel," he added.

The chip will target low-end desktop computers and laptops and is expected to be ready to go to customers early next year. Putting the two processors together will cut the time it takes to produce images as it removes bottlenecks between the graphics processor and memory. It will also improve battery life and power consumption.

"This is a big deal and we are all interested to see how the chip performs when it gets out into the real world next year," Martin Reynolds, managing vice president of research firm Gartner told BBC News.

"I don't however think it will revolutionise the industry but it does force that continued change that is part of the history of the PC industry. Intel has to keep new technologies coming to the market that keeps its growing so it is a big bet for the next couple of years."