Centrino: The Next Generation

On 7 March 2006, Intel released news on the next generation of Centrino technologies (codenamed Santa Rosa), scheduled for first quarter of year 2007. Its new Core 2 Duo (Merom) processor with 800MHz front size bus is however, expected to launch earlier, by end of August this year. A number of vendors have already unveiled plans to offer Intel's new Core 2 Duo processor inside their latest notebook PC models. Santa Rosa will combine Merom processors with a new supporting chip set code-named Crestline and an 802.11n wireless module, code-named Kedron Merom is expected to offer users extra performance - an increase of about 20 percent over its predecessor, the Core Duo, according to Intel, while holding power consumption to nearly the same level.

The Core 2 Duo also adds 64-bit addressing, something that Intel notebook chips have lacked to date.

The table below shows the Centrino Mobile Technology Roadmap Overview from the inception of Centrino 1st Generation (Carmel) in 2003 to the current dual-core 3rd Generation (Napa) in 2006 and the futuristic 4th Generation (Santa Rosa) scheduled next year.

More details on the Centrino Revolution can be found with our latest newsletter at: Milestones Aug 2006