We already knew that there were versions of Honeycomb being written for Intel’s Atom hardware. Google and Intel are taking the relationship to the next step; all future versions of Android will run on and be optimised for Intel chips. Intel processors in Android phones. Intel processors in Android tablets. This is big.
Intel and Google made the relationship more implicit at Intel’s developer forum in San Fransisco, announcing that all future versions of Android will have code-level Android support; in the case of Atom chips that means things like power saving and multimedia will function according to the capabilities of the given low-power CPU, while Intel’s CPUs will also be seen in upcoming Android based phones.
Intel showed off a mystery Android tablet running on their Atom processor — a pairing we should expect to see soon. The prospect of handsets being able to choose from both ARM and x86 processors means we’ll have an even wider choice of guts to power our phones and tabs — definitely good news. It also means Android can officially be run on anything — complete ubiquity. [Intel]
The video below details the announcement, captured by Carrypad.
EckyThump
Wednesday, September 14, 2011 at 8:02 AMAny device that combines Android and Intel against the fruit, has to be a good thing!
Jackson Bison
Wednesday, September 14, 2011 at 8:10 AM‘against the fruit’ – nice!
BenDTU
Wednesday, September 14, 2011 at 8:48 AMWhy? What’s wrong with ARM?
Steve
Wednesday, September 14, 2011 at 12:35 PMNothing, but choice is always good. The fact that Intel’s stepped into the Android market, dominated by ARM-licensees like Qualcomm is awesome, and will hopefully induce the same type of processor arms-race we see in PCs between AMD and Intel.
Norgan
Wednesday, September 14, 2011 at 1:48 PMHow quickly we forget the StrongARM and XScale processors. Intel are not new at this but I wonder why they ever dropped the StrongARM range.
x86 computing means more cross compatibility but they lost out big time to Qualcomm
Ash
Wednesday, September 14, 2011 at 3:19 PM“arms race”… hehehe
Adrian
Wednesday, September 14, 2011 at 6:54 PMFruit Nijas….
maddogeco
Wednesday, September 14, 2011 at 9:47 AMSee Nokia see what your missing out on. you guys are now stuck with some silly thing the microsoft tell you you have to have. Elop you made a big mistake.
Sorry to be the token Nokia fan
olearymo
Wednesday, September 14, 2011 at 9:51 AMHow does Nokia’s choice fit in with this? not sure I understand
maddogeco
Wednesday, September 14, 2011 at 4:09 PMNokia were partnering with Intel to bring Intel chips to Nokia phone running MeeGo. then Steven Elop came along and killer Nokia’s MeeGo plans. so now Intel has carried on in mobile work with android
Johnny P
Wednesday, September 14, 2011 at 10:23 AMMy EEEPC (Atom 1.6GhZ) runs Windows 7 for 10 hours. I wont even consider running android unless the battery life exceeds this.
EckyThump
Wednesday, September 14, 2011 at 11:02 AMI have a little 10″ Eee machine, did you get yours preinstalled? I had Vista basic on mine, which quickly got tossed, mainly because of the pile of crapware on it! Tried to install 7 home basic on it, but the firmware won’t accept it off a USB stick! #[
Steve
Wednesday, September 14, 2011 at 12:32 PMBut that’s due to its large 6 cell battery, not the energy efficiency of Windows 7 Basic. Compare the mAhr difference between an Android tablet like the Galaxy Tab (with comparable battery life) and a netbook, and you’ll realise that a dedicated mobile OS is more streamlined and sips less juice.
The notion that W7 Basic amazing for mobile battery is simply due to the manufacturer bolting on 3 extra battery cells on the bottom of your netbook.
EckyThump
Wednesday, September 14, 2011 at 12:53 PMYeah sorry dude, not sure where you’re going with that? Actually now that I think about it, it probably was XP basic, not entirely sure! It was pre installed though. I started using Easy Peasy on it after I tried Unbuntu, which was very slow!
Johnny P
Wednesday, September 14, 2011 at 12:46 PMI tried EasyPeasy (Linux Build for EEEPC’s) and it only gave me 5-6 hours. In answer to EckyThump I have the 1000HE. It came with Windows XP but I installed Windows 7 Ultimate 32bit edition. It runs good and I still get 8 hours or so 2 years later. I cant remember the process exactly but it was pretty straight forward and off an external thumb drive
EckyThump
Wednesday, September 14, 2011 at 12:57 PMYeah mine’s the N50 Atom with 3 battery cells, so chalk and cheese I guess! I do like Easy Peasy on it though. But it doesn’t matter any more anyway because now I’m using the Transformer Tab! #]
BRO
Wednesday, September 14, 2011 at 2:54 PMI just want to play C&C95 on my tablet
x86 should enable this I hope
Johnny P
Wednesday, September 14, 2011 at 3:32 PMSome games are just not meant for tablets/consoles……