Intel Atom - The Reactor That Powers Netbooks & Nettops

Intel Atom's family of processors are unique. They were designed to be general purpose processors. Yet, the most important feature is the extremely low power consumption. Intel positions these processors for the Netbook and nettop devices.

Netbooks are a new category of portable laptop/notebook family. Manufacturers aim these lightweight devices for people on the move. Most important applications on the move should provide the ability to receive and send emails, IMs and surf the net. General purpose productivity applications are not that important, though they would be able to run these applications in a pinch. Typically, a 10" display and corresponding smaller size and weight sets these apart. The way Intel defines the Nettops as a category of devices aimed at content consumption rather than content creation such as, browsing web pages, watching online video streaming etc. They see it as the tool the next billion users would use. Besides these are aimed at consumer electronic devices, embedded systems and thin clients.

It is easy to see that this category is going to be very popular. The Netbooks are already almost everywhere. So much so, that for a two year commitment you can get these Netbooks for $99 kind of prices. The commitment is to use the 3G communication services from these mobile services providers. This is the kind of connection that gives you mobility and bandwidth for operation. It is not difficult to see that the power consumption is one of the most important considerations in designs of such mobile devices.

Power consumption, as define as TDP or thermal design power, ranges from 0.65 watts for Z500 to 8w for 330 family, 4 watts in the 200 family and 2.4w or 2 w for the Z530, Z520 and Z510 processors in the Atom processor variants. Compare it with something like 35/40 w in the X86 processors in regular PC products. The processors themselves and the transistors used to implement the processors are of very small geometrical dimensions. Intel uses 45 nm lithography technology. That leads to a very small package size of 13 mmX14 mm in most cases. The processors that have a TDP of 2.5, 4 and 8 watts come in a package size 22mm X 22 mm.

While the extreme small size helps in controlling power dissipation Intel uses other techniques that help reduce power further. One is to use very low core voltage to operate the transistor on the chip. This is in the range of 0.7 to 1.1 volt in case of the processors that dissipates up to 2.4 watts. Processors that have TDP ratings of 2.5 watts to 8 watts use 0.8 to 1.625 v for the 2.5 watt unit; and 0.9 to 0.1625 v for the higher rated processors. To top it all, a very sophisticated power control is used to keep the power consumption at a minimum. These techniques include not only external voltage control, Intel has taken it to the extent that parts of the system goes to sleep when even one of the two threads the processors are capable of enters an inactive state. To retain efficiency though the processor is capable of coming out of a sleep state really quickly.

Debasis Das

Debasis Das has worked with technology companies for close to four decades, 25 years of which has been with IT consulting companies. He has managed software and Geospatial industry outsourcing from India for International clientele. He has worked with customers from US, Europe, Japan and China. He is widely traveled and currently engaged in consultancy in software, embedded systems and technical contents.