Intel Centrino Mobile Technology




Intel Centrino Processors and Chipsets. The purpose of Centrino technology is to allow optimized wireless communication for laptops.
Intel Centrino mobile technology is actually the combination of 3 new chips from Intel: the Intel® Pentium® M processor, the Intel® 855 Chipset Family and the Intel® PRO/Wireless 2100 Network Connection.
New Pentium M processors. Based on a new advanced chip architecture, Intel has made an improved mobile CPU that has lower clock speed then its current mobile Pentium 4 processor M.
Intel issued 6 new Pentium M CPUs at 1.60 GHz, 1.50 GHz, 1.40 GHz, 1.30 GHz, 1.10 GHz (low voltage), and 900 MHz (ultra low voltage).
Intel® 855 Chipset Family. The Intel 855 chipset family includes two new chipsets developed exclusively for the mobile market segment, the 855PM supporting discrete graphics and 855GM with integrated Intel® Extreme Graphics 2 technology.
The new chipsets also support Enhanced Intel SpeedStep technology, Deeper Sleep Alert State and an internal timer that automatically turns off the chipset clock when the chipset is inactive. The 855GM chipset also includes a low-power graphics power management mode.
Both chipsets include a 400MHz processor system bus and support for up to 2GB of DDR 266 memory, along with support for USB 2.0 and Intel's I/O Hub Architecture.
Intel PRO/Wireless 2100 Network Connection. The Intel PRO/Wireless 2100 Network Connection has been designed and validated to connect easily to 802.11b Wi-Fi certified access points. It also supports advanced wireless LAN security including 802.1x, WEP and VPN technologies, and will be software upgradeable to support WPA. Compatible Extensions.
Better Performance. Intel claims that Centrino mobile technology-based systems can deliver up to five hours of battery life or more, compared to about four hours on mobile Intel® Pentium® III processor-M-based system and about 3 hours on mobile Intel® Pentium® 4 processor-M-based systems.
On the same benchmark, Intel Centrino mobile technology offers 15 percent faster performance on multitasking office productivity applications compared to the mobile Intel Pentium 4 processor-M 2.4 GHz system.
In addition, users of Intel Centrino mobile technology based-systems will find a 13 percent improvement gain in their Internet experience when compared to the mobile Intel Pentium 4 processor-M 2.4GHz.
Documentation


INTRODUCTION
The world of mobile computing has seldom been so exciting. Not, at least,for last 3 years when all that the chip giants could think of was scaling down thefrequency and voltage of the desktop CPUs, and labeling them as mobile processors. Intel Centrino mobile technology is based on the understanding thatmobile customers value the four vectors of mobility: performance, battery life,small form factor, and wireless connectivity. The technologies represented by theIntel Centrino brand will include an Intel Pentium-M processor, Intel 855 chipsetfamily, and Intel PRO/Wireless 2100 network connection .The Intel Pentium-M processor is a higher performance, lower power mobile processor with several micro-architectural enhancements over existingIntel mobile processors. Some key features of the Intel Pentium-M processor Micro-architecture include Dynamic Execution, 400-MHz, on-die 1-MB secondlevel cache with Advanced Transfer Cache Architecture, Streaming SIMDExtensions 2, and Enhanced Intel SpeedStep technology. The Intel Centrinomobile technology also includes the 855GM chipset components GMCH and theICH4-M. The Accelerated Hub Architecture is designed into the chipset to providean efficient, high bandwidth, communication channel between the GMCH and theICH4-M.The GMCH component contains a processor system bus controller, agraphics controller, and a memory controller, while providing an LVDS interfaceand two DVO ports.The integrated Wi-Fi Certified Intel PRO/Wireless 2100 Network Connection has been designed and validated to work with all of the Intel Centrinomobile technology components and is able to connect to 802.11b Wi-Fi certifiedaccess points. It also supports advanced wireless LAN security including CiscoLEAP, 802.1X and WEP. Finally, for comprehensive security support, the IntelPRO/Wireless 2100 Network Connection has been verified with leading VPNsuppliers like Cisco, CheckPoint, Microsoft and Intel NetStructure.