Intel has made a strong move to compete in the Internet of Things, by announcing Quark, a new line of low-power, less expensive microcontroller chips. The new Quark chips draw 27 milliwatts, one-thousandths of a watt, compared to Intel’s standard chips that draw approximately 15 watts, and will be priced at $2 to $3. The new chips do not adhere to the Intel’s x86 chip design, which the company has used since the 1980s. With microcontroller chips, Intel faces new competition from Freescale Semiconductor and Atmel. Continue reading Intel Debuts Low Cost, Low Power Chips for Internet of Things

Apple is introducing 4K Retina screens for its 21.5-inch iMacs and 5K resolution for its 27-inch iMacs. Displays also tout a 25 percent increase in color gamut. Larger iMacs will feature enhanced graphics capabilities and Intel’s new Skylake processor. And now that the iPhone 6s and 6s Plus offerings include the ability to record 4K video, an updated iMovie supports 4K footage and 1080p HD video at 60 fps. The company has also redesigned its Magic line of keyboards, mice and trackpads to include new features, including the ability to recharge batteries with the same Lightning plug used by the iPhone. Continue reading Apple Goes All Retina with iMac Displays, Updates Peripherals

Qualcomm, which dominates the mobile phone chip market, is preparing to launch a new chip containing 24 processing cores, designed for server computers that run corporate networks and are the backbone of the Internet. Up until now, Intel has been the leader in that arena, but Qualcomm, slated to report its first annual decline since 2009, is eager to seek out new areas of growth and believes that providing an alternative chip to the operators of data centers could be worth $15 billion by 2020. Continue reading Qualcomm to Challenge Intel in Growing Server Chip Market

Oculus is joining with a number of hardware partners — including Alienware, AMD, Asus, Dell, Intel and Nvidia — to introduce “Oculus Ready” PC systems optimized for the Rift. Starting at price points under $1,000, PCs featuring the certification are expected to hit the market next year and could be a major step toward the consumer adoption of virtual reality. Oculus CEO Brendan Iribe previously hinted that a complete Rift system, including a PC, would run about $1,500. Founder Palmer Luckey recently added that the Rift headset alone will cost more than the $350 developer kit. Continue reading Hardware Partners to Introduce “Oculus Ready” Certified PCs

Chip giant Intel recently threw its hat into the quantum computer ring when it announced plans to invest $50 million in Netherlands-based QuTech, an institute launched in 2013 by Delft University of Technology and the Dutch Organization for Applied Research. The investment is part of a planned 10-year collaboration with QuTech. Researchers from leading tech companies such as Google, IBM and Microsoft have been looking to apply quantum physics to computing for a long time. Continue reading Intel Makes a Major Investment in Quantum Computer Research

Intel hopes to reverse the trend of declining PC sales with the release of its new line of computer chips. Based on a design called Skylake, the chips are the sixth generation of the company’s Core processor line and feature more performance and less power consumption, as well as fewer wires and a host of new technologies including facial recognition. Intel hopes that the new chips, together with Microsoft’s just-released Windows 10 operating system, will encourage consumers to replace 500 million PCs older than four years. Continue reading Intel Aims to Reinvigorate PC Sales with New Skylake Chips

Several high-profile technology companies, most notably Hewlett-Packard, have been hard at work trying to reinvent the hard drive. But it looks like Intel will be first to market with its new Optane drives. Although a current prototype of Intel’s Optane drives only functions seven times the speed of a top-end flash disk drive, it could be much faster by the time it is released in 2016. And the potential is great: Optane drives are said to operate as much as 1,000 times faster than today’s memory technology. Continue reading Intel to Bring Superfast Optane Hard Drives to Market in 2016

As growth slows in the chip market, Intel is turning to a variety of other related industries to keep the revenue flowing. The company has turned to the burgeoning field of wearables, creating tiny chips and circuit board modules that can fit into the form factors and designs favored by wearable creators. It is also pushing RealSense, technologies that bring hearing and vision functionality to devices. To keep in the public eye, the company is also launching a reality TV show with Mark Burnett and Turner Broadcasting. Continue reading Intel Looks to RealSense, Wearables, Creates Reality TV Show

Intel and Micron Technology announced that they have developed a new memory chip technology that will increase performance up to 1,000 times faster than today’s technology. If proven true, the new chip technology, named 3D XPoint, could offer tremendous new capabilities for computers, smartphones and other electronics. 3D XPoint is not as fast as DRAM (dynamic random access memory), but stores 10 times more data and also, similar to current NAND flash memory, retains data even after devices are powered off. Continue reading New Intel, Micron Chips Said to Offer Big Performance Gains

Google simultaneously launched the Cloud Native Computing Foundation, with other technology companies, and its first version of Kubernetes, a method of dynamically scheduling a massive amount of application containers on a large scale. Together, the Foundation and Google’s Kubernetes would service large-scale enterprises, putting the Silicon Valley company and its foundation partners in direct competition with Amazon Web Services and Facebook. Last year, AWS released its own container management services. Continue reading Google Debuts Cloud Foundation and New Container Standard

Google Glass “Enterprise Edition,” expected to go into testing this fall, will feature several notable updates to its hardware, including a larger prism display, a better Intel Atom processor and longer battery life. The new version reportedly corrects the eyestrain problems of the previous Explorer Edition, improves upon screen quality, and exhibits better heat management. Users of Enterprise Edition will be able to look up comfortably, without feeling the need to look up and to the right, as was the case with the earlier version. Continue reading New Google Glass to Feature Larger Prism and Intel Atom CPU

After three years of research and development, the Wi-Fi Alliance released Wi-Fi Aware, which instantly connects Wi-Fi-enabled products with devices, applications or information without an Internet connection or mobile data. Wi-Fi Aware software works continuously in the background, sending out short messages that dramatically lessen power consumption. With a Wi-Fi Aware smartphone, a user could find nearby services, videogame players or anyone from a high school friend to a business colleague. Continue reading Wi-Fi Alliance Debuts Wi-Fi Aware for Quick Device Connection

Verizon’s upcoming Internet TV service, expected to launch sometime this summer, may encourage brands to sponsor your binge watching. According to Verizon exec Marnie Walden — who described the new service as a “mobile-first video product” — the company plans to offer live and on-demand programming in addition to content from digital networks such as AwesomenessTV. Rather than passing the additional data costs for such a service to customers or programmers, Verizon is turning to advertisers. “Ad-sponsored data is part of the product offering,” said Walden. Continue reading Ad-Sponsored Data to Be Part of Verizon’s Internet TV Service

Industrial Light & Magic has created a new division with a focus on developing virtual reality and augmented reality experiences for movie fans. ILMxLAB is planning to debut an entertainment experience based on “Star Wars” later this year. It has been working on technology for the iPad and Oculus Rift that would allow consumers to enter their favorite movie scenes and navigate through them. ILMxLAB execs indicate that the technology could launch when the J.J. Abrams-helmed “Star Wars: The Force Awakens” is released in mid-December. Continue reading New ILM Team Developing Immersive VR and AR Experiences

More than 3,000 attendees and 200 exhibitors gathered in Santa Clara this week for the Augmented World Expo, now in its sixth year. The event, which has grown ten-fold since its inception, featured demos involving VR headsets, enhanced glasses, product-scanning apps and brain-scanning headbands. According to a recent Digi-Capital report, augmented and virtual reality is projected to reach $150 billion in revenue by 2020 (when AR is expected to dominate 80 percent of the market). AWE founder Ori Inbar believes “2016 will be the year of shakeups and mergers.” Continue reading AR/VR Leaders Imagine the Future at Augmented World Expo