Intel Montevina Plus

Finally, Intel officially presented what was already known - the new Montevina Plus platform with new high end CPUs and the new CULV platform.

To close the gap between cheap netbooks and expensive subnotebooks, Intel introduces the new CULV (Consumer Ultra Low Voltage) platform.

Smaller

The new platform consists out of new chipsets and CPUs in "Small Form Factor BGA Packages" leading to 58% less needed area on the mainboard (1415 mm2 versus 3342 with Penryn / Cantiga). As a drawback, the manufacturers need to use HDI (High Density Interconnects) mainboards.

Faster (as Atom)

The new CULV CPUs are single core processors and differ in features (Speedstep, Virtualization feature Vt), core clock (1.2 - 1.4 GHz) and L2 cache (1-3 MB).

Celeron M 723

1.2 GHz, 10 Watt TDP, 1 MB L2 Cache, FSB 800, 64 Bit, no Vt, no Speedstep
107 Dollar (if 1000 CPUs are purchased) compared to $44 of the Atom N270.

Pentium (Single Core) SU2700

1.3 GHz, 10 Watt TDP, 2 MB L2 Cache, FSB 800, 64 Bit, Vt, Speedstep (not all C-States supported)

Core 2 Solo SU3500

1.4 GHz, 10 Watt TDP, 3 MB L2 Cache, FSB 800, 64 Bit, Vt, Speedstep (all C-States supported)
$262

The new GS45 and GS40 chipsets are based on the well known GM45 with the GMA 4500M (HD) graphics core.

The GS45 is clocked with 380 MHz but may overclock automatically to 533 MHz to achieve the Blue-Ray logo. It supports FSB of up to 1066 and 8 GB of RAM. The TDP ist 8 Watt - 12 Watt (when overclocked, but should fit in 8 Watt Designs according to Intel).

The GS40 is a cheaper brother of the GS45 and is clocked with fixed 400 MHz. This means it wont be certified for Blue-Ray videos. Furthermore, it supports only 800 MHz FSB, 4 GB RAM and has a TDP of 12 Watt.

This CULV platform will show up in the upcoming CULV Notebooks like the Acer Timeline, Asus UX50V, MSI X-Slim, or MSI Wind U200. Further supporting manufacturer should be according to Intel: Sony, Dell, Fujitsu, Toshiba, Gateway, HP, Lenovo, LG, Panasonic, Medion, NEC, Packard Bell and Samsung.

(Really) fast CPUs

In addition to the CULV line, Intel also refreshed their top lineup of Core 2 Duo CPUs for laptops.

Core 2 Duo T9900
3.06 GHz, 6 MB L2 Cache, 35 TDP, $530 per CPU for 1000 pieces (this will lead to the death of the X9100 with 3.06 GHz, TDP 45 Watt, $851 which has a free multiplicator as the only advantage)

Core 2 Duo P9700
28W TDP, 2.8 GHz, 6MB L2 for $348.

Core 2 Duo P8800
25 Watt TDP, 2.66 GHz, 3 MB L2 Cache, $241.