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Amid growing fears over the health of the US and world economies, Intel Corp. on Friday lowered its sales forecast for the third quarter citing lower than expected demand for personal computers.

The world’s largest maker of computer chips said it expected revenue of between 10.8 billion dollars and 11.2 billion dollars – significantly lower than the rosy forecast it issued just last month of between 11.2 billion dollars and 12 billion dollars.

“Revenue is being affected by weaker than expected demand for consumer PCs in mature markets,” Intel said. “Inventories across the supply chain appear to be in-line with the company’s revised expectations.” Intel powers 80 per cent of the world’s personal computers and its revised forecast followed a report from research firm Gartner which slashed its previously upbeat assessment of world technology spending.

Intel is regarded as a bellwether for the tech economy, and had seen its position improve dramatically over the last year as consumers and businesses loosened their purse strings and the popularity of Microsoft’s Windows 7 operating system prompted a new wave of computer upgrades.

Intel’s long-term prospects however are clouded by a shift to online and mobile computing where high performance PCs are increasingly being replaced by smartphones, netbooks and tablet computers that use internet-based servers to perform many of the tasks previously handled by PCs.

Intel announced the dual-core Atom N550 netbook chip on Monday. The chip maker said netbooks with the new chip would become available immediately, but major PC makers have not announced products yet.

Intel has said the dual-core processor is faster than its single-core predecessors, which go into most netbooks today. Netbooks will run applications faster and play 720p video, an improvement over earlier models that struggled with high-definition video. Netbooks will remain as thin and light as existing models, and offer similar battery life.

The chip runs at a speed of 1.5GHz and has 1MB of cache. It draws up to 8.5 watts of power.

An Acer Aspire netbook with a 10.1-inch screen is being offered for US$399 on HSN’s website. The netbook offers battery life of up to eight hours, according to the website, which is almost similar to the battery life of many single-core Atom netbooks.

The netbook comes with a 250GB hard drive, 1GB of memory, Wi-Fi capabilities and an integrated webcam. It comes with the Windows 7 Starter Edition OS.

An online retailer in Australia, Penta, is selling Gigabyte’s GA-T1005M multitouch tablet PC for $905, a high price to pay for a netbook — they are usually priced between $200 and $400. The tablet-style netbook comes with a 10.1-inch multitouch screen. It has a 320GB hard drive, 2GB of RAM, webcam and Wi-Fi capabilities. The device weighs 1.48 kilograms (3.26 pounds) with a six-cell battery, and comes with the Windows 7 Home Premium OS.

A Chinese company, Timespad, is offering a netbook with an optional Atom N550 processor for bulk purchase on Alibaba.com. The netbook, priced between $285 and $305, comes with an 11.6-inch screen and an Nvidia graphics controller. The hard drive storage and memory capabilities are not specified.

PC makers are expected to announce products soon, with many possibly coming at the IFA show, which starts next week in Berlin.
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This post was submitted by rishi maurya.

Thanks to www.thehindu.com