Intel unveils its upcoming smartphone chips endorsed by Visa payWave, ARM acts amused

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Intel unveils its upcoming smartphone chips endorsed by Visa payWave, ARM acts amused
Intel announced that its new platform for smartphones Atom Z2460, formerly known as Medfield, will now hit CPU speeds up to 2GHz. The is shipping as we speak, and Intel has entered manufacturing partnerships with ZTE, Lenovo, the Indians from Lava and the carrier Orange, which has its Santa Clara handset with Atom Z2469 at MWC, running Android.

Sampling in the second half of 2012 to enter devices in early 2013, Intel will out the Atom Z2580 powerhouse, which will double the performance of Medfield, and have the multimode LTE modem XMM7160 slapped on to boot. 

Finally, Intel will attack the entry level market as well with the value Atom Z2000, aimed mainly towards affordable phones for emerging markets. It runs on 1GHz and includes the XMM6265 modem with HSPA+ connectivity and dual-SIM mode. 

As a sign of endorsement Visa announced that its payWave system has been certified for the new Atoms, and will be coming to emerging markets on phones with Intel hardware inside

ARM, of course, is not sitting still and will be advancing with its own chip plans this year, which are now in the vast majority of mobile devices, so we'll follow the battle of the two chip giants with vested interest, since it will be bringing us powerful and frugal mobile devices.

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