The rise of mobility has brought about vast changes in the computing world, and desktops and PCs often take a back seat to smaller wireless devices that can handle simple computing tasks. Intel (News - Alert) is hoping to bring all the benefits of wireless to the desktop along with major performance enhancements with its new Skylake processors, set to be unveiled in August.
Skylake is a core part of Intel’s wire-free initiative and will eliminate display cables and power supply cords by using Intel WiDi and WiDi Pro connections for displays as well as wireless charging. It is a successor to the Haswell family of chips, even though Intel has recently made significant graphics upgrades to the Broadwell line, aimed largely at developers and gamers. The majority of the company’s desktop deployments are currently Haswell, though, and Skylake is being touted as a strong successor that will bring a number of performance enhancements and efficiencies.
The first Skylake offerings, the Core i7-6700K, Core i5-6600K and Z170 chipsets will target gamers, while a host of additional Skylake-based chipsets are set to be released in late August and early September. Additional rollouts will occur throughout the fall, geared toward refreshing desktops with the new wireless features as well as better performance and power consumption than Haswell.
It has been rumored that Apple (News - Alert) is holding out for Skylake for use in the next generation of its iMacs, not having adopted Broadwell. How companies like Apple will implement the new processors remains to be seen, although Intel did offer a preview at the Computex show earlier this month with two reference designs. The Panther Mountain reference features a dockable keyboard, a RealSense 3D camera and a tiny footprint at only 7.8 mm thickness. The Star Brook reference is 10 mm with a 4K display and folding stand so the device could be laid flat for touchscreen use.
We won’t have to wait long to find out exactly what Skylake has to offer, but it certainly appears it has the potential to revitalize the desktop market and keep it a contender in an increasingly lightweight, wireless world.