The traditional PC market is continuing to shrink as devices like smartphones and tablets eat into the marketshare. There are certainly some critics who feel that Windows 8 is a big part of that blame, and with that in mind we present today’s newest rumor.

Intel is allegedly preparing to push new Haswell-based convertible notebooks running Android. Think devices like the Asus Transformer Prime, though manufacturers involved supposedly include Asus, Acer, HP, Toshiba and Lenovo.

The rumor further asserts that Lenovo will lead the way with this new Android “notebook” push by introducing an Android-powered variant of the Yoga this May.

So how much would an Intel Android convertible cost? The rumored price point would be sub-$500. At this price, they would be a considerably cheaper alternative to Ultrabooks and Macbooks. These convertibles would also represent a spiritual successor to the netbook, which has since largely faded into obscurity in the last few years.

By providing a device that was small, cheap and good for typing while also fully capable of seperating from the keyboard, Intel and its partners could find a way to bring out the best of netbooks and tablets all in one form.

Such a move from Intel doesn’t sound totally insane, but I would still be more than a little cautious about believing this latest rumor due to its source. Digitimes is known for generating tons of rumors, with a mixed reputation on actually getting them right.

Still, Android would work just fine as a basic notebook alternative. Android has plenty of apps and its productivity offerings such as Office Suite Pro aren’t half bad. What do you think, for a price around $375-$475 would you consider purchasing a convertible Android device as a replacement for a traditional Mac, Windows or Linux laptop?

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Intel will be introducing a television set-top box later this year to compete against giants including Apple and Google. The chip maker is preparing for the launch and has begun recruiting experienced people for various departments of their upcoming service.

According to spokesman Jon Carvill, Intel Media plans to add 60 people to its staff of over 300. Headed by former BBC executive Erik Huggers, Intel Media is searching for engineers with experience in cloud computing, user interface design and security.

They are also looking for specialists in Hadoop, which suggests they might give importance to analyzing viewing habits of customers. Interested people can apply for the post of “audience representative”, who will have to communicate with customers through phone, chat, email, and video, and apparently the qualification for this particular job also includes “Must be weird”.

So, Intel is certainly very serious about their TV debut, but the question is whether they will be able to compete against all the heavyweights on the market. They surely are going to go further than what is currently being offered by Apple and others. The hard part will be signing deals with content providers, but Carvill says that they are in talks and are confident that the service will be launched later this year.

What do you think about Intel’s new venture? Will they be able to survive?

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Intel has been trying to push into the mobile market for a while now. Although they have not made much progress, a deal with Apple would completely change that. Instead of trying to make their own device, providing chips for one of the largest mobile manufacturers may be Intel’s entrance into the mobile market.

According to a report from Reuters, Intel could be striking a deal with Apple in the near future. Less than 2 weeks ago, Intel made a deal with Altera that would be their biggest chip manufacturing customer in history. This deal foreshadows Intel’s future in that it could open up the Silicon Valley company to other contracts with big name mobile manufacturers like Apple.

Apple only made the switch to Intel x86 processors for Macs in January of 2006. The switch was a huge turning point in Mac computers and by 2009, with the introduction of Snow Leopard, the PowerPC architecture was completely replaced by Intel.

Would you like to see Apple and Intel working together in the mobile computing market? What kind of effect do you think that this deal would have on the mobile devices of tomorrow? Let us know in the comments below.

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Although Asus has premium tablet lines like the Transformer series, the company is no stranger to budget devices either, like the recently unveiled Asus MeMo Pad 7. Now it looks are gearing up to do another low-cost 7-incher, this time running on an Intel processor.

According to the latest rumor, the Asus tablet supposedly will be powered by an Intel Atom Z2420 dual-core processor with 1GB of RAM. Other specs will include a 3MP main cam, a 1.3MP webcam, a 1280 x 800 resolution display, and will have a 4,720mAh battery. As for Android, it will have Jelly Bean 4.1.

Intel continues to show interest into breaking big into the mobile world. So far they’ve had limited success but a partnership with Asus could certainly help, especially if the tablet could be pushed at a low price to a global market.

The leak doesn’t give much details as to when this is coming, or how much it will cost. If this could be priced reasonably low, say under $200, would you be interested or not?

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This week during an interview at CES, a senior project manager for Windows Phone, Greg Sullivan, didn’t exactly deny the possibility of a forthcoming Windows Phone handset with an Intel chip.  ”Our architecture is such that it’s hardware independent. For the same reason that Windows 8 [tablets] could run on Wintel, right now Windows Phone is on Qualcomm. We have a portable OS architecture.” While that leaves as many questions as before the statement, the lack of denial certainly makes the notion possible.

Intel Mobile Communications Group has a similar stance with President Hermann Eul stating that Intel is open to the idea of supporting the Windows Phone platform with an x86 chip. He also stated the decision would be made according to how successful the Windows Phone was in the future.

Intel has already seen success in the mobile phone chip market with companies like ZTE, Motorola and others already building smartphones with Atom and other Intel chips. Some tests have shown the Atom chips having better performance and battery life than that of many current ARM chips. Recent benchmarks, if they are to be trusted, ran on a Lenovo Atom-equipped smartphone showed performance nearly twice that of a Droid DNA with a Snapdragon S4.

Could Intel chips be the new standard for upcoming phones or will ARM always dominant the mobile sector?

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Thunderbolt cables are a fairly new technology that is capable of transfering data via the cable at an amazing 12 gigabits per second. When compared to USB cable transfer, there is a blazingly fast difference between the two. Obviously this is a huge contender to USB 3.0, which aims to transfer data at similarly fast speeds with it’s SuperSpeed USB.

However, previous thunderbolt cables have been expensive and bulky, somewhat dampening the appeal of the super-fast transfer speed. Intel has now showcased new sample products of their revamped thunderbolt cables at CES this year, and claim that prices will be slashed down greatly after volume production starts to pick up pace.

The new Thunderbolt cables also take a large 1.0mm off of the width of the wire, taking it down to 3.2mm, making it much more convenient and portable when compared to the previous version.

Apple has seemed pretty keen on adopting this technology into their new MacBook products, but do you think it’s a possibility Intel will ever replace the current PCs standard of USB?

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For years Google, Apple and Microsoft have been dancing around the idea of revolutionizing the living room with their perspective living room solutions. While devices like the 360, Google TV and Apple TV have helped change the way we watch content in the living room– they haven’t really reached a true revolutionary status either.

Tired of waiting for one of the big three to make a move, a new rumor arrives courtesy of TechCrunch suggesting that the revolution will not be lead by any of these companies. Who instead will be the first to truly change the way we interact with our multimedia content in the living room? Intel, that’s who.

Citing an unnamed source, the rumor suggests Intel is preparing to deliver set-top boxes with DVR that will be rolled out in a city-by-city basis. Outside of being a DVR and cable set-top box, the device is said to have quite a few interesting features inside.

Some of the feature include facial recognition and the possibility of creating individualized viewing settings, favorite settings and more based on who is “logged in” to the box. There will also be targeted and individualized advertising for online content.

The idea here is to create a hybrid that would have both online and traditional cable content working together. There would also be a “Catch Up TV”-style service that would let users view anything airedi in the last month on the channels that they are directly subscribed too.

Other ideas include having the options to buy specific channels instead of having to just have one big package. All the ideas here sound fabulous, but there is one major obstacle that is holding back these kinds of revolutions– that’s dealing with content creators and providers.

If Intel can manage to create a marvelous piece of technology and woo the content creators and providers, this will truly be a feat indeed.

Do you think that Intel could truly play a part in bringing the living room to the next level?

With the PC market on the decline, perhaps Intel wishes to focus on new areas in case the day comes when there isn’t as much demand for their x86 chips?

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An FCC filing has been made on Intel’s behalf for a new tablet codenamed “Red Ridge,” and with CES just around the corner, it is more than likely we will be seeing the tablet soon enough.

So far we know that Intel has shown a fair amount of interest in the mobile space, but have only released a very small amount of devices with their x86-based chips. The new Red Ridge tablet will most likely feature a dual-core Medfield Intel chipset, and will be running on Android 4.0.

Specs-wise, the only other information we can pick apart from the FCC filing is that the device will come with WiFi, Bluetooth and NFC, which is clearly not surprising.

Currently, Intel is in production stage for the product, which could mean anything from Intel having a simple prototype of the device, or that they have a full and final product very near to completion.Traditionally, Intel doesn’t make its own tablets, so who is building this one? We have no clue who the hardware partner is at the moment, though we probably will know more in early 2013.

Curious about app compatibility? While most Android devices run on ARM processors, Intel processors have proven reasonably compatible with a wide range of Android apps. Sure, some apps will not work, but overall, compatibility is pretty good.

If all of this proves true, would you consider an Intel tablet?

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Could future iPhone and iPad devices be powered by chips built by Intel? A new rumors seems to suggest so. With Samsung and Apple’s relationship becoming so distant, it is possible Intel could extend beyond providing Intel processors for Apple’s PC efforts.

There is a catch though. According to RBC Capital Markets, Apple wants Intel to build chips designed in-house by the Cupertino-based corporation using the ARM architecture, not X86. Why in the world would Intel, an X86 chip maker, want to do that? The keys to the iPad, that’s why.

While the PC market is reportedly shrinking, Apple’s iPad (and non-Apple tablets for that matter) continues to see strong growth. The rumor is that Apple will have Intel produce ARM chips for the iPhone 5, but the iPad will make a switch to Intel.

The idea here is that ARM is more power efficient for a smaller smartphone design, and yet Intel chips are more powerful and could make the iPad more effective as a desktop/laptop replacement going forward. On the downside, dual architectures can also be tricky to handle.

Still, Intel-based Android smartphones are said to handle almost all apps on Android, even though most Android devices run on ARM processors.

Besides RBC Capital Markets, CNET claims another source has backed up the idea of Intel and Apple coming together with Intel as a foundry for Apple’s future chips.

The source says that such a plan has been in “talks” for about two years, but recent Samsung-Apple relations might have pushed Apple to make this big move.

What do you think, is there any possibility this is all true or nothing more than a rumor?

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Maybe it’s because Windows 8 has arrived and that’s why retailers are frantically trying to clear out their Windows 7 laptops. That’s good news for consumers, because it means that you’re able to find some great deals on some pretty great laptops… like this substantial collection of Lenovo notebooks on sale for 20% off.

If you go to Amazon and look through the Lenovo notebooks that they have in stock, just about all of them on sale for quite a bit off the regular retail price. They’re mostly powered by Windows 7, but if you insist on having the newest OS, there are deals to get Windows 8 Pro for about $40.

As far as the Lenovo notebooks and ultrabooks go, a good example is the Lenovo IdeaPad Z585 261729U. It’s a 15.6-inch laptop powered by a 2.3GHz A-Series Quad Core A10-4600M processor and 6GB of RAM. It used to be $729.99, but now you can have it for $499.99. Similarly, you can get the MacBook-esque Lenovo IdeaPad U310 with the Core i5-3317U processor for $629.99, down from the regular price of $799.99.

Go find your Lenovo laptop deal on Amazon now before they take away these savings or run out of stock. They all qualify for free super saver shipping too.

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