Intel

Intel's next-generation processor is expected to add support for a key OS X technology that accelerates gaming and financial applications. That potentially means a more powerful MacBook Air in the future.

Listed as a "core" OS X technology, OpenCL "dramatically accelerates" applications by tapping into the special processing power of the graphics processing unit (GPU), according to Apple. It taps into what an Apple developer page states as the "the amazing parallel computing power of the GPU."

Intel revealed more details about the planned successors for its current-generation Sandy Bridge processors at its Intel Developers Forum in San Francisco this week.

My desktop isn't the only computer I plan to replace in the next few months. I need a new laptop too, and my goal is simple: to find a 13" MacBook Air that isn't made by Apple.

It turns out that I'm not the only one wanting this mythical non-Apple MacBook Air. Intel wants them too—it calls them Ultrabooks. The chip company has been kicking the Ultrabook idea around for a few months now, and it has grand ambitions: by the end of next year, it wants 40 percent of PC laptops to be Ultrabooks.

Imagine that it's 1995 and you're about to make your very first online purchase. You open your Netscape browser, sipping coffee as the home page slowly loads. You then navigate to Amazon.com, a new online bookstore your friend told you about. As you proceed to make your purchase and enter your payment information, the address your browser points to changes from one starting with "http" to one that begins with "https." That signals that your computer has established an encrypted connection with Amazon's server.

Intel is set to issue a firmware upgrade within two weeks to fix a bug that causes its SSD 320 solid-state drives to fail, which should resolve months of criticism of the company's slow response to the problem.

High-end retail versions of AMD's upcoming desktop processor code named 'Bulldozer' make come equipped with liquid-cooling components according to an Xbit Labs report.

The liquid cooling solution (LCS) will apparently enhance the degree of stable overclocking and will appear in boxed version of the FX-series of processors as AMD revives the well-regarded enthusiast FX brand.

Apple threatened to drop Intel as a component supplier unless it produced chips with drastically lower power consumption, it has been reported.

Greg Welch, director of Intel's Ultrabook group, made the comments to the Wall Street Journal when explaning the motivation behind the company's new Ultrabook concept.

Semiconductor giant Intel is continuing to diversify away from the CPU with the acquisition of Ethernet switch specialist Fulcrum for an undisclosed sum.

The deal will see Fulcrum - a 12 year old fabless company which designs semiconductors for 10GbE and 40GbE switches - become a wholly owned subsidiary of Intel's as the chip giant attempts to expand its data centre offerings beyond the system CPU.

Intel is investigating a potential bug that may be causing SSD 320 solid-state drives to fail. The company is offering replacement drives to affected customers until the issue is resolved, a customer service representative said.

In Intel forums, users are complaining about SSD 320 drives crashing due to power issues, causing data loss. In some instances the storage capacity on the drive is being reported as only 8MB after the crash.

AMD's Bulldozer processor architecture still hasn't formally launched, but Donanim Haber got a hold of a recent engineering sample with benchmarked speeds that come close to Intel's current Sandy Bridge CPUs. With the ability to run limited cores at up to 4.2GHz, it could potentially outperform comparable Intel hardware at certain workloads.