Intel has announced Apollo Lake platform, a low cost PC Platform for the 9th generation of Intels Atom-based notebook SoCs at IDF in Shenzhen. The platform comes with a new x86 micro-architecture named Goldmont and for improving the performance new-generation graphics core has been introduced. This comes as a successor to the Cherryview platform targeting the low-cost or affordable Tablet PCs, all-in-ones, miniature PCs, notebooks etc.
The new graphics core integrates more codecs, also comes with hardware-accelerated playback of 4K video from hardware decoding of HEVC and VP9 codecs. In terms of memory the SoCs supports dual-channel DDR4, DDR3L and LPDDR3/4 memory, this will let manufacturers choose the DRAM based on the requirement keeping the cost and performance in mind.
When it comes to storage it supports traditional SATA drives, PCIe drives and eMMC 5.0 as well giving the manufacturer many options to choose based on the type of device in which it will be used. The SoC supports USB Type-C along with wireless technology. Intel mentions the various advantages in using the new Apollo Lake SoC which lets you get more from a smaller battery. It supports Intel 802.11ac Wi-Fi solutions, eMMC storage. The SoC also supports MIPI camera which allows for thinner designs while potentially saving cost.
The PCs with Celeron and Pentium-branded processors based on Apollo Lake platform will be introduced in the second half of 2016. Intel says that there are numerous Apollo Lake BOM savings opportunities which will allow makers to save somewhere between $5 and $7 on BOM, compared to the previous generation SoCs. The pricing and availability of the Apollo Lake platform has not been revealed.
