Intel is allegedly starting to ship its miniaturized 65-nanometer Core 2 Duo processor which is used in Apple's MacBook Air laptop to other manufacturers. This means we will start to see soon similar offerings from PC makers. The first customers are apparently Lenovo and Fujitsu.

The chip, miniaturized 65-nanometer Core 2 Duo which is 60 percent smaller than the typical Merom chip and uses less power at comparable speeds, was designed by Intel at Apple's request. The Mac maker asked Intel last year to provide a chip which is smaller yet it doesn't overheat when fit into a tight spot.

The MacBook Air laptop is less than 1 inch thick, features a backlit 13-inch screen, a full-size keyboard and a pad responsive to Apple's multi-touch control gestures. The MacBook Air has the following measurements: Height - 0.16-0.76 inch, Width - 12.8 inches, Depth: 8.94 inches. Selling in the US for $1,799, the laptop is powered by Intel's miniaturized 65-nanometer 1.6 GHZ Core 2 Duo processor, with an available 1.8GHZ upgrade. It has 2 GB of RAM, battery life of 5 hours and an 80 GB hard drive.

The new chip is a much better compromise between speed and power consumption (~heat). Intel already has special versions of Core 2 Duo processors designed for ultraportable notebooks, usually defined as notebooks weighing 3 pounds or less. They are the LV (low-voltage) and ULV (ulta-low-voltage) versions, but their performance is pretty flimsy compared with their larger brothers. The new design is almost as good as a full-size, full-power chip when it comes to performance.

This is only a temporary solution that came in handy for the time being, but Intel is working on better, next-generation chips which use 45-nanometer process technology. The current 65-nanometer Core 2 Duo Merom will be part of Intel's mainstream offerings when the Montevina platform is released later this year.

Montevina will come, according to Intel, with a Penryn processor, a new chipset, and an integrated Wi-Fi/WiMax radio that will come as an option as part of the Centrino brand. The second generation Penryn processor will feature 1066 MT/s FSB and is planned to consume no more than 29W, compared to Merom's 34W TDP, and will also debut the SSE4.1 instruction set, which will add 47 new instructions to SSSE3. The motherboard will use Intel Mobile 45 Express chipset (code-named Cantiga) with Intel's X4500 graphics technology and the ICH9M southbridge.