Intel has always been going low-key at CES these days-forsoaking a flashy event staged in some big hotel showroom in the wake of COVID-19. It is also after a broader shift in PR policy, after years of making bullish bets on next-generation tech, such as drones and moonshots like Volocopter, and featuring them at the conferences. Do remember the year when Intel brought on stage an entire Volocopter aircraft and plopped its then-CEO into it for its "first U.S. flight"?

Still, CES in Vegas remains a salient moment for Intel. It's not just a bellwether for the state of the consumer electronics industry, but also an important marketing opportunity as a swathe of consumer electronics companies size up and buy components for their devices. Today, the company unleashed a gaggle of news related to processors and computer specifications using them, including a new 13th generation of its Intel Core processor, an entirely new 24-core processor, the i9, and — addressing the fact that there is over-penetration of computers among business and developed world users — a new N-series specifically for what it describes as "entry-level" education and mainstream laptops, desktops and edge-native applications.

The breadth here is intentional: Intel made its name decades ago for its revolutionary approach to computer processors, which helped usher in a new generation of smaller devices, but it has arguably met some very stiff competition at the higher end of the market, and some would say missed the boat on mobile years ago. These new releases are attempts to answer all of this: providing leadership in the bigger processing race of tomorrow and also hoping for a role in the making of devices for the mass market of today, not least after announcing in September 2022 that it would sunset its iconic Celeron and Pentium processor brands.

"The 13th Gen Intel Core mobile processor family delivers unrivaled, scalable performance for leadership platforms across all laptop segments," said Michelle Johnston Holthaus, executive vice president and general manager of the Client Computing Group at Intel in a statement. With industry-leading technologies and an unmatched global partner ecosystem, people expect high-caliber mobile experiences that can bring gamers and creators new and unique form factors that can game or create from anywhere.

It launches, Today, the 13th generation of Intel core mobile processor family, which is led by the i9-13980 HX; this is the world's first 24-core processor designed for laptops. According to Intel, it is the world's fastest mobile processor- meaning, laptop processor. The process clocks will come out with a turbo frequency of up to 5.6 GHz and achieve respectively 11 percent faster and 49 percent faster single-purpose and multitasking usage. This is more a matter of Intel keeping pace rather than really setting a new bar in the measure of what the race is like in processors today, given that it takes pains to note in a disclaimer that its "worlds-fastest claim" is only valid as of December 2022.

It divides the 24 cores up into eight Performance-cores and 16 Efficient-cores, with further complemented by 32 threads and "enhanced Intel Thread Director" - memory support of up to 128 gigabytes total, covering two classes of SDRAM, DDR5 (up to 5,600 MHz) and DDR4 (up to 3,200 MHz). The state of features today expected by consumers in these devices lays bare too, other support through a wide range of including super fast Wi-Fi 6E (Gig+) support; Bluetooth LE Audio and Bluetooth 5.2 support for faster speeds, multiple devices and lower power consumption-being so crucial given that earlier Bluetooth does drain battery; Thunderbolt 4 support for 40 gigabits per second transfer speeds; and more.

The H-, P- and U-series mobile processors address IoT, "enthusiast" and thinner devices. More than 300 models from Acer, Asus, Dell, HP, Lenovo, MSI, Razer, Republic of Gamers, Samsung and others will be released this year on them, Intel claims.

All 13th-generation processors will come with a Movidius vision processing unit, which is designed in collaboration with Microsoft to carefully integrate well with Windows Studio Effects and handle the processing of more AI-based tasks in order to accelerate the overall CPU and GPU performance of machines. That collaboration is a notable mark of how hardware and software have had to tie up closer to evolve and how hardware is increasingly becoming more of a software play for more complex applications and faster speeds. Microsoft, without its own chip-based vertical strategy in-house, is an obvious partner.

"With Intel, we continue to innovate to deliver powerful PC performance and experiences with Windows 11 and all of the products Intel is announcing today," added Panos Panay, EVP and product head for Microsoft, in a statement. "We are excited for our customers to benefit from meaningful optimizations, such as extended Windows support for Intel Hybrid Guided Scheduler, and new experiences, such as with the Intel Movidius VPU unlocking a new era of AI acceleration, starting with Windows Studio."

It's touting the new N-series chips as a direct replacement for the Pentium and Celeron lines. The chips are "purpose-built" for the education segment, entry-level computing and IoT edge-native applications. This will also mean they will be marketed as cost-effective with an aim towards generally lower-priced and lower-specced devices and will be more modern than the previous generations, which is a more evolutionary product for the company.

With new Gracemont-based cores, Intel 7 process technology means 28% better application performance and 64% better graphics performance at the peak compared to the older (now sunset) processors; up to 10 hours of HD video playback (if nothing else is being used) with better camera and display support as well as upgraded Wi-Fi and Bluetooth-they are based also on the i3 tech. Intel said that some 50 new ChromeOS and Windows designs from Acer, Dell, HP, Lenovo and ASUS are due to be launched this year based on these chips.
IoT is also getting addressed with these new N-series chips, which will be appearing, Intel said, in devices used in retail signages, kiosks, point of sale systems, portable medical imaging devices, office automation equipment like copiers, and in safety and security devices.

Along with the news of the chip, Intel has been constantly updating its laptops and portables computing specifica-tion-this year with new developments known as Intel Evo.

These are predicated on the new 13th generation processor but focus on extended battery life to improve both the speed of charging but also how long devices can run unplugged; improved performance for videoconferencing and other video and collaboration applications; and better bridging between laptops and other keyboard computing and mobile handsets and tablets, which it's terming "Intel Unison." Again, in the endgame of vertical integration, this was an essential move for Intel, in an environment where those who do still use laptops are always doing it in conjunction with handsets, something that device makers are keen to make as easy as possible, not least to lose those users as customers of the former products.

Hardware under development by other accessory makers, including Thunderbolt 4 docks, monitors, storage and wireless headsets, mice, keyboards, and other access points, also are part of the Intel Evo. If they will finally be gimmicks or buggy hardware that no one uses remains to be seen. Easy is the easiest, foolproof the surest, sometimes the whole thing.