IDF: Intel Keeps Atom-Powered Samsung Windows 8 Tab Behind Glass

Intel had used its IDF conference in San Francisco, which was held at the same time as Microsoft’s Build conference in Southern California, to show off to attendees the potential of Intel hardware. In Southern California, Microsoft had given attendees at Build a taste of what Windows 8 would look and feel like utilizing the higher end Intel Core chipset–in particular, the prototype Samsung tablet utilized an Intel Core i5 chip, and Intel is taking it a step further by highlighting the future of Windows 8 on an Atom chipset.

The tablet prototype running the Atom chipset was shown, unfortunately, behind glass, and Intel did not allow attendees to handle the tablet. That means that we were unable to truly gauge how Windows 8 would perform on Atom’s more conservative power and performance. That said, Microsoft had promised at Build that Windows 8 would run adequately on hardware with more modest specs, and that the new OS would require less system resources than Windows 7. Hopefully, in the end that means that performance on Atom with Windows 8 would be better than Windows 7 on Atom.

Intel says that the tablet on display with the Atom chipset utilizes a 32 nm manufacturing process. In terms of hardware, the device looks identical to what was shown with the more powerful Core i5 chipset in Anaheim, California at the Microsoft event.

In addition to Intel’s and AMD‘s x86 architecture, Microsoft will also be making Windows 8 compatible with ARM chipsets as well.