Intel has no plans to shelve its Celeron processor brand in 2011, the chip maker said Friday in response to a Taiwanese press report.
“The rumour is not true, Intel has no plan to phase out the Celeron brand in 2011. Intel Celeron processors continue to provide a low-cost computing solution for basic computing needs,” wrote Barry Sum, an Intel spokesman in Hong Kong, in an e-mail response to questions.
Intel’s comments came following a report, based on anonymous sources in Taiwan’s hardware industry, that the chip maker plans to stop shipping processors under the Celeron brand next year.
Intel has long used the Celeron brand for inexpensive processors found in low-end desktops and laptops, and the company’s current price list contains both desktop and mobile versions of the chips.
The latest price list contains three desktop Celeron chips, which have two cores and run at clock speeds ranging from 2.4GHz to 2.6GHz. They are priced at US$43 and $53 each in 1,000-unit quantities, a standard way of pricing chips. By comparison, Intel’s top-of-the-line Core i7-980x desktop chip, which has six cores running at 3.33GHz, is priced at $999 each in 1,000-unit quantities.
The chip maker also sells nine mobile Celeron chips, which have either one or two cores and run at clock speeds between 1.06GHz and 2.2GHz. They are priced between $70 and $100 each, in 1,000-unit quantities.