THE supremacy of the Pentium is to be challenged by a revolutionary chip with massive processing power. But experts are divided over whether the Cell, which was launched last week, will be enough to end Intel’s 20-year domination of the PC market. Some see the new chip as the future of personal computing: others say that the huge quantity of software designed to run on Intel’s chips has made the company’s position unassailable.
The Cell is a joint effort by IBM, Sony and Toshiba. Unlike the Pentium, it is a parallel-processing chip that contains no fewer than nine high-power microprocessors…
