Intel to release computers as small as USB thumb drives next year

Intel is planning to release diminutive thumb-sized computers next year. These Small PC's are fanless designs that are roughly the size of a USB thumb drive, and Intel actually demonstrated one of the devices at their recent investor conference. Intel didn't speak to the actual performance of the unit, but we do know that some Atom processors are small enough to fit into such devices.

The market for these small computers is actually in the tens of millions of devices per year, and there are already competing designs on the market featuring ARM processors and the Android operating system. By expanding x86 computing ability into this small form factor it opens up new potential use-cases. This class of tiny compute devices rarely have much storage, if any at all, onboard. Intel might be planning on integrating their new 3D NAND, which can pack up to 1TB of storage into a 2mm package, into the new devices. This would provide Intel a massive advantage over competing devices.

Intel did reveal they can be plugged into smart TV's and monitors and provide an instant computing solution. This may foreshadow Intel trying to penetrate into devices such as Amazon's Fire TV stick and Google Chromecast designs.