Hybrid Devices Are The Future of Notebooks, Says AMD

Kevin Lensing, AMD's Director of Mobility, recently told TrustedReviews that the growth of the traditional notebook is gone, that it's on the decline along with desktop sales. The lifeline for the notebook market, it seems, is in hybrids.

According to Lensing, a portion of the traditional notebook decline is due to its inability to keep the evolutionary pace with tablets and hybrids. He claims that slow boot speeds, limited mobility and poor quality displays have driven consumers away from Windows and into the arms of iOS and Android.

"We think the hybrid is the notebook of the future," he said although he also noted that there will be "numerous pitfalls" along the way before hybrids become the norm. "Some form factors will have a short shelf life and there’s no volume testing. The designs aren’t there yet."

The problem ODMs and chip makers are facing now is that the current lack of hardware sales is making it extremely difficult to determine what hybrid form factor consumers actually want. Thus the numerous pitfalls will be filled with failed attempts to get the hybrid designs right.

However with Temash and Kabini, AMD is shooting to provide devices with true dual functionality: those that function as a standalone tablet, and as a full-blown notebook experience when docked with a keyboard. Lensing said devices powered with these chips will focus primarily on the consumption of content when in tablet mode, including movie watching and browsing the internet. When the tablet is docked, overall power is boosted thanks to AMD's Turbo Dock Technology, which promises console gaming on a mobile device.

This hybrid solution is the result of AMD's own lessons learned from mistakes made in the past. Lensing told the site that AMD is now quicker to react to the changing computing landscape. "It took us too long to reply to the netbook," he admitted.

He also said AMD actually killed the netbook thanks to the launch of its Brazos processor in 2011. Other experts disagree, saying that Apple had already delivered the deathblow with the launch of its iPad in 2010. Brazos was just another nail in the coffin.