Gateway Inc. next week will roll out two upgraded PCs armed with the new 3.06GHz Pentium 4 processor from Intel Corp.
The Gateway 700XL and 500XL computers will each feature the chip, which comes with Intels hyperthreading technology, which the company said can increase PC performance by 30 percent by enabling a single chip to work like two virtual chips. Hyperthreading currently is only offered in Xeon chips built for workstations and servers.
For PC users, the technology is important particularly when running multiple applications at once.
Other features of the new chip include a 533MHz front-side bus and 512MB of Level 2 cache.
Gateway, of Poway, Calif., said the 500XL, for consumers and home offices, will be available with the new Pentium 4 chip for a limited time starting Nov. 18 for $1,449, including 256MB of 333MHz DDR (double data rate) SDRAM (synchronous dynamic RAM) memory.
The 700XL, for small and midsize businesses, will come standard with the 3.06GHz Pentium 4 starting at $3,499, including 512MB PC1066 RDRAM memory and 400GB of hard drive storage.
The company also will offer the new Pentium 4 chip as an upgrade option in other PCs in the 500 and 700 lines.
