Get ready for quad-core laptops next year. Intel, purveyor of processor technology, just recently announced in its Developer Forum held in Beijing that it's already working on quad-core processing for mobile computers.

Mostly geared for gaming and high-performance computers, using quad-core also means less battery life. That's the trade-off for mobile PC users who prefer more processing power in their machines, and also the reason why quad-core will not be used for standard notebooks for the meantime.

Aside from that, there aren't enough multithreaded applications - programs which take advantage of multi-core technology - to justify the use of quad-core in expense of battery life. "You'll see it at the high-end, but I don't see it running so fast into the mainstream because I don't believe there will be enough threaded applications that will justify the trade-offs," says Mooly Eden, vice president and general manager of Intel's mobile platform group.

To keep people occupied until mobile quad-core is released, Intel has released Santa Rosa, a Centrino Notebook platform with upgrades such as dynamic acceleration which adjusts the clock speed of one processor core to a higher frequency level when the other core is powered down. In this respect, one may think of dynamic acceleration as an improved version of overclocking; but unlike overclocking, this new technology allows the dual processors to work in less heat.