Intel’s Project Athena could make laptops better, if only it had teeth
Roughly eight years ago, Intel flexed its enormous power as one of the PC industry’s leading component manufacturers to improve the quality of the world’s laptops with one word: “Ultrabook.” Intel poured hundreds of millions of dollars into a marketing campaign for the industry’s latest laptops, but the publicity came with a condition: those laptops would have to meet exacting standards for thinness, weight, responsiveness and battery life.
Facing down the sizable challenge of the then-amazing MacBook Air, the PC industry signed on — and within a few years, the quality of Windows hardware had undeniably changed for the better. Flimsy plastic machines gave way to metal, less lag became the norm, and incredible machines like the Dell XPS...