From the Oculus Rift to 4K and Steam Machines, the PC has hardly fallen short in the innovation department in recent times. But until now, few box makers have innovated when it comes to taming the unruly mass of computer wiring that snakes down the back of every office and bedroom desk in the land.
Intel is looking to change all that by making the PC completely wire-free by 2016, PCAdvisor reports.
Announcing the company's plans at Computex, Intel's SVP of Computing Kirk Skaugen said it would do so using an upcoming CPU reference design codenamed Skylake - which will succeed Broadwell - that uses the company's WiGig tech (rather than cables) to carry and display data signals.
Speed demon
WiGig has a much shorter range than Wi-Fi (around 10 metres), but it can deliver speeds of up to 7Gbps, compared to the 1.3Gbps of 802.11ac.
This makes it speedy enough to beam content to replace HDMI and DisplayPort for high-resolution displays, and it could also be used to connect mice, keyboards and other peripherals.
As a secondary purpose, Skaugen said that the company is looking at adding wireless charging to its next-gen wireless modules. Much like wireless charging mats that can juice up smartphones, laptops would be able to charge when placed on hard surfaces.
The tech already exists in docking stations, and the next step is integrating it into computers themselves, according to Intel.
