Intel says it will ship quad-core chips designed specifically for laptops later this year.

The quad-core chips, most likely for desktop replacement laptops, will be based on the Core 2 Duo architecture and will ship in the third quarter, Intel officials said.

The initial quad-core processors will strain battery life and may first make their way to the high-end gaming and workstation notebooks that require heavy processing power, said Mooly Eden, vice president and general manager, Intel Mobile Platforms Group, earlier this year.

Intel was keen on making this chip consume less battery. In fact, Intel officials had declared that users expecting quad-core mobile processors may have to wait until issues surrounding power consumption are resolved.