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| Seagate First With SATA 6Gb/sec. 2 TB Drive |
2009-10-26 14:58:21 |
Seagate today started shipments of the Barracuda XT, which boasts the fastest SATA connection yet.
The Barracuda XT is a 7200 RPM 3.5-inch hard drive featuring 2 TB of storage capacity and a SATA 6 Gb/sec. interface.
"Capacity and performance remain the defining attributes of hard drives for PC gamers, digital multimedia content developers and many other customers requiring high-end systems at home and in the office," said Dave Mosley, executive vice president of Sales and Marketing at Seagate. "Seagate is meeting these requirements with the first 7200 RPM desktop hard drive to combine 2 TB of storage capacity with the fastest Serial ATA interface to date."
Of course, before you go blazing off with a SATA 6 Gb/sec. drive, you're going to need a motherboard that supports it. Right now, such boards aren't yet commonplace, but right now options include Asus' P7P55D Premium and Gigabyte's P55 series GA-P55-Extreme motherboards. |
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| Intel's Pine Trail Out Q4, Possibly October |
2009-06-16 12:14:05 |
Intel’s next iteration of its hugely popular Atom processor, codenamed Pine Trail, is now slated for a Q4 release. According to recent rumors, it's possible that we could see the processor as early as October.
ZoomIntel’s next iteration of its hugely popular Atom processor, codenamed Pine Trail, is now slated for a Q4 release. According to recent rumors, it's possible that we could see the processor as early as October.
Digitimes today reports that Intel is scheduled to phase out its Atom N270 CPU by launching its successor--the Atom N450--for netbooks in October at the earliest. Citing anonymous industry sources, DT says that Intel will issue last order notice for the Atom N270 in the first quarter of 2010, and the CPU will phase out before the end of the H1 2010
This fits in with earlier reports in May which said we’d see Atom’s Pine Trail chip with on-chip graphics, and the Tiger Point chipset (replacing the presently ubiquitous Atom N270 and 945GSE combination) "after September." When we published the news last month, most of you were uninterested and more eager to hear about machines running on Nvidia's Ion. Now that Nvidia has at least 20 manufacturers signed up and ready to produce a plethora of netbooks, nettops, all-in-ones and more, are you guys still unexcited by Pine Trail? Let us know in the comments!
http://www.tomshardware.com/news/Intel-Pine-Trail-View-Launch,8046.html |
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| Windows 7 Gets Official Release Date: October 22 |
2009-06-16 12:10:59 |
Windows 7 will indeed be hitting in time for the holiday season. The much-buzzed about operating system is set to inherit the operating system throne from the much-maligned Windows Vista, with general commercial availability starting on October 22 according to a Microsoft press release aired today.
Previous reports had come quite close to pegging the release date, with October 23 being the cited date in many reports. Bill Veghte, senior vice president for Microsoft's Windows, helped announced the true date, stating, "We feel confident that we will deliver Windows 7 with our partners on Oct. 22."
Microsoft faces tremendous pressure with the release. The company has been hounded by its investors in recent months for revenue drops related to the recession. These investors are quick to note that Windows Vista, while a solid seller, failed to surpass Windows XP.
Despite these problems, Vista and other Windows operating systems accounted for roughly 30 percent of the company's $60B USD in sales in 2008. Windows-based operating systems are currently installed on approximately 90 percent of the world's personal computers.
For Microsoft, the finalized release date represents both good news and bad. The good news is it will make the lucrative holiday shopping season, a frequent time for people to buy new systems. The bad news is that it will miss the equally lucrative back-to-school shopping season, where parents and college students typically purchase systems.
Microsoft does face some pressure, too -- Apple will be releasing its Snow Leopard OS sometime this summer or fall, and Google recently announced that its Android OS was coming to netbooks, courtesy of Acer. The chall |
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| SATA Spec 3.0 Now Official; 6 Gb/sec. Speeds |
2009-06-16 12:07:58 |
The Serial ATA International Organization has today made official the Serial ATA Revision 3.0 specification.
ZoomThe Serial ATA International Organization (SATA-IO) today made official the Serial ATA Revision 3.0 specification. The new interface now offers up to six gigabits per second (Gb/sec.) via a high-speed serial data link between storage units, disk drives, optical and tape drives, and more. The new 3.0 spec also offers enhancements to support multimedia applications, enhancements for increased functionality, and is even backwards compatible with earlier SATA implementations 1.5 and 3 Gb/sec.
“As speed becomes critical to today’s storage, the SATA Revision 3.0 specification doubles the maximum transfer speed enabled by technology, paving the way for a new generation of faster SATA products,” said Knut Grimsrud, SATA-IO president and Intel Fellow and director of storage architecture. “SATA-IO members will be able to design for their customers products with the speed they crave, without compromising the quality and performance they’ve come to expect from SATA technology.”
In addition to maintaining low cost and low power consumption via improved power management capabilities, the SATA-IO also provided a few general highlights with today's announcement. A new Native Command Queuing (NCQ) streaming command will be available in 3.0, enabling isochronous data transfers, specifically for audio and video applications that consume large chunks of bandwidth. 3.0 also provide a new connector designed to accommodate 7mm optical disk drives suited for thinner and lighter notebooks. A small, Low Insertion Force (LIF) connector will also be available for more compact 1.8-inch storage devices.
SATA-IO said that network administrators and computer equipment manufacturers will see an immediate benefit after moving from SATA 3 Gb/sec. to SATA 6 Gb/sec., with data transfers now taking half the amount of time; hard drive caching will experience faster transfers of short bursts of data. The SATA 6 Gb/sec. connection also minimizes the throughput bottleneck suffered by today's faster solid state drives; future SSDs will require 6Gb/sec. connectivity. With the reduced latency of SATA 6 Gb/sec., RAID performance will dramatically improve, workstation applications will perform better, and storage area network drives will experience an increase in data streams, boosting storage network density and efficiency.
The SATA-IO also added that the same cables and connectors used for current SATA environments could be used to connect SATA 6 Gb/sec. devices. However, cables already maxed out using the current 3 Gb/sec. operating margins will not perform quite as well using the new SATA 6 Gb/sec. because of an increased number of resends. The SATA-IO basically recommends that end-users utilize "quality components to ensure data integrity and robust operation" at the faster rate. Put simply, buy new cables.
"The SATA interface has developed into the de facto standard HDD interface in computing applications," said John Rydning, research director for hard disk drives at analyst firm IDC. "The new SATA Revision 3.0 specification builds upon the current market success of SATA, and will help to solidify SATA as the predominant storage device interface technology for the foreseeable future."
http://www.tomshardware.com/news/ata-sata-hdd-ssd,7915.html |
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| PCI-E SSD Does 1000 MB/sec. |
2009-06-16 12:06:38 |
PhotoFast's new G-Monster-PROMISE PCIe SSD claims to be the first in the industry to reach 1000 MB/s
ZoomPhotoFast's new G-Monster-PROMISE PCIe SSD--so new its not even listed on the official website as of this writing--claims to be the first SSD device in the industry to reach 1000 MB/s. In appearance alone, the device, connecting to an x8 PCI-e slot, looks huge, possibly eating up two or three physical spaces on the motherboard. That may not be the case, as the actual dimensions are 10.63-inches x 4.75-inches x 1.71-inches, and weighs just over two pounds.
However, despite its seemingly unusual size, the SSD comes with a great benefit: super-fast read and writes of 1000 MB/sec and 1000 MB/sec respectively, making it around three to five times faster than standard SATA solutions thanks to the PCI-e connection. According to the company, the G-Monster-PROMISE will appear in three flavors: 128 GB, 256 GB, 512 GB, and 1 TB. The drive also supports MLC flash, and offers 256 MB of ECC DDR II and SDRAM memory.
PhotoFast also revealed that the device has a MTBF of around 2,500,000 hours, and a data retention of five years. The SSD not only supports S.M.A.R.T. (Self-Monitoring, Analysis, and Reporting Technology), but has a high reliability based on its internal BCH 15-bit Error Code Correction technology. Unfortunately, the device isn't even available in Japan until the middle of May, and more than likely won't hit North American shores for a while. As for pricing, according to this flyer, the 128 GB version will cost a whopping $1600USD, and the 1 TB version will cost $4500USD. Ouch.
http://www.tomshardware.com/news/PhotoFast-SSD-PCI-e,7719.html |
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| Win 7 to be sexier-than-Vista for business |
2009-06-16 12:00:49 |
Much of the talk about Windows 7 has been about features for home users. However, since much of Microsoft's money comes from millions of business upgrades, what's in it for them?
Lost in the waves of news for the home version of Windows 7, today's being that you can now totally uninstall Internet Explorer from Windows 7, business users have been waiting eagerly to see what the Enterprise edition will offer. Microsoft is starting to let the cat out of the bag with an update on the official Windows Blog.
Most impressive, and clearly having listened after the lack of interest from some quarters in Vista Enterprise, Microsoft revamped the way that industry helps to develop the operating system with lots of early ideas and feedback, before any code was written. The focus is on the urgent business need, thanks to the current economic climate, to manage costs, environmental footprint (power usage), contingency planning (disaster recovery) and compliance (e-mail archiving, record keeping and so on).
Some of the interesting facts unveiled include the fact that 56% of businesses want help protecting data on laptops, memory sticks and so on (solved by BitLocker To Go). 61% of business want to limit what users can install (enter AppLocker), while almost half wanted easier remote access features (DirectAccess).
So, Microsoft is making a major effort to impress in the business world where Vista had been perceived to struggle. It talked to 27 active IT leaders across a number of industries including some of the world’s largest manufacturers, banks, telecoms, energy companies and other and used their input for overall direction and feature decisions.
System administrators are being teased by the tempting offer of Microsoft's Desktop Optimization Pack that is supposed to make it easier for admins to manage hundreds, if not thousands of machines faster and easier than before. With the number of variants of Windows 7 streamlined, it is possible that Windows 7 Enterprise may be the most popular yet.
http://apcmag.com/will-windows-7-enterprise-make-for-better-business.htm |
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| Socket AM3: AMD's Phenom II Gets DDR3 |
2009-05-21 13:21:00 |
Running in second place is a strong motivator to do things differently—or even better—than your competition. For AMD, that has meant trying to develop a reputation for smoother, less disruptive platform transitions.
When Intel launched Core i7, it was a given that you’d need an X58 motherboard with the company’s LGA 1366 interface. Before that, LGA 775 served the Core micro-architecture well. But again, that was a complete departure from Socket 478, as the device required a completely new motherboard. Each step of the way, Intel has tweaked the packaging of its CPUs, altering thermals and mechanical load limits. Each new socket has addressed those alterations in kind.
Say what you will about its current performance deficit versus Intel’s fastest Core i7 processors, but AMD’s approach to adding functionality and shifting platform technologies has arguably been a bit less disruptive—at least on the surface. Missing from the below chart is Socket 940 and Socket AM2+. Socket 940 was only somewhat relevant to enthusiasts who purchased high-end Athlon 64 FX chips. And Socket AM2+ is perhaps the best example of AMD unveiling a new socket without stranding customers who invested in AM2. You could drop a newer AM2+ CPU in an older AM2 board and not run into trouble, aside from losing split power plane and HyperTransport 3.0 support.
What the table doesn't reflect are the situations where a new 140 W CPU might fit into a given socket, but still not work due to a motherboard design inadequacy (AMD and early 780G boards) or a fresh micro-architecture is launched on an existing platform, requiring new motherboards as a result of voltage changes (Intel and its Conroe).
Now, with the unveiling of Socket AM3, AMD brings half of that same story over to its newest PGA-ZIF interface. You see, AM3 processors include the DDR2 and DDR3 memory controllers needed to drop into either AM2/AM2+ or AM3 motherboards. However, aging AM2/AM2+ processors don’t have the DDR3 memory controller to drop into an AM3 motherboard. We have to imagine more enthusiasts would be interested in adopting modern 45 nm CPUs and recycling their platforms than keeping a dated processor, hoping to only upgrade the motherboard, so that's an acceptable trade-off to us. Just to be sure no mistakes are made, AM3 processors come armed with 938 pins—two shy of the 940 needed in an AM2/AM2+ configuration. |
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| Bluetooth 3.0 Specifications Announced |
2009-05-21 13:18:51 |
Bluetooth 3.0 officially launched
The latest version of Bluetooth, Bluetooth 3.0 + HS, was officially launched during a recent meeting among the Bluetooth Special Interest Group (SIG).
Based off of the 802.11 protocol, Bluetooth 3.0 will increase transfer speeds from 3Mbps up to an impressive 23Mbps, according to Bluetooth supporters. The technology is based on Wi-Fi standards and offers power-saving benefits that weren't available with Bluetooth 2.1.
"Utilizing the 802.11 radio was a natural choice as it provides efficiencies for both our members and consumers -- members get more function out of the two radios they are already including in devices, and consumers with Bluetooth 3.0 HS products will get faster exchange of information without changing how they connect," Bluetooth SIG director Michael Foley said in a statement. "We are excited to expand the possibilities of the PAN."
During the announcement, Bluetooth 3.0 is expected to be used to help transfer large amounts of information between PCs and media devices, with wireless syncing available. Bluetooth has mainly been used by mobile phones, but the faster speeds should lead to Bluetooth adoption with more camcorders, TVs, Blu-ray players, cameras, and other consumer devices.
Even though Bluetooth 3.0 is out and about, many manufacturers are just now catching up to the Bluetooth 2.0 standard. Furthermore, no Bluetooth 3.0 devices are available on the consumer at the moment, and won't begin shipping until Q3 this year, if that early.
Tech journalists and analysts long-anticipated the launch of Bluetooth 3.0, and have high expectations of what it will be able to do in the future. Users will be able to transfer music library, DVDs, and photos all in a matter of seconds, a Bluetooth SIG statement said last week.
Foley said there could be a handful of Bluetooth 3.0 devices in time for the 2009 holiday shopping, but officials don't expect a significant amount of products until next year. |
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| Office 2010 Preview in July, Beta Later |
2009-05-21 13:17:42 |
Microsoft is gearing up to release an invitation-only "technical preview" of Office 2010 (aka Office 14) this July, followed by a full-blown Office 2010 beta for general consumption sometime during the second half of 2009. According to the company, the beta will come in both 32-bit and 64-bit versions, and will run on Windows XP SP3, Windows Vista, and the upcoming Windows 7 operating system.
In addition to the preview and beta announcement, Microsoft's Reed Shaffner also added that end-users will not need to upgrade hardware that currently runs Office 2007, however many older hardware and OS configurations may require an upgrade to run server and client products. "Like Windows 7 has demonstrated, we realize that taking advantage of the hardware you already own is just as important as supporting all the new technology coming out," he said over on the Office 2010 IT Blog.
For consumers who can't wait for the beta, Microsoft has launched this website that allows eager users to sign up for the technical preview. Invited participants will have access to Word 2010, Excel 2010, Outlook 2010, PowerPoint 2010, OneNote 2010, Access 2010, InfoPath 2010, and Publisher 2010. Microsoft said that attendees of its annual TechEd event, held here in the US, will comprise the first batch of the limited Technical Preview program; additional applicants will probably be added later. At this point, it's unknown if the following beta will contain the same feature set as July's technical preview.
For now, Microsoft remains tight lipped in regards to Office 2010 pricing and technical details and the company hasn't offered any information in regards to the variants planned for its Office suite. With OpenOffice.org providing a compatible suite for free, Microsoft will need to "go all out" with this latest version of Office in order to convince end-users to dish out loads of cash.
Read http://www.tomsguide.com/us/Office-2010-Preview-Beta,news-3925.html |
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| PCI-E SSD Does 1000 MB/sec. |
2009-05-21 13:08:50 |
PhotoFast's new G-Monster-PROMISE PCIe SSD claims to be the first in the industry to reach 1000 MB/s
ZoomPhotoFast's new G-Monster-PROMISE PCIe SSD--so new its not even listed on the official website as of this writing--claims to be the first SSD device in the industry to reach 1000 MB/s. In appearance alone, the device, connecting to an x8 PCI-e slot, looks huge, possibly eating up two or three physical spaces on the motherboard. That may not be the case, as the actual dimensions are 10.63-inches x 4.75-inches x 1.71-inches, and weighs just over two pounds.
However, despite its seemingly unusual size, the SSD comes with a great benefit: super-fast read and writes of 1000 MB/sec and 1000 MB/sec respectively, making it around three to five times faster than standard SATA solutions thanks to the PCI-e connection. According to the company, the G-Monster-PROMISE will appear in three flavors: 128 GB, 256 GB, 512 GB, and 1 TB. The drive also supports MLC flash, and offers 256 MB of ECC DDR II and SDRAM memory.
PhotoFast also revealed that the device has a MTBF of around 2,500,000 hours, and a data retention of five years. The SSD not only supports S.M.A.R.T. (Self-Monitoring, Analysis, and Reporting Technology), but has a high reliability based on its internal BCH 15-bit Error Code Correction technology. Unfortunately, the device isn't even available in Japan until the middle of May, and more than likely won't hit North American shores for a while. As for pricing, according to this flyer, the 128 GB version will cost a whopping $1600USD, and the 1 TB version will cost $4500USD. Ouch.
Read http://www.tomshardware.com/news/PhotoFast-SSD-PCI-e,7719.html |
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| Google Chrome Beta is now available for the public to download |
2008-09-04 15:31:40 |
On the surface, we designed a browser window that is streamlined and simple. To most people, it isn't the browser that matters. It's only a tool to run the important stuff - the pages, sites and applications that make up the web. Like the classic Google homepage, Google Chrome is clean and fast. It gets out of your way and gets you where you want to go
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| New Logitech Illuminated Keyboard Makes Typing Easy – Night or Day |
2008-09-04 15:29:22 |
To help you find the keyboard that best matches your needs – and style – Logitech (SWX:LOGN) (NASDAQ:LOGI) today introduced three new keyboards, including the Logitech® Illuminated Keyboard, which offers an optimized backlight experience, Logitech PerfectStroke™ key system and Logitech’s thinnest design ever. Also unveiled today, the Logitech® diNovo Keyboard for Notebooks is designed for laptop owners who use a notebook mouse to improve comfort and need a keyboard to complete their setup, while the Logitech® Cordless Desktop™ S520 offers a keyboard-and-mouse combination that matches a wide variety of computer setups.
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| NVIDIA announces native SLI for Intel X58 chipsets |
2008-08-30 12:28:06 |
It may not have produced quite the onslaught of news that Intel's recent Developer Forum did, but it looks like NVIDIA's NVISION08 conference was at least able to pull one big rabbit out of its hat, with NVIDIA itself dropping word that it's going to allow Intel's X58 chipset to natively support SLI. For those not following the ins and outs of the NVIDIA / Intel relationship, NVIDIA had previously said that it would let its nForce 200 chip to be implemented by board manufacturers to allow SLI support, but that idea never exactly caught on, leading to this new, more accommodating solution. As PC Perspective reports, the native SLI support will also be far from limited, with motherboards with as few as two PCIe x16 slots and as many as four PCIe x16 slots able to support an array of SLI configurations, including a 3-Way SLI with a fourth graphics card for a PhysX boost.
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| Microsoft Hardware teaser: 'Say Goodbye to Laser' |
2008-08-28 17:26:25 |
Microsoft Hardware, the unit that makes the company's mice and keyboards, has scheduled a Sept. 9 event in Seattle to unveil its latest product lineup. Today it launched an animation teasing a new product, with the tag line, "Say Goodbye to Laser."
The obvious guess is that it's a new mouse technology, maybe replacing the internal lasers currently used to determine the relative position of mice. But it could be something else entirely. Microsoft isn't offering any details. Does the shape of the logo provide any clues? I'm doing a little digging, and I'll update this post if I turn anything up.
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| Antec Takes a Step Toward DIY Notebook PCs |
2008-08-22 02:27:36 |
Antec said Tuesday that it is launching a series of standardized components for small channel vendors and system builders, with an eye toward true "whitebook" notebooks that could be built by just about anybody.
The new components, which interface to the MGM45WU and MGM45RM motherboards Intel launched in mid-July, use a motherboard standard called "Rich Creek 2," which provide standard interfaces for Antec's new keyboards, AC adapters, battery packs, and several components such as integral webcams and Bluetooth modules.
The motherboard spec builds on the "Common Building Block" specification Intel launched in 2006. Intel's CBB spec says that the hard disk drive, optical drive, LCD panel, battery pack, customizable notebook panel, power adapters and keyboards can be built on common components.
Although the dream is to allow enthusiasts to build notebooks as easily as they would build desktop PCs, "when that phase will happen, I couldn't tell you," David Forster, director of channel relations for Antec, said in an interview. Antec is "at the beginning" of a time in which smaller system builders can compete with the likes of Dell and other top-tier OEMs, he said.
Still, a number of components are now more readily available. Partner Chi Lin is providing LCD panels; Viewsonic has been rumored to be interested as well. System builders can buy the Rich Creek 2 motherboards directly from Intel, as well as the CPUs; one must be a system builder to buy one, however. Antec is working with a "handpicked" group of system builders, including ASI Corp.
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| Intel's Nehalem Processor Gets Turbo Boost |
2008-08-22 02:25:55 |
Intel's "Nehalem" will contain a technology called "turbo mode" that will dynamically reroute power to improve performance, an Intel executive said Tuesday.
An improved version of the turbo mode will also appear in the first mobile version of Nehalem, the Calpella platform, next year, executives said.
Nehalem is the flagship product of this year's Intel Developer Forum and most likely – for Intel, at least – 2009 in general. The desktop version of Nehalem, now renamed the Core i7, is the product of Intel's "tick tock" strategy, where a new process technology is introduced first, and then a new microarchitecture. Intel shifted to 45-nm process technologies last year, and this year it's time for the new microarchitecture, Nehalem, to be introduced.
For Pat Gelsinger, who leads Intel's Digital Enterprise Group, Nehalem represents the most dynamically scalable architecture in the industry. That appears to mean that Intel will be able to easily scale up and down clocks and threads, and add capabilities like graphics and other accelerators to future cores.
"The only records left to beat are our own," Gelsinger said.
Many aspects of Nehalem have alredy been announced, among them features like two to eight cores, a 4-instruction-wide ISA, and two-way simultaneous multithreading. Other notable additions include the QuickPath interconnect, with up to 25 Gbytes/s per link, and an integrated memory controller, following AMD into the market. In addition, there will be a new 8-Mbyte shared level 3 cache.
Here's Intel's Nehalem roadmap, as officially released by Intel: Nehalem's first server processor (codenamed "Nehalem-EP") will be first to production. Intel is also planning to manufacture a second server derivative designed for the expandable sever market ("Nehalem-EX"), the company said, and desktop ("Havendale" and "Lynnfield") and mobile ("Auburndale" and "Clarksfield") versions in the second half of 2009. The Calpella mobile platform will connect to the Auburndale and Clarksfield processors.
The Core i7 will ship sometime during the fourth quarter, although Intel isn't saying exactly when. It will be a four-core chip, capable of eight threads. Its clock speed and performance have not been disclosed.
Power management has been a key design attribute for Intel and other hardware manufacturers for a number of years, and Nehalem is no exception. Unfortunately, Intel declined to disclose the thermal design power of the new chip.
Turbo mode, however, will be an innovative feature that will span the new family and will be used in future processors as well, according to Rajesh Kumar, an Intel fellow and architecture of the new turbo mode feature. "We wanted to develop an entirely new process technology for power," Kumar said.
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| Intel announces Mainstream SSD drives |
2008-08-20 17:08:03 |
Intel has now formally announced its Mainstream series of SSD drives. Models will be available in 1.8- and 2.5-inch sizes, and rely on MLC (multi-level cell) NAND memory, which should in theory aid to keep prices down. One of the first examples is the 80GB X25-M, which is also Intel's first SATA-based SSD for notebook and desktop OEM builders.
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| New SATA Spec Will Double Data Transfer Speeds To 6 Gb/s |
2008-08-20 17:06:48 |
A new specification for the popular Serial ATA storage interface will double the maximum transfer speed from three to six gigabits per second (Gb/s). This will enable large amounts of data to be moved at even faster rates, a key advantage as end-users amass ever-increasing amounts of high-resolution photos, videos, music and other multimedia files.
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| Logitech reveals Cordless Desktop Wave Pro keyboard / mouse tandem |
2008-08-20 17:04:57 |
Logitech is now offering you its highest level of comfort with the introduction of the Logitech® Cordless Desktop® Wave Pro™ keyboard-and-mouse combination. The second-generation Logitech Cordless Desktop Wave Pro combines the field- and laboratory-tested comfort of the Logitech® Wave Keyboard™ with the exceptionally comfortable, rechargeable Logitech® MX™1100 Cordless Laser Mouse. If you're looking to upgrade your mouse only, a battery-powered version of the MX1100 mouse will be sold separately.
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| Everything You Need to Know About USB 3.0, Plus First Spliced Cable Photos |
2008-08-20 17:02:50 |
No doubt you’re familiar with the Universal Serial Bus – we ranked it as our top PC innovation of all time. But what do you know about the next version of this ubiquitous interface? USB 2.0 (otherwise known as USB Hi-Speed) boosted the original 12Mbps data rate to 480Mmb/s over eight years ago, and now USB 3.0 (dubbed USB Superspeed) is set to multiply that bandwidth tenfold. The USB Implementers Forum (led by Intel) released the USB 3.0 spec to hardware partners last week after some reported disputes with AMD and Nvidia (who, afraid Intel would have a jump start in incorporating the tech in chipsets, threatened to develop their own USB standard). But how does this affect you? We dug up some new information about USB 3.0, got our hands on the new connectors, and even took a look inside the new cables.
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| Next-Generation Intel PC Chips to Carry Intel Core Name |
2008-08-11 18:08:03 |
Intel Corporation announced today that desktop processors based on the company's upcoming new microarchitecture (codenamed "Nehalem") will be formally branded "Intel® Core™ processor." The first products in this new family of processors, including an "Extreme Edition" version, will carry an "i7" identifier and will be formally branded as "Intel® Core™ i7 processor." This is the first of several new identifiers to come as different products launch over the next year.
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| AMD's new 790GX chipset for Gamers |
2008-08-08 12:41:09 |
The AMD 790GX chipset is here to give gamers an incredible experience with unprecedented graphics scalability and new performance tuning innovations. Featuring ATI Radeon™ HD 3300 graphics, get the best DirectX®10 gaming experience right out-of-the-box. With the addition of an applicable ATI Radeon graphics card, ATI Hybrid Graphics technology leverages powerful motherboard graphics to give your performance a boost. AMD 790GX is the only desktop platform that scales from the best motherboard graphics to high-performance ATI CrossFireX™ for multi-GPU gaming at maximum 3D resolutions. Unlock even higher AMD Phenom™ processor performance using new AMD 790GX performance-tuning innovations and AMD OverDrive™.
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| NVIDIA gets official with GeForce 9800 GT / 9800 GTX+ GPUs |
2008-08-08 12:40:24 |
The 9500 GT is the first desktop video card based on the G96 core. Currently manufactured in 65nm (55nm production will start later this year), PCI-Express 2.0 and OpenGL 2.1 support. You also get support for PureVideoHD which enables hardware decoding of VC-1 in addition to WMV and MPEG-2 HD. Memory wise, it is equipeed with 256MB or 512MB of DDR2 or GDDR3.
Here are the reference specs:
* Stream processors: 32
* Core clock: 550 MHz
* Shader clock: 1400 MHz
* Memory clock: 800 MHz
* Memory bus width: 128 bits
* Memory bandwidth: 25.6 GB/s
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| Hello AMD Socket G34 |
2008-08-08 12:30:49 |
AMD's 12-core and 8-core processors get a new home in 2010
AMD's newest roadmap reveals a major shift in early 2010: the company will once again overhaul its socket architecture to make way for DDR3 support.
The new socket, dubbed G34, will also ship with two new second-generation 45nm processors. The first of these processors, 8-core Sao Paolo, is described as a "twin native-quadcore Shanghai processor" by one AMD engineer. Shanghai, expected to ship late this year, is AMD's first 45nm shrink of the ill-fated Barcelona processor.
This past April, AMD guidance hinted at a 12-core behemoth of a processor. This CPU is now named Magny-Cours after the French town made famous by its Formula One French Grand Prix circuit.
Both of these new processors will feature four HyperTransport 3 interconnects, 12MB of L3 cache and 512KB L2 cache per core.
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| Microsoft's Midori -- a future without Windows |
2008-08-08 12:27:40 |
With the Internet increasingly taking on the role of the PC operating system and the growing prevalence of virtualization technologies, there will be a day when the Microsoft Windows client OS as it's been developed for the past 20-odd years becomes obsolete.
Microsoft seems to be preparing for that day with an incubation project code-named Midori, which seeks to create a componentized, non-Windows OS that will take advantage of technologies not available when Windows first was conceived, according to published reports.
Although Microsoft won't comment publicly on what Midori is, the company has confirmed that it exists.
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| NVIDIA GeForce 9500 GT Mainstream GPU |
2008-08-08 12:25:34 |
NVIDIA has introduced the PCIe 2.0-compatible GeForce 9500 GT which provides a 550MHz core clock, 1,400MHz shader clock, 32 stream processors, 800MHz memory clock, 256MB / 512MB of RAM and twin dual-link DVI ports. It's a solid buy for those okay with being a few steps behind, and HTPC builders will find the low power consumption, quiet operation and small size to be quite appealing.
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| Intel announces EP80579 system on a chip for MIDs and consumer electronics |
2008-07-29 12:40:39 |
Intel has just announced EP80579 Integrated Processor features a system on a chip design that integrate the Pentium M core with a Memory Controller Hub (MCH), I/O hub (ICH) and data path acceleration engines (among other things dependent upon model). Intel believes these new Integrated Architecture (IA) chips will simplify consumer electronics like set-top boxes and MIDs due to their consolidated design that will reduce incompatibility issues. Intel also says portable devices will benefit from the new processors' energy efficiency. Speeds run from 600MHz on up to 1.2GHz and all sport a 256KB L2 cache.
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| Western Digital intros 2.5-inch 10,000RPM VelociRaptor HDD |
2008-07-29 12:39:03 |
WD announced today the WD VelociRaptor(TM) 10,000 RPM enterprise SATA
hard drives in an enterprise-class 2.5-inch form factor for blade servers
and 1U and 2U rack servers. The newest WD VelociRaptor hard drive is built
for business-critical applications with enterprise-class mechanics and
packs up to 300 GB of capacity into the enterprise small form factor bays,
while consuming 35 percent less power than the previous-generation WD
Raptor(R) drive.
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| New Optimus Family Member |
2008-07-29 12:36:37 |
Optimus Pultius - a 15-keys addition to any keyboard. To be used with the Maximus or with any other non-display keyboard.
Optimus Pultius uses the same principles as Maximus, has the same display keys and the same set of ports on the back (using one instead of two additional USB hub slots).
Click here for more information. |
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| Windows Home Server Power Pack 1 Goes Live!! |
2008-07-29 12:34:42 |
The team is pleased to announce that Windows Home Server Power Pack 1 has been released to manufacturing (RTM) and is now available on the Microsoft Download Center!.
Please click here for more information. |
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| VIDIA's GeForce 9700M / 9800M laptop GPUs get quasi-official |
2008-07-29 12:33:38 |
Nvidia releases new graphics cards for notebooks-end enthusiast: Nvidia GeForce 9700M GT / GTS and Nvidia GeForce 9800M GT / GTS / GTX promise 3D performance at the highest level but also greater energy efficiency.
Click here for more information. |
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| Toshiba's 9.5-mm thin laptop disk hits 400GB |
2008-07-29 12:32:25 |
Toshiba just bested its own 320GB hard drive with a 400GB offering in the same 9.5-mm height form factor favored by most thin laptops. That's as good as it gets unless you can track down Sammy's elusive 500GB Spinpoint M6. The MK4058GSX spins just 2 platters which means the disk sports an impressive 477Mbit/mm2 (308Gbpsi) areal density while consuming 20% less power (0.0015W/GB energy consumption efficiency) and 2dB less noise than its own 320GB predecessor. Rounding out the specs are a 12-ms average seek and 8MB cache. Toshiba also boosted the rest of its 9.5-mm, 2.5-inch, 3.0Gbps SATA disk lineup to 7,200rpm including the 320GB MK3254GSY. Mass production of the 400GB slab is expected to begin in September while the 7,200 HDDs will hit the market in August. No prices announced.
Click here for more information. |
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| Analog Devices bails on SoundMAX, PC audio |
2008-07-29 12:30:58 |
Analog Devices' SoundMAX line of audio codecs has been one of the more notable integrated audio options in PC motherboards for some time now. SoundMAX solutions have found their way into motherboards from Intel and Asus, among others, and have fared reasonably well in our testing. However, ADI hasn't quite managed to steal enough market share away from suppliers like Realtek to make a go of it, and now, the firm has decided to cease development of new PC audio codecs in order to focus on other markets.
Click here for more information. |
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| AOC's 22-inch 2230Fm HD3 display includes integrated media player |
2008-07-29 12:29:41 |
AOC has launched HD3 Display technology with their 2230Fm; a multi-functional high definition platform that provides powerful performance and the ultimate in digital flexibility. The 2230Fm is a true HD monitor, HD TV, digital picture frame and Multi-media player all rolled into a light, sleek 22" frame.
If you would like to know more about this product, please click here. |
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| Albatron Retrotechnology -"PCI" graphics alive and kickin' with GeForce® 8 Series GPUs! |
2008-07-29 12:28:08 |
Albatron Technology recently unveiled three new "PCI" graphics cards at Computex 2008. You read it right - "PCI" and not "PCI Express"! The PCI8600GT-256X, the PCI8500GT-256X and the PCI8400GS-256 are all VGAs that retrofit recent GeForce 8 Series graphics onto older PCI technology. These cards all offer a significant graphics boost along with dual monitor capabilities for an entire generation of integrated-graphics, PCI-only mainboards.
For more information, please visit Albatron. |
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| Pioneer develops 400GB 16 layer disc |
2008-07-29 12:26:48 |
Pioneer invented a disc structure that can reduce crosstalk from adjacent layers, resulting in a 16-layer optical disc that can playback high-quality signals from every layer. … Each of the layers can hold 25 GB of data, the equivalent of one singel Blu-ray disc layer.
Please click here for more information. |
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| Seagate Powers Next Generation Of Computing With Three New Hard Drives, Including World's First 1.5-Terabyte Desktop PC And Half |
2008-07-29 12:25:10 |
Seagate unveiled the industry’s first 1.5-terabyte desktop and half-terabyte notebook hard drives to meet explosive worldwide demand for digital-content storage in home and business environments.
The debut of the Barracuda® 7200.11 1.5TB hard drive, the eleventh generation of Seagate’s flagship drive for desktop PCs, marks the single largest capacity hard drive jump in the more than half-century history of hard drives – a half-terabyte increase from the previous highest capacity of 1TB, thanks to the capacity-boosting power of perpendicular magnetic recording (PMR) technology.
The Barracuda 7200.11 hard drive combines proven PMR technology, components and expert manufacturing to provide 1.5TB of reliable storage for mainstream desktop computers, workstations, desktop RAID, gaming and high-end PCs, and USB/FireWire/eSATA external storage.
Seagate’s new 2.5-inch half-terabyte 5400- and 7200-rpm drives – Momentus® 5400.6 and Momentus 7200.4 – deliver the best combination of capacity, mobility and durability for mainstream and high-performance notebook computers, external storage solutions, PCs and industrial applications requiring small form factor.
For more information, please click here. |
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| Intel to launch three Nehalem-based processors by the end of 4Q 08 |
2008-07-29 12:22:37 |
Intel plans to launch three Nehalem-based quad-core processors (Bloomfield) at the end of the fourth quarter this year targeting the company's new LGA1366 socket, according to sources at motherboard makers.
Although official model names have not yet been set, the CPUs are currently identified by the codenames XE, P1 and MS3 with core frequencies of 3.2GHz, 2.93GHz and 2.66GHz, respectively. All three have a TDP of 130W, 8MB L3 cache and will support simultaneous multi-threading (SMT) technology, the sources detailed
The company will also launch the X58 and ICH10 chipset combination in the fourth quarter to support these processors. The new platform is expected to increase performance by 15-30% compared to current generation products. The X58 chipset will adopt Intel's latest QuickPath Interconnect (QPI) architecture replacing its longstanding FSB design.
The new platform will also feature four PCI Express 8x slots and support AMD's Quad CrossFireX technology, however it is still unknown whether Intel will be able to license Nvidia's SLI technology too.
In other news, Intel has updated its processor schedule in will begin to phase out its Core 2 Extreme QX6850 and 6800 after July this year, the sources revealed. Additionally, the performance-level quad-core Q9550 and Q9650 will both phase out in the first quarter of 2009. Intel will leave its quad-core Yorkfield processors for the mainstream market and their life cycle will not end until the end of fourth quarter 2009.
Finally, Intel was originally planning to mass produce its dual-core Atom 330 processor in July, however, due to shortages of the single-core Atom 230, the company has postponed the launch to at least September this year, will release further planning in August, the sources said.
Intel declined the opportunity to respond to report saying it cannot comment on unannounced products. |
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| Firefox 3 Web browser is now out as free download |
2008-07-29 12:22:06 |
What’s New in Firefox 3:
The Web is all about innovation, and Firefox 3 sets the pace with dozens of new features to deliver a faster, more secure and customizable Web browsing experience for all.
User Experience. The enhancements to Firefox 3 provide the best possible browsing experience on the Web. The new Firefox 3 smart location bar, affectionately known as the “Awesome Bar,” learns as people use it, adapting to user preferences and offering better fitting matches over time. The Firefox 3 Library archives browsing history, bookmarks, and tags, where they can be easily searched and organized. One-click bookmarking and tagging make it easy to remember, search and organize Web sites. The new full-page zoom displays any part of a Web page, up close and readable, in seconds.
Performance. Firefox 3 is built on top of the powerful new Gecko 1.9 platform, resulting in a safer, easier to use and more personal product. Firefox 3 now uses less memory while it’s running, and its redesigned page rendering and layout engine means users see Web pages two to three times faster than Firefox 2.
Security. Firefox 3 raises the bar for security. The new malware and phishing protection helps protect from viruses, worms, trojans and spyware to keep people safe on the Web. Firefox 3’s one-click site ID information allows users to verify that a site is what it claims to be. Mozilla’s open source process leverages the experience of thousands of security experts around the globe.
Customization. Everyone uses the Web differently, and Firefox 3 lets users customize their browser with more than 5,000 add-ons. Firefox Add-ons allow users to manage tasks like participating in online auctions, uploading digital photos, seeing the weather forecasts, and listening to music, all from the convenience of the browser. The new Add-ons Manager helps users to find and install add-ons directly from the browser.
For more information about Mozilla Firefox 3 and how it delivers an easier, faster, and safer online experience, visit http://www.mozilla.com/firefox/features.
Mozilla Firefox 3 is available now for Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X operating systems as a free download from http://www.getfirefox.com.
The release of Firefox 3 kicks off Download Day, the Mozilla community’s grassroots campaign to set a brand new Guinness World Record for the greatest number of software downloads in 24 hours. The worldwide community effort begins the minute Firefox 3 is released and will continue for a full day. For more information, please visit http://www.spreadfirefox.com/worldrecord/. |
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| AMD, NVIDIA to Create Second Open Host Controller For USB 3.0 |
2008-07-29 12:21:03 |
AMD and NVIDIA say Intel won't share its USB 3.0 open host controller specs
The USB 3.0 specification is expected to be out in 2009 and will significantly upgrade the bandwidth of the current USB 2.0 ports and products that all computer users are familiar with. The body responsible for the support and promotion of the USB specifications going back to USB 1.1 is the USB Implementers Forum (USB-IF).
The USB-IF was founded by Intel in 1995 along with other industry players including Microsoft, HP, Texas Instruments, NEC and NXP Semiconductors. Currently, the USB-IF and its members are working to bring the USB 3.0 specification to market. USB 3.0 is also being called “PCI Express over cable” because the USB 3.0 specification uses intellectual property that was sourced from the PCI SIG. USB 3.0 will increase the bandwidth offered by USB 2.0 by 10 times with a data throughput of about 5 gigabits per second.
Despite the fact that much of the intellectual property behind the USB 3.0 specification wasn’t developed by Intel, AMD and NVIDIA both assert that Intel is keeping crucial information concerning the open host controller to itself. According to NVIDIA and AMD, Intel has working silicon, meaning the open host controller portion is mature and working, yet Intel is refusing to give the specifications to other processor and chipset makers.
AMD and NVIDIA say that by withholding the open host controller specifications that Intel is basically giving itself a market advantage of six to nine months because of the time lag between receiving the host controller specifications by other CPU and chipset makers and getting product to the marketplace.
An Intel source told News.com, “Intel only gives it [open host controller specifications] out once it's finished. And it's not finished. If it was mature enough to release, it would be released. If you have an incomplete spec and give it out to people, these people will build their chipsets and you'll end up with chipsets that are incompatible with devices. That's what (Intel) is trying to avoid."
The Intel source continued saying, “[Intel is] a little bit behind and that's what might be causing some of the resentment. You could take the opinion that Intel is giving stuff out for free and people are complaining because (Intel) isn't giving it out fast enough.”
If Intel feels that AMD and NVIDIA aren’t willing to do the hard work of developing the open host controller for USB 3.0 themselves, it may be very mistaken. AMD and NVIDIA say they are going to develop their own open host controller for USB 3.0. Both firms point out that developing a separate open host controller could very well mean incompatibilities between USB 3.0 controllers and products.
An AMD source told News.com, “We are starting development on it [open host controller] right now.” An NVIDIA source says the first meeting of the alternate open host controller specification is set for next week and adds, "We fully intend to productize this spec.”
Intel maintains that it is not withholding the specification and that it will provide the details for the open host controller when it is complete.
Intel is in hot water already for some of its business practices. The FTC announced last week that it will investigate whether Intel has abused its market position to stifle competition. |
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| New ASUS Eee PC Models Arrive for 2008 |
2008-07-29 12:20:01 |
With over one million Eee sub-notebooks sold to date, it’s safe to say that the Asus Eee is far more than the fad that many thought it would always bEee (that will be the last shameless pun, I promise.) For those of you playing at home, a million units since last October roughly comes out to 4000-ish units every single day. Go get ‘em Asus.
All those numbers aside, this year’s Computex has seemingly been one big stage for Asus, using the high profile convention to announce not only their Eee Box desktop PC using Intel’s Atom family of processors but also the next predicable step in the Eee mini-notebook evolution. While not a very well kept secret, only yesterday did Asus officially announce their Eee 901 and Eee 1000.
Starting with the smaller of the two notebooks, the 901 is primarily an updated version of the popular Eee 900. Of the listed changes to the series, the most notable is undoubtedly the inclusion of Intel’s new Atom processor. This new CPU from Intel is designed with low power consumption in mind and accordingly, Asus is making the lofty claim of up to 7.8 hours of usage. Taking a step back from excitement, it original Eee was seeing between 2 and 4 hours of battery life so a claim of 7.8 hours is huge.
Asus attributes this jump in battery life to what they are calling their “Super Hybrid Engine” that supposedly “provides three GUI modes to easily adjust CPU frequency, voltage, and LCD brightness to minimize system noise and power consumption to save up to 15% power consumption, or to maximize system performance according to individual needs.” This sounds great and we can’t wait to hopefully confirm these claims out on our own. That said, other changes in the 901 also include a slightly larger chassis that allows for a larger keyboard to be used while keeping the same 8.9” LCD screen of its precursor.
The Eee PC 901 comes with your choice of 20GB hard drive with Windows XP installed or 12GB drive with Linux.
While the 901 is all well and good, the real exciting news coming out of the Asus camp is that of the 1000 series of Eee PCs. Bringing a completely new design, the 1000 sports a larger 10” screen and the option of a solid state hard drive for all of you hard core road warriors out there. One other major point of interest of the Eee 1000 is that with the larger frame comes a larger keyboard. Using a keyboard that is 92 percent the size of those found on larger, regular form factor notebooks, using the Eee 1000 should provide a much more comfortable user experience.
According to our friends over at PC Perspective, the new lineup of Eee PCs offer WiMAX connectivity, bringing faster wireless internet to its users (whenever the infrastructure finally gets into place.)
While pricing has yet to be released, Engadget captured a photo of a pricing sheet. Take it for that it is as nothing is official yet.
Just released though from Asus are the final specs of each of the three new Eee models. All models come with at least a gig of RAM with the 1000 and 1000H coming with 2. All also include Draft n wireless (yes, it’s still not ratified) and a decently capable 1.3 Mega Pixel web camera. As we mentioned earlier, the 1000 comes equipped with an SSD and going by the spec sheet, it’s a 40 GB drive and interestingly enough, it’s loaded with Linux. Each model can be found in a variety colors as well.
As we said earlier, Asus has already had an exciting showing at Computex 2008 and it’s only just started. As excited as I was for the idea of the Eee, I was personally was not a believer once it finally started to hit store shelves and the pricing became stable. That said, and regardless of my opinion, you can’t argue with the sales figures (unless they are of the shady Vista variety). One million notebooks is a LOT of movement considering the brand has only been available for a little over 8 months.
With competition coming from practically every corner of the industry, the sub-notebook market has quickly become saturated but the benchmark so far has been the Eee. It will be interesting to see how Asus adapts once these other manufacturers start shipping their goods en masse. While I am still not completely sold on the Eee, I’m starting to like what I see more and more. I have been using a Dell D430 a lot lately and can certainly appreciate its mobility. For half the price, an Eee might not be that bad of an investment. We are looking forward to forming our own opinion on the latest offerings from Asus but until then, keep checking in for more Computex coverage.
Source: Techgage |
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| Windows 7 Multi-touch LCD Announced |
2008-07-29 12:17:30 |
Multi-touch is one of the big technology trends these days: Bill gates recently demonstrated a display integrating multi-touch at the recent D6 conference and unfortunately received little more than lukewarm feedback. Albatron is one of the first companies demonstrating what appears to be a production ready multi-touch device: Having played with the LCD at Computex, we have to say that we are impressed.
It is easy to overlook the truly exciting products at Computex due to the flood of rather common things at the show. After day one of the show, we found that the probably most stunning product on the show floor comes from Albatron. This motherboard and graphics maker may not be the first name that comes to you mind when you are thinking about LCD displays, but we have to admit that the company’s new LCDs reveal a whole new level of interactivity on your PC.
Imagine Apple’s iPhone display on a large scale: Albatron integrated sensors on both sides of the touchscreen display. Robert Doncevski, sales director at Albatron, demonstrated the screen and its features to us and as far as we could see, controlling an operating system is a breeze. You simply only use your fingers to start and close applications. Bill gates’ demonstration may have been rather underwhelming, but seeing a multi-touch LCD actually in front of us made it clear that this technology works much better than we expected. Playing around with Google Earth was a blast.
Albatron integrated the technology into a 22" LCD providing a resolution of 1680 x 1050 pixels. According to Doncevski, multi-touch is not affected by typical touch-screen limitations. Screen sizes of 24" and above simply require a third sensor on top of the screen. That’s it.
You don’t have to have supernatural powers to predict that this display may become a huge hit when Windows 7 becomes available. At this time, the display works with the current crop of Windows XP users, while Vista is the default operating system.
Pricing and availability has not been announced, but we were told that physical price of this multi-touch screen is only 20% above a regular LCD. |
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| VIA's "Isaiah" Officially Launches as "Nano" |
2008-07-29 12:16:04 |
VIA hopes to take the fight to Intel with its Nano processors.
VIA's C7-M processor architecture has soldiered on for a number of years, but it's finally time for a chance. While the C7-M processors are relatively efficient and find homes in embedded products and notebooks like the HP 2133 Mini-Note, it's not exactly a performance powerhouse.
VIA hopes to change this with its Isaiah processor family which today is being officially launched as the Nano. The Nano is a 64-bit out-of-order processor design -- Intel's Atom is in-order to save power -- and is built on a 65 nanometer manufacturing process.
"VIA Nano processors represent the next generation of x86 technology, providing the fundamental building blocks for a new genre of optimized computing solutions," said VIA President and CEO Wenchi Chen. "‘Small is Beautiful’ is more than a design strategy; it’s our vision of where the PC market is heading and our new processors will help the market realize that dream."
The Nano will be available in both standard voltage (desktop) and ultra low voltage (notebook) SKUs to satisfy a large range of products. Standard voltage chips include the 1.8GHz Nano L2100 (25W) and 1.6Hz Nano L2200 (17W). The ultra low voltage lineup will consist of the 1.3GHz Nano U2300 (8W), 1.2GHz U2500 (6.8W), and the 1.0GHz U24000 (5W). All Nano processors include 1MB of L2 cache and an 800MHz FSB.
Preliminary benchmarks for the Nano have been quite favorable as previously reported. VIA's own supplied benchmarks also show that the Nano is quite a bit faster than the venerable C7-M.
However, the true test will be to see how the Nano stacks up to Intel's Atom processor. OEMs are flocking to Intel's latest mobile processor and the chip giant is expected to be in short supply until Q3 as a result. If VIA can match or exceed the performance of the Atom, the company might find itself in prime positioning to be a serious player in the mobile consumer market.
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| Samsung Set to Introduce 200MB/sec Read, 160MB/sec Write 256GB SSD |
2008-07-29 12:14:00 |
Samsung throws down the gauntlet when it comes to SSD performance
The solid state disk (SSD) market is really starting to heat up as more player enter the market and NAND flash memory/controller technology improves. A few weeks ago, Super Talent dazzled consumers with a new "budget" line of SSDs which offered surprisingly large storage capacities at relatively affordable levels.
Samsung today is taking tackling the opposite end of the pricing spectrum with its new 256GB SSDs which it plans to introduce later this year. Samsung's new SATA II SSD should obliterate the competition with read speeds of 200MB/sec and write speeds of an amazing 160MB/sec. This compares to 120MB/sec and 40MB/sec respectively for Super Talents latest SSDs. Even Mtron falls far behind Samsung's new 256GB SSD with read speeds of 120MB/sec and write speeds of 100MB/sec.
Most would take a gander that Samsung is using single-level cell (SLC) NAND chips to achieve these unheard of performance figures, however, the company instead settled on cheaper multi-level cell (MLC) NAND chips.
"With development of the 256GB SSD, the notebook PC is on the brink of a second stage of evolution," said Samsung Memory Marketing VP Jim Elliott. "This change is comparable to the evolution from the Sony Walkman to NAND memory-based MP3 players, representing an initial step in the shift to thinner, smaller SSD-based notebooks with significantly improved performance and more than ample storage."
Given the wide performance delta between Samsung's new 256GB SSD and lesser rivals, the drive will likely come to the market with a price tag that pushing into the multi-thousand dollar range. With a price tag that high, the SSD will likely be relegated to high-end business use and for consumer with plenty of money to burn.
However, as the technology matures, we can expect to see prices drop as we have seen with the offerings from Super Talent. And if Intel has anything to say about it, it will offer SSD performance that will rival all contenders and likely will use its girth to push pricing further down to “mere mortal” levels. |
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| Western Digital Quietly Moves to 334GB HDD Platters on 1TB Drive |
2008-07-29 12:13:00 |
Western Digital gets to 334GB per plater about a year after Samsung
When hard drive manufactures move to platters with higher storage densities, it is a good thing all around -- the higher the storage density for the platters, the fewer platters are needed to reach the same capacity compared to lower density platters.
That means less power is needed and less moving parts are required to make the drive operate. Impress is reporting that Western Digital has quietly updated its Caviar GP line of drives in Asia with a platter density of 334GB in the 1TB capacity drive. Other features of the drive remain the same with a 16MB cache.
Western Digital isn’t alone in moving to 334GB per platter. This week Samsung announced a new 1TB EcoGreen hard drive aimed at surveillance and audio/video applications that use platters of 334GB in size.
Samsung claims that the EcoGreen F1 drive provides a 15% power savings compared to other low power 1TB drives and a full 50% power savings compared to traditional 1TB drives often spinning at 7200RPM. Samsung’s EcoGreen F1 spins at 5400 RPM and uses the 3Gbps SATA interface. Availability for the Samsung drive is set for Q2 2008 at $199.
In January 2008 Western Digital introduced the single platter 320GB HDD, which was its highest density platter. Samsung was first to ship a 334GB per platter 1TB drive in June of 2007. |
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| Next-gen NVIDIA GeForce Specifications Unveiled |
2008-05-22 11:24:45 |
NVIDIA's upcoming Summer 2008 lineup gets some additional details
Later this week NVIDIA will enact an embargo on its upcoming next-generation graphics core, codenamed D10U. The launch schedule of this processor, claims the GPU will make its debut as two separate graphics cards, currently named GeForce GTX 280 (D10U-30) and GeForce GTX 260 (D10U-20).
The GTX 280 enables all features of the D10U processor; the GTX 260 version will consist of a significantly cut-down version of the same GPU. The D10U-30 will enable all 240 unified stream processors designed into the processor. NVIDIA documentation claims these second-generation unified shaders perform 50 percent better than the shaders found on the D9 cards released earlier this year.
The main difference between the two new GeForce GTX variants revolves around the number of shaders and memory bus width. Most importantly, NVIDIA disables 48 stream processors on the GTX 260. GTX 280 ships with a 512-bit memory bus capable of supporting 1GB GDDR3 memory; the GTX 260 alternative has a 448-bit bus with support for 896MB.
GTX 280 and 260 add virtually all of the same features as GeForce 9800GTX: PCIe 2.0, OpenGL 2.1, SLI and PureVideoHD. The company also claims both cards will support two SLI-risers for 3-way SLI support.
Unlike the upcoming AMD Radeon 4000 series, currently scheduled to launch in early June, the D10U chipset does not support DirectX extentions above 10.0. Next-generation Radeon will also ship with GDDR5 while the June GeForce refresh is confined to just GDDR3.
The GTX series is NVIDIA's first attempt at incorporating the PhysX stream engine into the D10U shader engine. The press decks currently do not shed a lot of information on this support, and the company will likely not elaborate on this before the June 18 launch date.
After NVIDIA purchased PhysX developer AGEIA in February 2008, the company announced all CUDA-enabled processors would support PhysX. NVIDIA has not delivered on this promise yet, though D10U will support CUDA, and therefore PhysX, right out of the gate. |
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| Intel X58 Chipset Details Leaked |
2008-05-22 11:12:34 |
Leaked slides from Intel are floating around the Internet saying that Intel X58 paired with ICH10/R southbridge will be the first chipset combo to support Intel Bloomfield desktop processors, part of Intel's 45nm Nehalem architecture. The following list shows only a few of the new features that will be presented with Intel's forthcoming high-end platform:
* Intel Bloomfield is a 45nm quad core processor that supports 8 processing threads and use LGA 1366 Socket
* Bloomfield CPUs will come with 8MB of shared L2 cache
* Bloomfield supports IMC (Integrated Memory Controller) and triple-channel DDR3 RAM
* Bloomfield supports QPI and adds seven more SSE4 instructions.
* Motherboards with Intel X58 chipset that will support Bloomfield processors will utilize PCI-e 2.0 slots working in dual x16 or Quad x8 configurations. |
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| XP SP3 And Vista SP1 Back in Action |
2008-05-22 11:11:50 |
After being missing for a week, the service packs are back and ready to upgrade your OS (if you use Windows, that is)
While XP may be nearing its end of life, it still enjoys a large user base and remains a strong seller. Thus many customers were thrilled when XP Service Pack 3 (SP3) came out, offering a wide variety of improvements.
Unfortunately it had a compatibility issue with Microsoft Dynamic RMS -- a program for small to medium businesses -- which caused Microsoft to decide to pull the pack, leaving users in the dark. A similar problem was found in Vista SP1, and while Microsoft did not pull Vista SP1, it halted its automatic distribution.
Well happy days are ahead, as both Vista SP1 and XP SP3 are back in action. The packs went live on Tuesday. The XP SP3 is available here. Microsoft solved the MSD RMS issue with a hotfix, which can be had here. Microsoft suggests you install this hotfix before installing XP SP3 to avoid issues.
The third service pack weighs in at 316 MB, for those interested. Over 1,100 hotfixes/patches are included in the pack. Also included are new features, among which are the handy Network Access Protection and Black Hole Router Detection.
Most will agree that while the delay of XP SP3 might be slightly embarrassing for Microsoft, the company did a remarkably good job of fixing the problem quickly and getting the packs back online. The whole process only took a week, lying to rest customer fears caused by Microsoft failing to disclose when the packs would be available again.
Windows Update is also back to automatically distributing the pack once again. Users who disabled the feature can re-enable it to get the pack automatically without any effort.
Microsoft recently announced that it will likely plan to stick to its June 30th end of life date for XP. However, many manufacturers will continue to support it after the date. The new XP SP3 provides one more compelling reason for users to enjoy this mature operating system, which has been fine tuned over the course of three major service packs.
Some users have expressed that they plan on using XP until Windows 7 comes out in 2010. While this approach certainly isn't for everyone, those users and the many IT users who deploy XP will be pleased that the service pack is once again available. |
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| TSMC, Intel, Samsung Agree on 450mm For The Future |
2008-05-22 11:09:57 |
Wafer manufacturing giants tape out a new, larger wafer platform for the future.
Three major players in integrated circuit manufacturing -- Samsung Electronics, Intel Corporation, and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing (TSMC) -- have made the announcement of an agreement for a new, even larger wafer production standard. The current wafer plants crank out 300mm discs, but going forward, the three companies feel that the need for another graduation in area is necessary. They will also work with International Sematech to insure a viable set of standards for the new wafers.
Though TSMC, the world's largest semiconductor manufacturer, has recently entered into an agreement with two other Taiwanese chip makers to build $14.7 billion worth of new 300mm fabs, the idea of further progress and efficiency for the future has not been brushed aside. Moving from the current 300mm to the planned 450mm platters will save more money, more energy and cause less pollution overall, as well as allow the industry to pile more microchips into a single wafer.
The last standards change for wafer manufacturing was in 2001, when production was transitioned from the 1991-originated 200mm to the present 300mm discs. The trio plan to have the new standard and fabs online by 2012, making the transitions nearly a decade apart each.
Not only will the larger wafers allow manufacturers more overall efficiency in the fabs, with the ever-falling footprint of transistors, almost exponentially more microchips should come from each wafer. Intel recently moved from a 65nm to 45nm architecture, while TSMC moved its chips from 65nm to 40nm. Further gains will no doubt be made by the time the 450mm fabs go live, further enabling what looks like will become a multi-core revolution in the near future.
The three companies are hoping to create a smooth transition to the new wafers by working together on the new standards. The overall attitude is that the change is necessary to keep the industry efficient and profitable. Not only will it benefit them in the future, sharing the cost of research and development will certainly keep their accountants happier until then. |
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| NEW 3DMark® Vantage |
2008-05-22 11:09:19 |
3DMark® Vantage is the new industry standard PC gaming performance benchmark from Futuremark, newly designed for Windows Vista and DirectX10. It includes two new graphics tests, two new CPU tests, several new feature tests, and support for the latest hardware. 3DMark® Vantage is based on a completely new rendering engine, developed specifically to take full advantage of DirectX10, the new graphics API from Microsoft.
Presets
A key new feature in 3DMark® Vantage is the rendering option Presets. These pre-selected combinations of rendering option settings, like resolution, anti-aliasing and texture quality, represent different, successively more advanced levels of visual quality. When running 3DMark® Vantage with one of the presets selected, the benchmark produces an official score for that preset. Instead of the single default setting of previous 3DMarks, there are four Presets available for Entry, Performance, High and Extreme visual quality. |
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| AMD's Phenom X3 8750 triple-core processor |
2008-05-22 11:08:26 |
Today AMD is releasing its first triple-core processors to the retail market after initially announcing them on the eve of IDF Fall 2007 in an attempt to steal away some of the limelight from Intel’s twice yearly shindig.
Don’t be fooled though, these aren’t the first ever triple-core processors AMD has released, we’d spotted several Mesh machines using triple-core Phenom 8400 and 8600 processors long before AMD officially announced them late last month.
Because of the release timeframe, they were of course based on the older B2 stepping but, unlike today’s launch, those processors were limited to system builders only. This was probably due to the fact that the B2 stepping chips weren’t exactly renowned for overclocking and shipping with relatively cheap systems would be a way to shift the old stock as quick as possible.
In fact, saying that the B2 Phenoms were poor overclockers is probably an understatement because, of the two Phenom 9600 Black Edition processors we received, neither managed to remain stable above their stock clock speeds on a consistent basis and the whole overclocking malarkey was a complete non-event. But that’s not all that was wrong with Phenom, because there was the infamous but now largely forgotten Translation Look-aside Buffer erratum that sat right at the heart of the bad press AMD’s first native quad-core processors initially received.
AMD feels that this was largely over-exaggerated, but a lot of that was down to its own doing in our opinion. And to some extent AMD agrees because it has said that it wished it had handled the situation a little differently in hindsight.
The problem, though, was that when the company disclosed the bug to the press in Warsaw, it didn’t know enough about it. In that respect, hindsight is a wonderful phenomenon and AMD believes that if it had understood the problem in a bit more detail, it could have presented a compelling enough case for the press to essentially not worry about it ever affecting consumers considering purchasing the products.
Indeed, we feel it was the lack of confidence surrounding the issue that came out of AMD was ultimately what hampered the chip maker’s launch. But let’s forget about that for now because things have changed with the B3-stepping – not only is the TLB bug fixed, but the 9x50 processors we’ve seen so far have also overclocked fairly well too.
AMD is announcing a total of three new triple-core processors today, the X3 8750, X3 8650 and X3 8450 – they’re clocked at 2.4GHz, 2.3GHz and 2.1GHz respectively and all use the B3 revision silicon. What’s interesting is that CPU-Z recognises the Phenom X3 8750 as a 65nm ‘Toliman’ core, which confirms the rumours we reported last December and, what’s more, AMD’s documentation confirms that this is nothing more than a 65nm ‘Agena’ die with one core disabled.
Both chips have an approximate transistor count of 450 million transistors packed into a 285mm˛ die size. Like the equivalently clocked Phenom X4 processors, all of the Phenom X3 chips feature a 1.8GHz north bridge and memory controller clock along with a 16-bit/16-bit full duplex HyperTransport 3.0 link running at up to 3.6GHz.
Each core features its own 64KB L1 data and 64KB L1 instruction caches, along with a 512KB L2 cache, meaning a total of 384KB of L1 cache and 1.5MB of L2 cache. This is obviously slightly less than the Phenom X4 processors, but that’s because there are fewer cores – the shared L3 cache remains the same at 2MB and it runs at the same speed as the north bridge (1.8GHz). |
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| Western Digital Velociraptor 300GB SATA HD |
2008-04-24 14:37:47 |
Western Digital's Raptor line of high performance hard drives has been a long-time favorite of PC enthusiasts since its introduction several years ago. When WD's Raptors first hit, their 10K RPM spindle speeds allowed for much lower access times than the more common 7200 RPM desktop drives of the time, and overall relative performance was strong. Many users were put off by the relatively low capacities of the Raptor, which debuted at 36GB and topped out at 150GB, but they were still wildly successful amongst enthusiasts regardless.
As time wore on though, Western Digital's competitors introduced faster and faster, high capacity drives, that began to out-perform the Raptor in a number of key metrics. WD too released some fast, high-capacity drives that out-performed even the fastest Raptor in many scenarios. WD released a number of more eco-friendly drives under their "Green Power" badge as well, which may have led some to believe WD's focus on the enthusiast sector had diminished. However, as you'll see today, that is definitely not the case.
Killer Speed - Built on the performance bloodlines of WD Raptor, these 10,000 RPM drives, with SATA 3 Gb/s interface, and 16 MB cache deliver mind-bending performance. Not only are they 35 percent faster than the previous generation WD Raptor drives, but they also beat out all other competitors in the field.
Rock-solid Reliability - Designed and manufactured to mission-critical enterprise-class standards to provide enterprise reliability in high duty cycle environments. With 1.4 million hours MTBF, these drives have the highest available reliability rating on a high capacity SATA drive.
Double the Capacity - State-of-the-art technology packs twice the capacity per disk compared to its older brother WD Raptor resulting in 300 GB of high-performance storage space in this enterprise-class 2.5-inch drive. (Not compatible with notebook computers)
IcePack™ Mounting Frame - The 2.5-inch WD VelociRaptor is enclosed in a 3.5-inch enterprise-class mounting frame with a built-in heat sink that keeps this powerful little drive extra cool when installed in high-performance desktop chassis.
Rotary Acceleration Feed Forward (RAFF™) - Optimizes operation and performance when the drives are used in vibration-prone, multi-drive chassis.
SecurePark™ - Parks the recording heads off the disk surface during spin up, spin down and when the drive is off. This ensures the recording head never touches the disk surface resulting in improved long-term reliability and increased drive protection when the chassis is moved.
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| Intel reveals plans for quad-core laptop CPUs |
2008-03-20 13:17:47 |
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 microarchitecture and will ship in the third quarter, Intel officials said.
Intel declined comment on chip details, though enthusiast Web sites reported the chip is Intel's Core 2 Extreme QX9300. The chips will be manufactured using the new 45-nanometer process.
After Montevina Launch
The chip will be released after Intel's Centrino 2 platform, code-named Montevina, is launched in the second quarter. Montevina is an upgrade to the current Centrino mobile platform that puts WiMax and Wi-Fi networking capabilities on a single chip. Montevina will include processors based on the Core 2 microarchitecture and the quad-core notebook processor could be included in the platform.
The initial quad-core laptops will be desktop replacements, weighty laptops that will appeal to gamers and office workers requiring processing power, said Nathan Brookwood, principal analyst with Insight 64. The chips won't reach smaller notebooks like the MacBook Air anytime soon, Brookwood said.
A quad-core laptop with a separate graphics card could be a powerful desktop alternative, and it will be portable, he said.
Notebooks are still being driven by battery life, and the number of people who need huge performance is still small, he said. The quad-core CPU (central processing unit) is going to require more power than a dual-core CPU even if the CPU clock is slowed down, he said.
Intel officials in the past have said that users expecting quad-core mobile processors may have to wait until issues surrounding power consumption are resolved.
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. |
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| AMD Finally Ships |
2008-03-20 13:17:10 |
AMD puts its processor lineup back on track
Hark! The long awaited B3 stepping of AMD's Opteron and Phenom finally made its way to system integrators this week.
AMD made it virtually impossible to obtain any K10-based Opteron processors after the TLB bug caught the world's attention last December. Desktop Phenom processors continued to ship, though the BIOS workaround for the TLB race condition severely hampered performance on some benchmarks.
The vendor who obtained the B3 sample photographed (right) couldn't be more ecstatic. "There's been no Opterons since November. We've even been shipping Socket F Opterons to fill AMD orders. This is a big deal,"
"Pre-production" Opterons sent to Torrent search engine IsoHunt last February were later revealed as gray-market B2 stepped processors, which AMD tracked to October 2007 samples.
In addition to fixing the TLB race condition, AMD will finally increase the core frequency of the Opteron series on the B3 stepping. After the initial OEM orders are filled, channel vendors like Newegg and TigerDirect will carry the new Opterons in frequencies ranging from 1.8 GHz to 2.4 GHz. Vendor estimates put this e-tailer ship date in early April.
AMD roadmaps also indicate the Phenom and Opteron lines will reach 2.6 GHz before this Fall on the new B3 stepping. In 2009 both lines will transition from the 65nm to the 45nm process node, codenamed Shanghai, with additional SKUs at higher clock frequencies.
B3 Opterons can be easily identified by the "GH" as opposed to "GD" at the end of the product number. With the exception of Phenom and Opteron SE processors, AMD emphasizes to DailyTech that no vendor should be selling or distributing "GD," and customers who obtain these older B2 steppings should contact their local AMD distributor. |
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| Intel Roadmaps Outline Centrino 2 Platform This June |
2008-03-01 12:55:29 |
New branding, 5.5 Watt 1.2 GHz processors, DisplayPort, two-fold increases in graphics power await notebook enthusiasts this June
You could set your clock to Intel's mobile platform roadmap. For the last three years, the company announced its new processor lineup in January, followed by a chipset and processor refresh in June. June is always a critical month for notebook manufacturers, as the impending school semester spurs the largest volume orders on the year.
This year Intel announced its first generation 45 nanometer desktop, mobile and server processors. New roadmaps issued to notebook partners claim the company will replace its Santa Rosa Centrino platform with the Montevina Centrino 2 platform this June.
The June refresh includes new Penryn-based processors boasting a 1066MHz front-side bus and new motherboard core logic. Together, the chips will form the Montevina Centrino 2 and Centrino 2 vPro platforms.
On the processor front, Intel will launch a slew of dual core processors covering a wide range of market segments.
The Txxx processors are labeled as "Performance" parts and feature a TDP of 35W. The Pxxx parts are labeled "Power Optimized Performance" and feature a lower TDP of 25W. The P9500 strikes a fine balance between the two market segments by retaining a 2.53GHz core clock and 6MB of L2 cache while still managing a TDP of 25W.
The processors above are lumped into Intel's "Performance Small Form Factor" segment and feature a TDP of 25W at the high end for the SP9400 and continually fall until we reach rock bottom with the U3300 which touts a TDP of 5.5W.
An Intel engineer hinted to DailyTech that the U3300 will be reserved for the "slimmest of slim" notebooks and tablets. By comparison, the 1.6 and 1.8 GHz processor found in the MacBook Air has a rating of 20W TDP. The same Intel engineer, speaking on conditions of anonymity, detailed that all of these small form factor processors will find their way into Apple and PC mobile products -- as indicated by other Intel representatives in previous interviews.
On the chipset front, Intel will launch three SKUs during the second quarter: the GM45, GM47 and PM45. The GM45/47 will feature Intel's new X4500 HD integrated graphics processor which promises DX10 support, increased battery life, integrated HDMI and DisplayPort.
The GM45/47 support 667MHz and 1066MHz FSBs, DDR2/DDR3 memory, and the ICH9M/ICH9M-Enhanced south bridges. The two parts only differ in the clock speed for the graphics core -- the GM45 features a 533 MHz core clock while the GM47 has a faster 640 MHz core clock.
Intel marketing materials claim GM47 performs twice as high on 3DMark as GM965 found in the current Santa Rosa chipsets.
The PM45 supports all the features of the two aforementioned chipsets minus the integrated graphics core. The PM45 thus will be used with integrated mobile graphics solutions from ATI and NVIDIA.
While the processors and new chipsets are important, we must also take a look at Intel's supporting cast of characters with the Centrino 2 platform. Centrino 2 notebooks will be available with 2GB of Turbo Memory -- Windows Vista ReadyDrive and ReadyBoost compliant.
Networking upgrades are plentiful for the Centrino 2 launch. Intel will launch the 82567LM and 82567LF Gigabit Ethernet controllers for LAN connectivity. Customers will also have a choice of two Shirley Peak-based WLAN controllers with the Intel WiFi Link 5100/5300. Finally, Intel will offer two WiMAX/WiFi controllers in the form of the Intel WiMAX/WiFi Link 5150/5350.
Apple yesterday launched revised MacBook and MacBook Pro notebooks that incorporate Intel’s first run of Penryn processors. Apple insiders confirmed the company will refresh its notebook lineups in June, which comes as no surprise since all Centrino partners indicated they will announce notebooks based on the new Montevina Centrino 2.
Don't expect just the same old notebooks from January this June. The upcoming second-generation Penryn mobile processors require the new Socket B motherboards. However, since the thermal envelopes will not change between Penryn revisions vendors will be able to keep the existing form factors, like that found on the ultra-compact Lenovo X300, with minimal changes to the motherboard design. |
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| NVIDIA Launches GeForce 9600 GT |
2008-03-01 12:55:03 |
Exactly one month ago NVIDIA leaked GeForce 9600 GT benchmarks with very attractive results. The G94-based graphics card gave the current high-end GeForce 8-series cards and AMD's HD3800-series a run for the money using beta drivers coming short in only a few benchmarks.
Though the 9600 GT will be the mid-range card in the D9x graphics family, with such impressive performance over the previous generation, many have already proclaimed the G94 the pinnacle of price-performance in the series.
Tomorrow NVIDIA will officially launch the 9600GT and the cost will attract the masses. Between $169 and 189 the 9600GT will compete with the 8800 GT in performance but the newcomer adds a number of new features from an architecture standpoint.
The 9600 GT's stock configuration will be a core clocked at 650MHz with a shader clock speed of 1625 MHz and 512MB of 1800 MHz memory. Utilizing a 256-bit bus, the reference 9600 GT is able to pump data through its veins at 57.6 GB/sec. These numbers are subject to change, of course, depending on the manufacturer of the card and what memory is used since NVIDIA only designs the reference cards. Additionally, the 9600GT's G94 processor features 64 unified stream processors, twice the number found on the last generation 8600GT.
The card will require a 6-pin power connector and will consume around 95W of power in a single-card setup. The reference design had a single slot design but third party card manufacturers may decide to throw in some extra cooling hardware in their designs for extra heat dissipation since there are reports that the G94 runs hot under the single slot heat sink fan solution.
The reference board will also feature two dual-link DVI outputs and a single multi-out video connector for output to a high-definition TV.
As far as performance goes, NVIDIA claims a couple 9600 GT's in SLI mode will perform slightly better than a single 8800 GTX. With the cost of an 8800 GTX still above the $400 price point, the 9600 GT SLI setup is a better investment. Just to mention it, NVIDIA states the 9600 GT puts out twice the frame rates as the 8600GTS when comparing SLI performance.
AMD announced price cuts on its high-end offerings today. The Radeon HD 3870, which was priced at $249, has dropped to $189 while the HD 3850 dropped $30 from its original $199 price point to a down to earth $169 to better compete with the GeForce 9600 GT.
Initial benchmarks claim the GeForce 9600 GT is extremely competitive with the AMD Radeon HD 3850. Overclocked versions of the GeForce 9600 GT barely edge out AMD's highest offerings with current drivers. |
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| Samsung 64GB SATA II SSD In Mass Production |
2008-03-01 12:54:15 |
Samsung refreshes 64GB SSD with faster SATA II interface
Solid-state drives (SSDs) are the new hype in high-speed storage solutions and with each new launch comes improvements over the last. Currently, storage space is what many manufacturers are focusing on due to the demand by consumers.
There are still a few details that certain manufacturers are bringing up to speed. Many of the key players in the SSD game are still implementing a PATA interface on their solid-state products which is holding these devices back from performing at the highest levels. This is the reason for Samsung Electronics' most recent launch announcement.
Samsung announced in a press release that its 1.8-inch and 2.5-inch 64GB SSD with a SATA II interface is now in the mass production stage. The new SATA II version of the drive was announced in Q4 2007 and is said to remove the bottlenecks of the PATA interface used in the previous version of the drive.
According to the director of Samsung Semiconductor's flash marketing department, “While there will always be a market for HDDs, we see growing demand for our new SSDs, especially now that they are available with the SATA II interface.”
Due to the inclusion of the SATA II interface on the new refresh, transfer rates on the new 64GB SATA II SSD will increase 60 percent from SATA I versions of the same drive. Instead of the 65 MB/sec read and 45 MB/sec write speeds of the previous PATA SSD drive, the SATA II flavor will produce a maximum write speed of 120 MB/sec read and 100 MB/sec write speeds.
Additionally, because the drive is based on solid-state memory technology, the 64GB SATA II SSD will be able to withstand 1500Gs of shock within a 1/2 ms span, roughly 3 times the amount of shock a traditional hard disk drive would be able to withstand in 2 ms.
Pricing information on the 1.8-inch 64GB SSD is not officially available since these drives are currently an OEM-only option, however, it seems that PC makers such as Dell and Alienware are providing solid-state drives as a $1,000+ option in certain high-end notebook systems.
Recently, Samsung also announced a 128GB SSD using multi-level cell NAND flash which is scheduled for a mid-2008 launch with costs speculated to be around the $2,000 mark. With prices this high, only the super-enthusiasts will opt for these products.
That said, drives such as BitMICROs 832GB SSD that is scheduled for a H2 2008 launch will be completely out of reach for anyone but the mildly wealthy under current price schedules. |
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| Sony Develops Smaller, Cheaper Blu-ray Disc Laser Unit |
2008-02-09 11:55:47 |
New 3mm laser helps pave way for more compact, 9.5mm
In the spirit of continuous improvement, Sony Corporation announced on Thursday a new design of the blue-violet laser unit that measures just 3mm thick. The laser unit is a crucial component of Blu-ray Disc drives and players.
Developed in part with Nichia Corporation, the new blue-violet laser is now small enough for practical integration of Blu-ray Disc playback and record functions into mobile applications, such as laptop computers and in-car entertainment systems. Sony said that its less-than 3mm thick laser unit will enable Blu-ray Disc drives measuring in 9.5mm thickness.
Besides improvement in packaging, the new laser unit also features more stable reading of dual-layer media and new reading capabilities, such as the ability to read organic media.
The shrink to a 3mm design also cuts down cost – a critical point in Blu-ray Disc hardware. Last year, Blu-ray Disc movie players hit sub-$300 levels. Analysts now believe that it costs Sony around $400 to manufacture each PlayStation 3, thanks in part to the falling costs of Blu-ray Disc drive hardware.
With the falling price of Blu-ray Disc assemblies and processor die-shrinks to 65nm, SCEI chief Kazuo Hirai expects the PlayStation division to be profitable starting next fiscal year. |
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| NVIDIA Details GeForce 9600 GT |
2008-02-09 11:55:00 |
NVIDIA's D9M makes its first appearance on corporate roadmaps
NVIDIA's newest mid-range processor, codenamed D9M, will make its official debut as the GeForce 9600 GT.
Corporate guidance from NVIDIA lists the initial GeForce 9600 GT shipments come stock with a 650 MHz core clock and a 1625 MHz unified shader clock. Unlike the G84 core found on GeForce 8600 GT, D9M will feature a 256-bit memory bus interface. Coupled with a 900 MHz memory clock, NVIDIA calculates the memory bandwidth at 57.6 GB/s.
The texture fill rate is estimated at 20.8 billion pixels per second. The company would not indicate how many shaders or stream processors reside on the D9M core.
Late last year, NVIDIA confirmed the D9 family will use TSMC's 65nm process node. The company introduced its first 65nm processor shrink in November 2007: the G92.
Other details of the D9M family have already surfaced. ChileHardware published slides yesterday claiming the GeForce 9600 requires a 400W power supply that requires 26A on the 12V rail. Unlike previous mid-range GeForce cards, the D9M will require a 6-pin supplementary power connector.
NVIDIA publicly confirmed other details of D9M: DirectX 10.1 support, Shader Model 4.0, OpenGL 2.1 and PCIe 2.0 support just to name a few.
Further documentation from NVIDIA claims the 9600 GT will also support the Quantum Effects physics processing engine.
Like all NVIDIA processors, the GeForce 9600 is also HDCP compatible, though final support still depends on vendor implementation.
NVIDIA declined to comment on expected price of GeForce 9600. A representative for NVIDIA would comment that the performance increase between GeForce 9600 and GeForce 8600 is "almost double." |
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| Toshiba's new 128GB SATA SSDs -- hello, SanDisk? |
2008-02-09 11:52:48 |
| 128GB of SSD. You long for it, you need it, and with any luck you'll have it when Toshiba starts churning 'em out for production by May. The new 1.8-inch and 2.5-inch MLC NAND slabs with SATA interfaces will ship in three capacities: 32GB, 64GB, and the big daddy 128GB. The new SSDs are based on the new 56-nm processes announced back in January. Of course, with Toshiba and SanDisk bedfellows in flash we're also expecting a SanDisk announcement on the quick -- certainly no later than CES in early January. No prices announced, though we anticipate the year-over-year reductions to continue, right boys? |
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| The Visiontek 2600XT Quad!!! |
2007-12-06 11:06:40 |
One of the latest graphics cards to be released by Visiontek is a Radeon 2600XT model. Bored already? then fear not........ this is no ordinary XT, this video card features one gigabyte of DDR2 memory and two GPUs on a single PCB. Dual GPU cards are nothing new; there was the Voodoo 5500 many years ago and more recently the GeForce 7950 GX2. Unfortunately more often than not dual core cards are a miss rather than a hit; thinking of the X1950 Dual and Volari V8 Duo brings back awful memories for us, but when it is done right the benefits can be substantial. The 7950 GX2 for example gave us many months of enjoyment following its release.
In today's review we will be testing the 2600XT Quad against a similarly priced 8600 series product to find out which offers the best value and performance. |
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| But Wait, There's More NVIDIA G92 for 2007!! |
2007-12-06 11:05:24 |
On the heels of one of its most successful launches in history, NVIDIA sets its sights on AMD's next graphics refresh
NVIDIA's GeForce 8800 GT might be remembered as one of the most successful NVIDIA graphics cards of our time, at least according to the flurry of reviews this week. Virtually every top tier e-tailer managed to sell out of the card in less than two days.
Yet NVIDIA isn't done yet. A G92-derivative will appear later this year with even more shader units. According to company guidance, the new G92 will launch in early December and feature 128 shader units as opposed to the 112 featured on GeForce 8800 GT.
This would be mean the additional 16 shader units exist on all GeForce 8800 GT cards, but are disabled for yield or marketing purposes. In addition to the extra shaders, the new G92 will also feature higher core frequencies and support for up to 1GB GDDR3.
The new 65nm G92 has a tentative SKU designation of GeForce 8800 GTS. This might sound confusing as NVIDIA already sports a GeForce 8800 GTS card based on the 90nm G80 silicon. However, since G92 sports a 256-bit memory interface, the new 8800 GTS cards will feature traditional memory blocks of 512MB or 1024MB. The older, G80-based GeForce 8800 GTS features 320-bit memory blocks of 320MB or 640MB.
As the new GeForce 8800 GT generally outpaces the existing GeForce 8800 GTS, the new GeForce 8800 GTS will likely surpass NVIDIA's high-end GeForce 8800 GTX and potentially GeForce 8800 Ultra.
NVIDIA doesn't just risk cannibalizing its own high-end offerings -- AMD's launch schedule for Radeon HD 3800 (RV670) is slated for just a few days before NVIDIA's G92 re-launch. AMD corporate guidance suggests the company will launch its Phenom desktop processor and RD790 desktop chipset simultaneously with its new graphics offering. |
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| AMD RV670 Document Touts DirectX 10.1 Superiority! |
2007-12-06 11:04:47 |
ATI Radeon HD 3800 bets big on next-generation DirectX
On the eve of NVIDIA's GeForce 8800 GT launch, a memo to technology journalists was sent out containing details for AMD's upcoming RV670 graphics processor, officially dubbed the ATI Radeon HD 3800.
Yet rather than attacking the processing power or thermal envelope of NVIDIA's new 65nm GPU, the AMD document focuses on DirectX 10.1 support. AMD details many of these effects of this new abstraction layer, including even more anti-aliasing patterns and a new global illumination engine -- all of which are supported by the RV670 graphics processor.
RV670, slated to launch next month simultaneously with AMD's upcoming Phenom desktop processor, is still very hush-hush even so close to launch time. AMD corporate roadmaps previously indicated that RV670 is, for the most part, an optical shrink of the lackluster 80nm R600 graphics processor.
AMD's newest document fleshes out RV670 as "The new ATI Radeon HD 3800 series of GPUs are the first to be designed for DirectX 10.1, as well as other cutting edge technologies, including PCI Express 2.0, Unified Video Decoder (UVD), hardware accelerated tessellation, and power efficient 55nm transistor design."
A copy of the DirectX 10.1 whitepaper is still available at PCPerspective.
NVIDIA declined to launch a next-generation graphics processor in 2007, instead opting for the 65nm optical shrink of the G80 architecture -- dubbed G92. While G92 features fewer unified shaders than the GeForce 8800 GTX or GeForce 8800 Ultra, the majority of the architecture remains wholly intact.
However, what is clear is that NVIDIA and AMD will both benefit from the reduced process node. Smaller nodes mean lower leakage and thermal envelopes -- and in turn quieter and more robust cooling and packaging.
Banking on DirectX 10.1 selling the Radeon HD 3800 is certainly not without its criticism. DirectX 10, while clearly the future of game development, has received slow adoption from the developer community even with hardware availability in its second year now. BioShock, Crysis, Hellgate: London and Unreal Tournament 3 are the only big-ticket titles in 2007 that utilize DirectX 10 support.
DirectX 10.1 is expected to launch with the Windows Vista Service Pack 1 and is backwards compatible with the existing DirectX 10 layer. |
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| Hitachi Develops 100GB Blu-ray Disc Compatible With Existing Drives |
2007-10-17 12:41:35 |
100GB on a single Blu-ray Disc that will work with today's machines, promises Hitachi
Throughout the life of the format, DVD has been primarily limited to at most two layers, keeping the format at a maximum storage space of under 9GB. The new high-definition formats, however, appear to have taken a page from hard disk drives when it comes at adding additional storage.
Just as how adding additional platters inside a hard disk drive provides more storage, optical media makers are finding ways to stack layers of readable surface inside a polymer disc to increase capacity. Hitachi revealed this week at CEATEC JAPAN 2007 that it has successfully developed a quad-layer Blu-ray Disc that is capable of storing 100GB of data.
The concept multi-layer discs is practiced by many other media labs, but Hitachi claims that its quad-layer technology would be compatible with existing Blu-ray Disc drives after a firmware update. Prior developments of greater than dual layer discs have required special hardware to read the new media.
Hitachi is now working on improving the signal quality of its quad-layer technology so that it will be ready for market. The company also said that it is working on an eight-layer variant of the technology, which would yield a Blu-ray Disc capable of holding 200GB.
Although no new hardware may be required to read the additional layers of Hitachi’s Blu-ray Disc, it is still unclear what costs, if any, would be added onto the manufacturing side of the equation. Should expensive equipment be required to manufacture the discs, movie studios may opt to release their titles across two Blu-ray Discs rather than cram movie and special feature data onto a single disc.
While the Blu-ray camp has its hopes in Hitachi’s multi-layer disc technology, the HD DVD group recently approved a triple-layer disc that is capable of holding 51GB. In order to reach a dual-layer Blu-ray Disc-besting capacity, an extra 2GB per layer was squeezed in, for a total of 51GB. Toshiba states that continued improvement in disc mastering technology has achieved further minimization in the recording pit, allowing for the boost in capacity to 17GB in single layer and a full 51GB on a single-sided triple-layer disc.
Interestingly enough, blue-violet laser technology has not stopped endeavors in increasing the capacity of red laser-based media. UK-based New Medium Enterprises revealed in March that it developed a quad-layer DVD, called the Versatile Multilayer Disc (VMD), which is capable of storing 20GB. Even with four layers, the VMD can’t best the storage offered by today’s HD DVD and Blu-ray Disc media.
Adding just one or two layers may just be the tip of the iceberg in optical media technology. Media specialist company Ritek told DailyTech at CES 2007 that not only has it been able to produce three-layer and four-layer HD optical discs, but to have successfully designed HD media with a full 10 layers. Ritek said that its multi-layer process can be applied to both HD DVD and Blu-ray formats, making the latest developments in 20GB DVD, 51GB HD DVD and 100GB Blu-ray Discs look like just the beginning. |
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| AMD Preps "R600" Die-shrink |
2007-10-17 12:40:44 |
New ATI documents and images shed more light on AMD's newest processor core
AMD continues to develop its new RV670-based cards in the wake of the recent
ATI Radeon HD 2900 PRO release. The RV670 GPU is the current code name for a mid-range graphics core slated to fill the gap between the current Radeon HD 2600 and Radeon HD 2900 offerings.
On the surface the RV670 core is very similar to the R600 core featured on Radeon HD 2900, though where the R600 was manufactured on TSMC's 80nm process, RV670 will feature a 55nm process node.
According to early board partners, including MSI, the GPU comes clocked at 600MHz and features 320 stream processors -- the same featured on the Radeon HD 2900 series. However, test boards make use of 256MB of Hynix GDDR3 900MHz memory -- R600-based boards feature 512MB and 1GB GDDR3 or GDDR4.
New ATI documents and images shed more light on AMD's newest processor core
Photographs of the card show a single-slot cooler. Despite the single-slot cooler, the card is quite large and appears to require a 6-pin PCIe connector.
AMD guidance claims the RV670 die includes integrated Shader Model 4.1 capability along with PCI Express 2.0 support. Corporate guidance does not mention support for Crossfire, but newest images of the card clearly reveal interconnects across the top of the board found on other Crossfire cards.
As of right now the card is expected to make its way into AMD’s lineup in Q1 2008. Vendors have not issued pricing for the card, partially due to the fact NVIDIA is also expected to launch new high-end adaptors before the end of the year. |
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| "Nehalem" Taped-out and Running Windows |
2007-10-17 12:34:58 |
Intel's largest architecture overhaul in decades is less than a year away
It wasn't that long ago that predictions of doom and gloom pinned Intel between a rock and a hard place. The company's NetBurst architecture didn't scale and its Itanium architecture didn't sell; it looked as if for the first time in history, Moore's Law was in serious jeopardy.
All that changed, to some extent on a whim, with the Israeli-developed mobile processors. The mobile Core architecture would eventually replace Intel's entire NetBurst family, and the company vowed a new development cycle that would assure the company never pigeonholed itself in the same manner again: Intel's "tick-tock" philosophy. The company will replace its processor node every two years, followed by a new architecture design every other year on the mature processor node.
Nehalem chief architect, Glen Hinton, tells DailyTech the philosophy behind 731 million transistor, 45nm Nehalem is an extension of the approach to Penryn and 65nm Core 2 Duo processors: a universal, robust core design that will scale from mobile to server applications.
"We wanted to build the highest performance per core that could be used in notebooks all the way to high end servers," stated Hinton.
The Gigahertz War has officially shifted to the Multi-core War. However, instead of fighting a pitch-battle the company will focus on improvements that allow multi-core systems to scale without forking development trees. Hinton emphasizes the company spent extensive resources improving single-thread performance, for example.
An integrated memory controller and new QuickPath interface will probably steal the limelight for these new single-thread improvements, but wait, there's more.
Hyper-Threading will make its long awaited return with Nehalem, yet Hinton claims symmetrical multi-threading is a far cry from the Hyper-Threading found on NetBurst. Nehalem will allow the operating system to dynamically power down threads -- so while an eight-core Nehalem processor will appear as 16 logical cores to the operating system, these threads can be powered down on-demand.
Like AMD's Barcelona architecture, Nehalem will allow the operating system to dynamically power and sleep other components of the processor including individual cores and cache components.
Nine months later, it looks like Nehalem is following in the same footsteps at Penryn. Today Intel CEO Paul Otellini announced the company taped-out the processor three weeks ago. Otellini demonstrated a Windows XP machine running Nehalem, and claims the processor boots Mac OS X as well.
Neither Otellini nor Hinton would hint when Nehalem will see its first ship date, though Penryn is slated to ship almost exactly 11 months to the date of its tape-out announcement. Nehalem could potentially launch in the late summer of 2008 – 11 months from the initial tape out date. |
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| AMD Adds Triple-Core Processors to Roadmap |
2007-10-17 12:30:05 |
New Phenom triple-core processor coming in 2008
AMD today updated its roadmap with another multi-core processor, to slot between its dual and quad-core processors – Phenom triple-core processors. The new Phenom triple-core processors feature three processing cores on a single die and based on AMD’s Barcelona architecture, which launched last week in Opteron form.
The new triple-core processors will feature similar specifications as its upcoming Phenom X2 and X4 brethren. The Socket AM2+ processors feature 512KB of L2 cache for each core and a shared pool of L3 cache. Essentially, the Phenom triple-core processors are quad-core variants with one core disabled. This allows AMD to simply disable one core on quad-core dies for maximum use of a single wafer.
AMD claims to be the only company to offer tri-core processors, which the company claims to bring “true multi-core technology to a broader audience.” AMD has not given the Phenom triple-core processors an official name yet. However, it wouldn’t be too surprising if the tri-core processors followed the current Phenon naming scheme and received the Phenom X3 name.
“With our advanced multi-core architecture, AMD is in a unique position to enable a wider range of premium desktop solutions, providing a smarter choice for customers and end users,” said Greg White, vice president and general manager, Desktop Division, AMD. “As a customer-centric company, AMD is committed to working with our OEMs to deliver compelling value propositions across their multi-core product families with capabilities that address their requirements and aspirations.”
Features unique to AMD’s Barcelona and Stars architectures such as split power planes and dynamic independent core speed adjustments remain supported on triple-core processors. Additionally, AMD Phenom triple-core processors support HyperTransport 3.0 for up to 16GB/second of I/O bandwidth.
AMD claims significant performance gains over dual-core processors with its triple-core processors in benchmarks such as SYSmark 2007 and 3DMark06, where gaming and digital content creation performance is key.
“A continued commitment to elegant design and innovative processor architecture is instrumental to revolutionizing the technology industry,” said Richard Shim, research manager for IDC's Personal Computing program. “The advent of triple-core processors is a valuable market opportunity for customers to deliver end users compelling solutions and further differentiate on the desktop.”
Expect AMD to launch its Phenom triple-core processors in Q1 2008. AMD plans to launch its quad-core Phenom X4 next quarter. |
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| Lenovo Announces Solar Power Capable Desktop |
2007-10-17 12:29:25 |
New ThinkCentre A61e has solar panel option
Lenovo this week announced its latest ThinkCentre A61e ultra small form factor desktop with greater emphasis on green computing. The new ThinkCentre receives the Green Electronics Council’s EPEAT Gold status, for its energy efficiency and environmentally friendly materials. Lenovo’s new desktop features 90 percent recyclable material. The packaging is also 90 percent recyclable.
Lenovo packs the ThinkCentre A61e with energy-efficient 45-watt AMD processors. Single-core AMD Sempron and dual-core Athlon 64 X2 processors are available for the ultra small form factor system. Lenovo also offers an optional solar panel to power the ThinkCentre with sunlight, for the ultimate green experience.
"The importance of maximizing energy efficiency and being environmentally conscious is touching all aspects of our daily lives, from the light bulbs we use to light our homes to the hybrid cars we drive to the green technology we rely on to run our businesses," said, Peter Schrady, vice president and general manager, Emerging Products Business Unit, Lenovo. "Lenovo is committed to providing an extensive menu of environmentally-responsible, energy efficient technology choices, and the ThinkCentre A61e is our signature item. For the first time, a major PC vendor has combined small size and consistently quiet acoustics with a light weight, highly energy efficient desktop offering all at an affordable price."
Powering the ThinkCentre A61e system is an 85 percent efficient power supply. Lenovo claims the combination of energy-efficient processors and the 85 percent efficient power supply yields an average $20 a year savings in energy, per desktop.
Expect the ThinkCentre A61e to be available next month. |
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| NASA Develops Extreme Heat-resistant Computer Chips |
2007-09-15 11:27:05 |
NASA chip can take the heat: 1,700 hours of continuous operation at 500 degrees Celsius
Heat is the enemy when it comes to silicon. One of the primary goals for system designers and overclockers is to find ways to keep chips cool, usually by relying on innovative, or extreme, cooling methods.
The scientists at NASA, however, appear to have approached the issue of heat from another angle – to design a chip that can operate at intensely hot temperatures. NASA claims that its new chip, which it terms as the “silicon carbide differential amplifier integrated circuit,” in tests exceeded 1,700 hours of continuous operation at 500 degrees Celsius. Typical computer chips malfunction after just hours of extreme temperatures.
"It's really a significant step toward mission-enabling harsh environment electronics," said Phil Neudeck, an electronics engineer and team lead for this work by the Aeronautics Research Mission Directorate at NASA's Glenn Research Center in Cleveland.
As the special processor can withstand high temperatures, the requirement for elaborate cooling measures may be unnecessary. Freeing the need for cooling could enable more streamlined and reliable designs.
"This new capability can eliminate the additional plumbing, wires, weight and other performance penalties required to liquid-cool traditional sensors and electronics near the hot combustion chamber, or the need to remotely locate them elsewhere where they aren't as effective," added Neudeck.
NASA believes that this breakthrough, that it claims represents a 100-fold tolerance increase in what has previously been achieved, could lead to improved safety and fuel efficiency as well as reduced emissions from jet engines. The chip would also apply to other space exploration applications, for example, robotic exploration on the hostile surface environment of Venus.
For on-Earth uses, the temperature-resilient chip could also be used in long-lasting high temperature environments, such as oil and natural gas well drilling. Further down the line, and cost permitting, the chip would have its uses inside automotive engines. |
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| seagate Announces 1TB HDD With Native Encryption |
2007-09-15 11:24:39 |
Seagate announces a 3.5-inch 1TB hard drive with full disc AES encryption and a 250GB notebook hard drive
Seagate this week announced two new hard drives for desktops and notebook computers. The new desktop hard drive is a 1TB 3.5-inch internal drive with integrated government-grade encryption technology to keep data safe from unauthorized users. The drive is called the Barracuda FDE for full disk encryption and is the world’s first 3.5-inch desktop hard drive with native encryption and uses the same technology as the Momentus FDE notebook hard drives.
Seagate employs AES, which is the strongest level of commercially available encryption protocols. The Barracuda FDE encrypts the entire drive’s contents for full protection when the system is off. Booting a computer with a Baraccuda FDE drive requires the user to enter a pre-boot password. The Barracuda FDE desktop drive is available in capacities up to 1TB and has a 7200-rpm spindle speed.
Additionally, Seagate also introduced a new notebook drive -- the Momentus 5400.4. The new Momentus notebook drive uses a standard 2.5-inch form factor with a 5400-rpm spindle speed and packs a full 250GB of storage into a notebook-sized form factor. While this Seagate drive gives up storage capacity to the 320GB Toshiba notebook drive recently announced, the new 250GB is the largest notebook drive made by Seagate.
To reach this high level of storage, Seagate employs perpendicular magnetic recording technology it pioneered on the 750GB Barracuda hard drive last year. The Momentus 5400.4 also has improved durability with an operating shock tolerance of 325 Gs and a non-operating shock tolerance of 900 Gs.
The Momentus 5400.4 is scheduled to ship to system builders in the fourth quarter of 2007 and the Barracuda FDE is on track for shipment in 2008. Seagate has no comment on pricing of either drive at this time. |
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| Toshiba announces 160 GB 1.8" CE-ATA hard drive |
2007-09-15 11:17:33 |
Irvine (CA) – Coinciding with the release of a 160 GB iPod, Toshiba today announced a 160 GB 1.8" hard drive, which will be available with a CE-ATA interface later this year.
Toshiba's new MK-series 160 GB drive is the highest-capacity drive announced in the 1.8" segment so far, but is also the firm's first hard drive to integrate a CE-ATA interface, which has been developed for consumer electronics applications.
The MK series comes in two versions, as a PATA 1-platter 80 GB versions as well as the CE-ATA 2-platter 160 GB model. The storage density is 228 Gb/square inch in either case. The PATA model is rated at a slightly higher performance (66 MB/s data transfer rate) than the CE-ATA version (52 MB/s), but the CE-ATA model is promised to be more power efficient (0.002 watt/GB compared to 0.004 watt/GB in the PATA version – which means that both drives are rated at the same power consumption overall).
The 160 GB "MK1626GCB" is also slightly higher at 8 mm, as compared to the 5 mm height of the 80 GB "MK8022GAA", which is interestingly about the same difference that is listed by Apple for the new iPod Classic models. |
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| Nokia's 500 GPS navigator with 4.3-inch display |
2007-09-02 10:51:35 |
| Nokia's second in-car navigation system, the Nokia 500, was just unveiled in Espoo. Not only does it do the satnav, multimedia, and handsfree Bluetooth calling like the 330, the 500 does it big with a relatively jumbo 4.3-inch display. Integration between the 500's navigation and communications allows you to receive details for the POIs you pass as well as instant directions to the addresses stored in your contacts list. The 500 also features Nokia's Traffic Message Channel Service offering jam alerts as well as an embedded FM transmitter to feed audio out any FM radio. |
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| Razer Announces 4000 dpi Gaming Mouse!!! |
2007-09-02 10:49:51 |
Razer kicks Microsoft in the mouse with the 4000 dpi Lachesis
Most gamers understand the value of a good mouse when it comes to optimizing their game play. Certainly, a good mouse won’t make a bad player better, but a good mouse can help a decent player have more fun.
This week Microsoft revived the SideWinder name with a new SideWinder Mouse that had a paltry 2000 dpi. Paltry compared to the new Razer Lachesis, which is equipped with the new Razer 3G Laser engine good for a whopping 4000 dpi non-interpolated sensitivity setting. In addition to the high-sensitivity, the Lachesis also has a tracking speed of 60-100 IPS and can withstand acceleration of up to 25G during play.
Razer also uses the familiar on-the-fly sensitivity adjustment with one notable improvement, rather than using software to adjust the sensitivity levels, all adjustments on the Lachesis are done with hardware. That means you get true sensitivity settings, not settings resulting from interpolation.
The Lachesis uses an ambidextrous design that Razer optimized for a “claw” grip. Razer’s Synapse software handles the mouse programming and the Lachesis also has 32kb of onboard memory to store game profiles.
Ultrapolling at 1000 Hz provides a 1ms response time and the mouse has nine independently programmable Hyperesponse buttons. The data path on the mouse is 16-bit ultra-wide and uses the always-on mode to reduce lag.
The Lachesis only comes with a black body and is available with two lighting colors, Phantom White and Banshee Blue. The Lachesis will be available in October 2007 globally for $79.99 (USD) |
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| Microsoft Hardware's Got Game: SideWinder Line is Back With a Mouse That Defines Customized Gaming Control |
2007-09-02 10:48:03 |
The Microsoft(R) SideWinder Mouse was created to meets gamers' individual needs, providing custom tuning tools and a design for ultimate handling. The first mouse to wear the coveted SideWinder name, this top-of-the-line gaming machine sets itself apart from the competition with never-before-seen features that gamers want, uncovered during worldwide research. Features include one-touch access to Windows Vista(R) Games Explorer, Quick Turn -- a performance-enhancing macro that lets users check their perimeter from wherever they are in-game -- the first-ever LCD on a gaming mouse, and a cable anchor that doubles as an accessories storage box.
"We're taking gaming mice to a new level with a mouse created in direct response to gamer feedback from all over the world; it offers superior customization and performance handling," said Bill Jukes, product marketing manager for Microsoft Hardware. "We found that gamers are a lot like performance car enthusiasts. They like to tweak and tune their mouse to get it just right, and today we are giving them the tools to create a personalized experience that lets them focus on what's important: being at the top of their game."
The SideWinder Mouse marks the return of the popular SideWinder line of gaming peripherals, established in 1995 and known for its top-notch PC gaming peripherals, including game pads, joysticks and steering wheels. The SideWinder Mouse adds to the line of PC gaming products and reinforces Microsoft Corp.'s continued commitment to PC gamers.
Nearly 5,000 Mice in One
The SideWinder Mouse lets gamers create an individual gaming system with tuning options that allow them to personalize their SideWinder Mouse, including an adjustable weight tray, changeable mice feet with three materials for glide preference, DPI control and new software features. The SideWinder Mouse lets gamers record their own macros by tying a sequence of actions into one press of a button. With all the features in this new mouse, gamers can transform their mouse into nearly 5,000 different mice from a single system. |
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| Logitech G51 Surround Sound Speaker System Provides 360-Degree Surround Sound, Matrix Modes, Dual Mute Controls |
2007-09-02 10:46:53 |
For gamers who want to bring their games to life, the Logitech G51 Surround Sound Speaker System offers all the benefits of 360-degree surround sound – and makes it available with or without a multi-channel audio source. With Logitech’s dual Matrix technology, gamers can create a 5.1 surround-sound experience from any common two-channel stereo source.
“The G51 delivers an immersive surround-sound experience, but it goes far beyond that for gamers,” said Jef Holove, general manager and vice president of Logitech’s audio business. “Surround sound is a competitive advantage in true 5.1 games, plus the system also offers two Matrix surround modes for classic stereo games or music. For online players, the G51 features headphone and microphone jacks with independent mute controls. And, the system was designed to allow modders to easily customize the satellite speakers with their favorite game art or to match their gear. In short, the G51 is authentic gaming equipment.”
Nearly all digital music, and legacy games, are only primed for stereo – or two-channel – sound. Using Logitech’s proprietary Matrix surround sound technology, the G51 speakers split the audio signal into six channels of sound, without degrading the audio quality. That means, even if their game doesn’t provide six-channel audio, people can enjoy it anyway. As a result, gamers can gain the competitive advantages of surround sound – first-person-shooter gamers, for example, can now hear enemies creep up behind them. If they’re being shot at, they’ll know what direction the bullets are coming from.
Two Matrix modes – gaming and music – turn stereo sound into 5.1 surround sound. Gaming Matrix mode boosts the rear speakers and subwoofer to provide a more intense gaming experience. And with the ported, down-firing subwoofer, explosions sound more explosive. Music Matrix mode enhances stereo music, delivering a more natural surround-sound experience through all five satellite speakers.
With 155 watts of total RMS (root mean square) power, the G51 speaker system is optimized to deliver high-performance audio experiences. The G51 speakers feature Frequency Directed Dual Driver (FDD2) technology, which produces a uniform soundfield by housing two drivers in each satellite. FDD2 overcomes high-frequency overlap that leads to uneven sound – a major barrier to dual driver speakers in the past. The result is uniform, intense sound from any place in the room. And with laser-tuned audio drivers, the speakers provide clear audio with less distortion.
Responding to Logitech research, which showed the popularity of headphones and headsets with gamers, Logitech has equipped the G51 speakers with an improved control pod that includes both headphone and microphone jacks. The control pod provides precision dual mute controls, which allows gamers to easily mute the game audio, or mute only the microphone – or both. Independent volume controls and convenient LEDs make controlling the subwoofer, center channel and satellite speakers simple. And with the control pod’s silicone feet, gamers never have to worry about it shifting during intense gameplay.
Because gamers often want to personalize their gaming experience – from computers cases to software profiles – Logitech provides the ability to mod the G51 speakers, allowing gamers to create their own artwork for the four left and right satellite speakers. And gamers can rotate the satellite stands to mount them on the wall, or clip the center channel to the top of their LCD flat-panel monitor. |
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| Qantas passengers will soon be able to surf the Web in-flight, following the airline's decision to adopt a range of aircraft wit |
2007-08-01 12:21:33 |
Qantas passengers will soon be able to surf the Web in-flight, following the airline's decision to adopt a range of aircraft with connectivity for the airborne business traveller.
Qantas announced this week that it will be taking delivery of a fleet of A380s from August next year that the company claims will sport a "next generation in-flight entertainment system" from Panasonic.
Travellers using the planes will be able to connect up their own laptops to the Internet by the plane's on-board Wi-Fi network, charge it up using an in-seat plug socket to power up the PC or connect up devices to their local USB port.
for detail information, please visit: http://www.cnet.com.au/wireless/0,239028844,339280542,00.htm |
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| OCZ Technology Group Releases the World’s First Production 1800MHz DDR3 Solution |
2007-07-23 18:21:24 |
Sunnyvale, Calif—July 19, 2007—OCZ Technology Group, the worldwide leader in innovative, ultra-high performance and high reliability memory, today unveiled the next step to achieving maximum performance on the latest PC platforms with the launch of the World’s first production PC3-14400 DDR3 modules. These OCZ kits are meant to set industry performance standards as well as accelerate the development of next-generation enthusiast platforms.
Tested and qualified to reach DDR3-1800 with ample overclocking capability and aggressive latencies, the OCZ PC3-14400 Platinum Edition is a true milestone. At 1800MHz, the OCZ PC3-14400 modules are rated to run CL8-8-8 to take the latest Intel platforms to previously unimaginable levels.
“OCZ is excited to release the world’s first 1800MHz DDR3 solution, which offers consumers not only the fastest production specification, but has additional headroom for enthusiasts to go on and break records,” commented Dr. Michael Schuette, VP of Technology Development at OCZ Technology. “Following on the heels of the 1600MHz release of OCZ DDR3 comes the 1800MHz DDR3 series with a peak bandwidth of 14400MB per second and latencies comparable to the fastest offerings of DDR or DDR2. No other architecture can offer the same balance of bandwidth and latencies, and no other architecture has annihilated all existing high scores within a mere few weeks after its introduction and the OCZ3P18001G series plays an integral part in this triumphant achievement.”
OCZ Platinum DDR3-1800 modules will be available in single 1024MB (1GB) modules and 2x1GB dual channel kits. OCZ’s ongoing collaboration with the leading platform providers ensures optimal performance and compatibility on all the next generation computing platforms that will be introduced later this year.
Each module is 100% hand-tested for quality assurance and compatibility and features a proprietary platinum-mirrored XTC (Xtreme Thermal Convection) heatspreader for the most effective heat dissipation. As part of OCZ’s line-up of premium memory, the DDR3 series is backed by a Lifetime Warranty and industry-leading technical support for unparalleled peace of mind.
Please visit here for more information. |
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| Logitech MX Air Mouse - Gesture Based Navigation for Notebooks |
2007-07-23 18:16:11 |
Logitech is introducing an innovative wireless mouse that works on a desk or in the air. The Logitech MX Air Rechargeable Cordless Air Mouse let’s users control multimedia playback or any other mouse function with in-air hand gestures. This is similar to how gamers control the Nintendo Wii.
To change the volume, you press and hold the volume button and simply gesture – to the right to increase volume, or to the left to decrease it. For music applications, a small circular motion to the right activates the skip track command, while a circle to the left repeats the song.
Logitech’s using a technology it call Freespace to enable the gesture controls. This patented technology is based on a combination of MEMS (microelectromechanical systems) sensors, DSP (digital sprocessing) technology and RF (radio frequency) wireless technology. Freespace allow sa user to hold the mouse in any orientation, point in any directioand enjoy effortless, intuitive cursor control.
“The MX Air mouse offers a radically new way for people to control their PC entertainment,” said Rory Dooley, Logitech senior vice president and general manager of the Control Devices business unit. “It’s for anyone who has listened to music on their PC and been frustrated by having to return to the desk to change songs or volume. It’s for people who want to share vacation photos with friends and family without being tied to the desk. It’s for any of the millions of people using the Internet to browse and watch videos on sites such as YouTube or Grouper. And it’s for people with a living-room computer or media PC who want to navigate their media content
on their terms.”
Instead of a click wheel, the MX Air Mouse has a touch-sensitive scroll panel. There are several media functions on the scroll panel including paly/pause, volume/mute, back and select. The MX Air Mouse uses a rechargeable battery and a 2.4GHz radio, giving it a range of up to 30 feet.
Logitech has once again combined technology and style to make using a PC even easier. The MX Air Mouse will be available late August. |
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| Samsung Begins Mass Production of 64GB SSDs |
2007-07-05 18:14:28 |
Samsung rolls out its highest capacity 1.8" flash SSD
Back in March, Samsung announced its 64GB flash Solid State Disk (SSD). The 1.8" unit promised read speeds of 65MB/sec and write speeds of 45MB/sec.
Samsung today revealed that it has started mass production of its new drive. The 64GB SSD uses 64 eight gigabit single-level cell (SLC) flash memory chips which are built on a 51 nanometer manufacturing process.
"We see sharply increasing interest in SSDs among OEMs worldwide amid a growing push to launch premium SSD-based notebooks, particularly in the ultra-mobile category," said Jim Elliott, director, flash marketing, Samsung Semiconductor, Inc.
Samsung's 64GB SSD will likely appear at online retailers and inside ultra-portable notebooks (and UMPCs) within the coming weeks and months.
SSDs have the advantage of low power consumption, low weight, durability, silent operation and high performance. These advantages are expected to allow SSDs to account for 29 percent of ultra-portable notebooks and 25 percent of mainstream notebooks according to iSuppli.
The benefits afforded by SSDs are offset by one major deficit: pricing. 1.8" SSD are currently around five times more expensive than their 1.8" HDD counterparts. By the year 2010, that differential is expected to only drop to three times as expensive.
For those that simply can’t wait for the 1.8” 64GB SSDs to arrive, the older and slower 32GB version (53MB/sec reads, 30MB/sec writes) is available online for the princely sum of $529. |
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| NVIDIA Announces Tesla General Purpose Processor Platform |
2007-07-05 18:13:35 |
NVIDIA takes on AMD's Stream Computing Initiative with its Tesla GPU cards and HPC systems
Late last year AMD and ATI merged into one company, forming not just a bigger entity but creating a very specific roadmap altogether. AMD's grand scheme with ATI is to develop a single chip handling both general purpose computing as well as graphics. The Fusion project as AMD calls it is this very goal.
Today, NVIDIA reveals that it is not behind when it comes to general purpose GPU, or GPGPU, computing. Earlier this year the company announced its complete unified device architecture, or CUDA, Technology, which laid the groundwork for GPGPU programming for NVIDIA GPUs. CUDA Technology directly competes with AMD’s Stream Computing initiative.
The GPGPU product lineup will be known as Tesla. Tesla is a top to bottom product lineup consisting of internal PCIe cards and external high-performance computing, or HPC, systems – Tesla C870, S870 and D870.
The internal PCIe solution consists of an output-less GeForce 8-series based card on a PCIe x16 card. The Tesla D870 is NVIDIA’s only internal GPGPU card for desktops. The GPGPU still requires two external PCIe power connectors and consumes up to 170-watts of power at maximum. NVIDIA claims the Tesla D870 delivers 518 Gigaflops of GPGPU processing power.
Last year, the company announced a highly integrated graphics sub-system named QuadroPlex. Using a number of GPUs in a tightly integrated system, the QuadroPlex family of machines accelerated 3D rendering and graphics work. QuadroPlex became the stepping-stone for the new Tesla C870.
The Tesla C870 GPGPU server packs two GeForce 8-series GPUs in an external system with packaging similar to the QuadroPlex. The GPGPU delivers one Teraflop of GPGPU computing power while consuming up to 550-watts of power.
Finally, the Tesla S870 comes equipped with four GeForce 8-series GPUs and offers up to two Teraflops of computing power. The Tesla S870 consumes up to 800-watts of power and fits into a stackable 1U chassis.
Tesla C870 and S870 systems connect to workstation systems via an external PCIe Gen2 x16 interconnect. The machines contain PCIe switches and can be daisy-chained with more systems. As with the Tesla D870 GPU card, the Tesla C870 and S870 systems lack output capabilities. Theoretically, customers can purchase multiple Tesla GPGPU systems and chain them up for big increases in performance.
NVIDIA designed the new Tesla family for everything from graphics rending to medical research and data farming. At the core level, GPUs are far more efficient at dealing with parallel computing than general-purpose processors. This makes Tesla very powerful for cluster-type applications.
The Tesla S870, D870 and C870 carry an MSRP of $12,000, $1,499 and $7,500, respectively. |
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| Apple Previews OS X 10.5 Leopard |
2007-06-18 12:42:36 |
Apple unveils just a bit of its next major OS release
Apple today talked a great deal about its upcoming version of OS X, codenamed Leopard. While it's true that past and current versions of OS X have introduced a fair number of updates and new features into the overall OS X mix, upcoming version 10.5 will be a giant step forward for OS X, making the minor 0.1 numeration change quite an understatement. While Apple did not go into detail about some of what it claims to be Leopard's larger improvements and new features, it did say that more details will be revealed at a later date. For now, Apple is still working on Leopard and anticipates a shipping date sometime in spring of 2007.
Leopard will be a true 64-bit operating system with 32-bit compatibility. Apple claims that 32-bit applications will run alongside 64-bit applications without conversion, emulation or virtualization. Users will be able to run both types of applications side by side in real time.
Another major feature that Steve Jobs talked about is Time Machine, Leopard's built in backup and rollback mechanism. Time Machine brings a lot to the table in terms of keeping data safe and accessible for users and like the upcoming System Restore feature in Windows Vista, Time Machine is able to perform several neat features and then some. Users are able to instantly restore an entire system or simply one file, down to specific dates. Like the restore system in Windows Vista, Leopard users will also be able to see what past versions of a document looked like, and preview it before a restore. Time Machine also appears to be well integrated into Finder, OS X's built in file searching and management system. Users can perform file lookups by date and time stamp, and Finder will display past versions of that file. Time Machine can also perform searches within past documents.
Apple says that the API in Time Machine will be openly available to developers for integration. For example, Time Machine features are available in Leopard's release of iPhoto, allowing users to restore entire rolls of film or just one photo. Users can use Time Machine to backup to local disk or to a network.
Apple's highly popular Boot Camp will be seeing a full release in Leopard. Responsible for allowing Mac users to dual-boot Windows XP, Boot Camp was introduced earlier this year for Intel-Macs. The feature became an instant success with Mac owners and online Apple retailers even started shipping Macs with optional Windows XP Home or Professional bundles. Apple did not talk about virtualization integration.
Mac users will already be familiar with OS X highly useful but elegant desktop management feature called Expose. With Leopard, Apple is introducing a new feature called Spaces, which is really just a virtual desktop feature. However, Spaces go beyond typical virtual desktops utilities by integrating Expose-like features and presentation. Users can simply click a button, and all Spaces will arrange themselves onto the screen so that a user can see what's going on in all the desktops. Users can even drag and drop individual applications from one desktop to another within the overall view. Within the same view, users will be able to rearrange the desktops around to their liking as well. Spaces brings the best of virtual desktop features with the elegance of Expose into one highly useful tool.
Several other features being introduced with Leopard are new iChat features such as video camera support and tabbed-chat. iChat will also introduce iChat Theater, allowing users to share photos and presentations to friends through a live view. Leopard will also have vastly improve text-to-speech features, which will be able to read documents in a highly realistic voice.
Apple indicated that there are many other big features of Leopard that are still under wraps at this time, but so far, the company believes that it's ahead of Microsoft and Windows Vista. More details to come at the next Apple conference, Mac World. |
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| Intel's 975X Express gets the "Bearlake" upgrade |
2007-06-18 12:41:43 |
Intel's 975X Express gets the "Bearlake" upgrade
Intel will unveil the high-end version of its Bearlake-family next month, the Intel X38 Express. The new Intel X38 Express replaces the 975X Express, which launched over a year ago with Intel’s Presler Netburst processors. The new chipset introduces new features to Intel’s high-end enthusiast and workstation platform such as PCIe 2.0 and DDR3 memory.
New to the Intel X38 Express is support for dual full-speed PCIe 2.0 x16 slots. The dual PCIe 2.0 slots are compatible with AMD’s CrossFire technology for multi-GPU graphics processing. Motherboard manufacturers are also free to equip Intel X38 Express based boards with a third physical PCIe 2.0 x16 for triple-play physics. Due to chipset limitations, the third physical PCIe 2.0 x16 slot has lesser lanes, with most manufacturers opting for four lanes.
DDR3 is the only officially supported memory for the Intel X38 Express. Intel touts DDR3-1333 memory for X38 Express motherboards. The Intel X38 Express also supports DDR3 ECC memory. DDR2 memory support has been removed officially from the X38 Express, however, the memory controller can still function with DDR2, just without Intel validation. The DFI LANParty X38-T2R will pair DDR2 support with the Intel X38 Express chipset.
The Intel X38 Express also supports upcoming Intel Penryn-family dual and quad-core processors with front-side buses up to 1333 MHz. The new Penryn family is Intel’s first 45nm processor family, expected to launch in Q1’2008 for consumer desktops. Desktop Penryn-family Core models will launch in early 2008.
ASUS, Biostar, DFI, Foxconn, Gigabyte, Intel and MSI have X38 Express-based motherboards on display at Computex 2007. ASUS plans to release an X38 Express-based workstation board. The upcoming ASUS P5E3 WS Professional pairs the X38 Express with the ICH9R south bridge. The board supports dual-channel DDR3-1333 memory, with no mention of ECC support. The P5E3 WS Professional does not have a third physical PCIe 2.0 x16 slot. ASUS opted for a vanilla orange PCB with the P5E3 WS Professional.
Biostar is preparing the TX38D3-A7 Deluxe with three PCIe 2.0 x16 slots. Two of the PCIe 2.0 x16 slots operate at full speed while the third slot has four lanes. Biostar also adds one PCIe x1 and two PCI slots into the mix. The TX38D3-A7 also features onboard power and reset buttons for the tweaking-inclined.
DFI has two X38 Express-based models in the pipeline – the LANParty X38-T2R and the X38-T3R. The two models differ in the memory support department. The LANParty X38-T2R supports DDR2-800 memory while the X38-T3R supports DDR3-1333. The upcoming X38-T2R and X38-T3R feature genius BIOS and CMOS Reloaded technologies. New to the LANParty X38-T2R and X38-T3R is the DFI Bernstein 8-channel theater-level audio solution.
Foxconn has the X38A on display with three PCIe 2.0 x16 slots. There are also two PCIe x1 and two PCI slots. The Foxconn X38A supports DDR3 and DDR2 memory on the same board. There are four DDR3 and two DDR2 memory slots. Users can only install DDR2 or DDR3, not both at the same time.
Gigabyte is taking the same route as DFI, with two X38 Express based motherboards – the GA-X38T-DQ6 and GA-X38-DQ6. Both boards have similar feature sets, with the GA-X38T-DQ6 offering DDR3 support while the GA-X38-DQ6 supports DDR2. Gigabyte takes DDR3 further than other manufacturers by claiming support for DDR3-1600 memory. Gigabyte has opted to equip its GA-X38x-DQ6 motherboards with two PCIe 2.0 x16 slots. New to the Gigabyte X38 Express-based motherboards is the Realtek ALC889A high-definition audio codec, offering a 106dB signal-to-noise ratio.
Intel also plans to join in on the X38 Express festivities with the successor to the D975XBX2 BadAxe2. The new DX38BT Bonetrail features three physical PCIe 2.0 x16 slots. The DX38BT is one of the few enthusiast X38 Express motherboards currently on the Computex show floor without an elaborate heat-pipe cooling setup. Instead, Intel sticks with a simple aluminum cooler.
Lastly is MSI with the X38 Diamond. MSI manages to squeeze four physical PCIe 2.0 x16 slots into the X38 Diamond. Two of the PCIe 2.0 x16 slots are full-speed while the other two slots are half-speed. MSI also squeezes in support for DDR2-800 and DDR3-1333 memory on the same board.
Expect Intel to officially launch the X38 Express next month, coinciding with the upcoming Core 2 Duo E6x50-series. |
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| AMD Announces 9-watt Sempron 2100+ |
2007-06-18 12:40:34 |
New Sempron for Socket S1 embedded and SBC systems
AMD today announced the latest addition to the embedded product lineup, the Sempron 2100+ processor. The new Sempron 2100+ has a thermal design power rating of nine watts. With the low TDP rating, the Sempron 2100+ is ideal for fan-less embedded systems.
AMD packages the Sempron 2100+ in a Socket S1 package. The Sempron 2100+ is compatible with the AMD M690T chipset. The new Sempron 2100+ is the first embedded targeted processor from AMD to feature AMD64 technology.
“By expanding our product portfolio with this new, very low power version of the highly successful AMD Sempron processor and extending the temperature support in our Geode line, AMD is delivering on our promise of customer-centric innovation for a range of embedded markets,” Embedded Computing Solutions Division Vice President Greg White said. “You will continue to see AMD offer our embedded customers the products and tools they need to get high performance, very low power products to market quickly.”
Expect the Sempron 2100+ to make its way into embedded and SBCs. AAEON and Arbor offer boards compatible with the new processor. |
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| Legalized Blu-ray, HD DVD Copying Coming Soon |
2007-06-18 12:39:51 |
Managed copy in the works for HD DVD and Blu-ray Disc
One of the biggest arguments against digital rights management (DRM) is that it restricts users from doing what they wish with the media for which they’ve paid. For owners of high-definition movie players, such restrictions may soon be a little lighter.
The Advanced Access Content System Licensing Administration (AACS LA) says that it is now working to provide “managed copy” features on the media that uses its protection technology. HD DVD had plans to implement managed copy as part of its specification – a main reason why Microsoft and Intel stood behind the format – but Blu-ray Disc had thus far ignored the concept.
The final version of AACS will supposedly introduce methods for users to legally copy their high definition media. For example, a user may wish to copy a movie from his PC HD DVD drive onto his network for play on his PVR – and with managed copy, he may now do that without breaking copyright.
“The final version will include things like managed copy – which will address the main thing that hackers claim they're interested in,” said Michael Ayers, spokesperson for the AACS LA, to HDTVUK.
Currently, those who wish to do more with their HD content other than just play it straight off the disc must resort to using hacker-discovered processing keys or similar software, which are used to completely defeat the AACS protection.
Although the AACS LA’s plans to introduce a little freedom to HD media by giving users a legal way to copy their movies, the technicalities surrounding just how to accomplish that are still unclear.
“The structure of managed copy, how it's technically going to work, what will the rules and conditions for the offer of a managed copy be — part of it is just understanding the rights in offering a managed copy, the rights a content owner may or may not have,” explains Ayers. “Potentially, you could have a situation where somebody has the right to distribute on disc, but nothing else; or, the distribution rights are limited to a specific region or continent.”
Movie studios may elect to adjust its pricing on titles with managed copy. It would be an undesirable situation if movies with managed copy carried a premium over those without such rights – but the AACS is looking in the other direction, hoping that managed copy features will increase sales and acceptance of high-definition optical media.
“Studios will have to take that into account when they select pricing,” Ayers said to IDG. “We are optimistic that the studios will see this as a benefit that will drive sales.”
For current owners of high-definition movies and players, the change to managed copy will not be transparent. An upgrade to new AACS version 0.93 software will likely be required, either through an Internet connection or other means. |
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| Microsoft Plans to Revolutionize Interface Technology With "Surface" |
2007-06-18 12:39:17 |
Surface takes user involvement with digital media to the next level
Microsoft is looking to today make the same breakthrough in interface technology with "Surface" that the mouse did back in the 1980s. Surface, which will be demonstrated today at the Wall Street Journal’s D: All Things Digital conference, provides instant interaction between people and digital content using hand gestures on a touch screen.
"With Surface, we are creating more intuitive ways for people to interact with technology," said Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer. "We see this as a multibillion dollar category, and we envision a time when surface computing technologies will be pervasive, from tabletops and counters to the hallway mirror. Surface is the first step in realizing that vision."
In its current form, Surface is incorporated into a 30" display mounted into a table. This allows user involvement to expand beyond just one person. Surface is capable of recognizing input from not just one finger, but up to dozens of inputs simultaneously.
This technology isn’t exactly new as Apple uses a less complex version on its iPhone and “multi-touch” technology was demonstrated by Jeff Han to much fanfare last year. Microsoft, however, is bringing multi-touch to the masses.
Users can perform tasks such as browsing through pictures and music files by simply using their fingers. For users operating Surface in restaurants, a simple touch of the screen could allow you to order a beverage during a meal.
Surface also has the ability to read bar codes on items to provide further information to the user. "This means that when a customer simply sets a wine glass on the surface of a table, a restaurant could provide them with information about the wine they’re ordering, pictures of the vineyard it came from and suggested food pairings tailored to that evening’s menu," said Microsoft. "The experience could become completely immersive, letting users access information on the wine-growing region and even look at recommended hotels and plan a trip without leaving the table."
Microsoft also notes that the transfer of digital content is also possible with Surface. So it's not too hard to envision being able to set your Zune on Surface and transfer your playlist or video files for playback on the 30" display. |
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| Dell Shows Off Super-Slim Display Port LCD Monitor |
2007-05-24 14:18:59 |
At Dell's launch of its "Hybrid Business" strategy today, the company spent a few minutes talking about its history of developing new standards, and forcing them on the industry. One of the standards discussed: Display Port. This new interconnect, according to Dell CTO Kevin Kettler, will redefine what an LCD monitor looks like.
It will support up to 4x the current HDTV resolutions, allow for integrated peripherals around the display, and will let you daisychain multiple monitors, rather than installing them in a star configuration. Everyting, including audio, microphone, panel I/O and more will all go through a single bi-directional cable.
Even better, by eliminating a lot of the electronics used for video conversion, new LCD monitors will be super-thin, and super sleek. The prototype, displayed above, should be available later this year. It's only about a half an inch thick. Display Port also promises to make notebook monitors thinner too, said Kettle |
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