47558103
submission
MojoKid writes
"For the last 20 years, NVIDIA has developed and used its own graphics IP in-house. While the company engaged in several prominent cross-licensing deals with companies like Intel, those deals never resulted in an Intel-branded graphics card or an equivalent product from another company. Today, that changes — NVIDIA has announced that henceforth, it will license its graphics designs to other companies. It's not hard to see why. Imagination Technologies is currently the graphics darling of the mobile industry. It has provided GPU solutions to Apple, Intel, Samsung, and a host of other, smaller players. With Tegra, NVIDIA tackled the market with an all-in-one solution that it hoped would win designs on the strength of its overall performance and mobile graphics. Clearly, NVIDIA now feels it has more to offer beyond just a silicon solution, by licensing its graphics IP separately, rather than trying to entice manufacturers with only packaged silicon."Link to Original Source
47522895
submission
MojoKid writes
"Intel announced a set of new enterprise products today aimed at furthering its strengths in the TOP500 supercomputing market. As of today, the Chinese Tiahne-2 supercomputer (aka Milky Way 2) is now the fastest supercomputer on the planet at roughly ~54PFLOPs. Intel is putting its own major push behind heterogeneous computing with the Tianhe-2. Each node contains two Ivy Bridge sockets and three Xeon Phi cards. Each node, therefore, contains 422.4GFLOP/s in Ivy Bridge performance — but 3.43TFLOPs/s worth of Xeon Phi. In addition, we'll see new Xeons based on this technology later this year, in the 22nm E5-2600 V2 family, with up to 12 cores. The new chips will be built on Ivy Bridge technology and will offer up to 12 cores / 24 threads. The new Xeons, however, aren't really the interesting part of the story. Today, Intel is adding cards to the current Xeon Phi lineup — the 7120P, 3120P, 3120A, and 5120D. The 3120P and 3120A are the same card — the "P" is passively cooled, while the "A" integrates a fan. Both of these solutions have 57 CPUs and 6GB of RAM. Intel states that they offer ~1TFLOP of performance, which puts them on par with the 5110P that launched last year, but with slightly less memory and presumably a lower price point. At the top of the line, Intel is introducing the 7120P and 7120X — the 7120P comes with an integrated heat spreader, the 7120X doesn't. Clock speeds are higher on this card, it has 61 cores instead of 60, 16GB of GDDR5, and 352GBps of memory bandwidth. Customers who need lots of cores and not much RAM can opt for one of the cheaper 3100 cards, while the 7100 family allows for much greater data sets."Link to Original Source
47479629
submission
MojoKid writes
"Odds are, if you’ve purchased anything that uses Flash memory in the last 20 years or so, you already own a piece of SanDisk technology. The company has been in Flash storage since the late ‘80s and manufactures products used in everything from smartphones to digital cameras. Even though it enjoys a long history in the Flash memory business, SanDisk is perhaps not as well known for its Solid State Drive (SSD) solutions for desktop and mobile PCs. However, SanDisk recently expanded their product stack with new, high-performance SSDs that leverage the company's own NAND Flash memory and Marvell’s popular 88SSS9187 controller. The new drives are SanDisk’s Extreme II family of SSDs targeted performance enthusiasts, workstations professionals and gamers. The initial line-up of drives consists of 120GB, 240GB, and 480GB models. Performance specifications for the three drives come in at 545MB/s – 550MB/s for reads with write performance from 340MB/s to 510MB/s, depending on density. In the benchmarks, SanDisk's Extreme II SSD showed it has the chops to hang with some of the fastest drives on the market from Samsung, Corsair and OCZ."Link to Original Source
47390285
submission
MojoKid writes
"Dell recently introduced their Alienware X51 series of small form factor gaming PCs but until now, squeezing in components that were powerful enough for the enthusiast gamer was a significant thermal challenge. Intel's recent Haswell Core processor release, as well as NVIDIA's GeForce 670 series graphics cards have changed the game considerably though. The X51 R2 is shaped similar to to an Xbox 360 Slim, and though it's slightly larger, it would be right at home in a living room setting. Alienware is also bundling Steam Big Picture mode installations with systems as well. Performance-wise, with its latest CPU and GPU upgrades, the system is over twice as fast as the first generation X51, again thanks to Haswell and upgraded NVIDIA GeForce graphics. The console-sized PC is capable of running virtually any current gen DX11 title at full 1920X1080 HD resolution and high image quality settings."Link to Original Source
47352345
submission
MojoKid writes
"Intel is updating its line of enterprise-class solid state storage offerings today, with a new more cost-effective drive that targets datacenter and cloud-computing applications. The Intel SSD DC S3500 as it is known, is similar in a number of ways to the SSD DC S3700, though it's built on more affordable NAND flash memory than the previously released DC S3700-series drives. Regardless, data integrity and consistent performance across varying workloads remain key design goals for Intel’s datacenter-targeted “DC”-branded drives, but the new SSD DC S3500 will do so at much more mainstream price points than the higher-end DC S3700-series. The Intel SSD DC S3500 will be offered in 80GB — 800GB capacities in both 2.5” and 1.8” form factors. The drive is rated at a maximum of 500MB/s read and 450MB/s write bandwidth at 85K IOPS. In the benchmarks, read performance was competitive with most any high-end SATA SSD on the market now. Write performance, while good, wasn’t quite as high as some competing offerings in the majority of tests."Link to Original Source
47324815
submission
MojoKid writes
"AMD is stepping up its efforts on the CPU front by announcing two new FX-series chips, the FX-9590 and FX-9370. The company claims that the FX-9590 is the world’s first commercially available processor clocked at 5GHz (Max Turbo), and the FX-9370 isn’t far behind at 4.7GHz(Max Turbo). Based on the Piledriver architecture, the 8-core processors are unlocked so gamers can push the already-high CPU clock even further. They also feature AMD Turbo Core 3.0, which is designed to optimize performance across all of the CPU’s cores. AMD didn’t announce plans for when or if you’ll be able to buy these processors outright; for now, they’re only available through system integrators."Link to Original Source
47324671
submission
MojoKid writes
"Now that we have system specs from both the PS4 and Xbox One, we can compare the two and see which console is better equipped for the future. A similar CPU is found in both consoles. The PS4 wields a custom low-power x86-64 AMD Jaguar chip with eight physical processing cores, and the same is true of the Xbox One. In this category, it's essentially wash, though the PS4 leaps ahead when looking at the other specs. Of most interest are the GPU and RAM, as these are primarily gaming devices, after all. The Xbox One's GPU is similar to a Radeon 7790, offering 68GB/s of bandwidth to a local 32MB SRAM memory cache, plus another 30GB/s of bandwidth to game controllers and peripherals like the Kinect. It also has 8GB of DDR3 system memory. The GPU in the PS4 offers similar performance to a Radeon 7870, which is quite a bit more powerful than the 7790. It's also aided by 8GB of unified GDDR5 RAM and thus able to offer 176GB/s of bandwidth to the CPU and GPU. The advantage here clearly lies with Sony."Link to Original Source
47301945
submission
MojoKid writes
"On the hardware side, Apple is updating its two MacBook Air devices; both the 11-inch and 13-inch versions will enjoy better battery life (up to 9 hours and 12 hours, respectively), thanks in no small part to having Intel’s new Haswell processors inside. They’ll also have 802.11ac WiFi on board. Both models have 1.3GHz Intel Core i5 or i7 (Haswell) processors, Intel HD Graphics 5000, 4GB of RAM, and has 128GB or 256GB of flash storage. Arguably the scene stealer on the desktop side of things is a completely redesigned Mac Pro. The 9.9-inch tall cylindrical computer boasts a new “unified thermal core” which is designed to conduct heat away from the CPU and GPU while distributing it uniformly and using a single bottom-mounted intake fan. It rocks a 12-core Intel Xeon (256-bit) processor, dual AMD FirePro GPUs (standard), 1866MHz DDR3 ECC memory (60GBps), and PCIe flash storage with up to 1.25GBps read speeds. The system promises 7 teraflops of graphics performance, supports 4k displays, and has a host of ports including four USB 3.0, two gigabit Ethernet ports, HDMI 1.4, six Thunderbolt 2 ports that offer super-fast (20Gbps) external connectivity."Link to Original Source
47222501
submission
MojoKid writes
"Dell recently combined two trending PC design styles into a single system and called it the XPS 18 Portable All-In-One Desktop. The machine has all the power of an AIO desktop system and some of the portability of a tablet. To be clear, Dell isn't suggesting you'll want to tote this thing across town in ways that you might use an iPad. It's portable in that you can snatch up the 18.4-inch Full HD display from your home office and take it to the living room to switch gears from Google Docs to gaming with the kids, or take it upstairs for some late night surfing before bed. The system is powered by an Intel Core i5 3337U dual-core 1.8GHz CPU that can Turbo to 2.7GHz, 8GB of DDR3-1600 memory, and a 500GB HDD / 32GB mSATA SSD hybrid storage subsystem for faster response times. The main attraction, however, is that the PC itself is a portable display featuring an 18.4-inch IPS panel with a 1920x1080 resolution and full touch support. Performance-wise the XPS 18 holds its own versus mainstream all-in-one touch PCs, but with added ability to pick the 5 pound system up go virtually anywhere with it on a moment's notice."Link to Original Source
47154005
submission
MojoKid writes
"AMD recently unveiled a handful of mobile Elite A-Series APUs, formerly codenamed Richland. Those products built upon the company’s existing Trinity-based products but offered additional power and frequency optimizations designed to enhance overall performance and increase battery life. Today AMD is launching a handful of new Richland APUs for desktops and small form factor PCs. The additional power and thermal headroom afforded by desktop form factors has allowed AMD to crank things up a few notches further on both the CPU and GPU sides. The highest-end parts feature quad-CPU cores with 384 Radeon cores and 4MB of total cache. The top end APUs have GPU cores clocked at 844MHz (a 44MHz increase over Trinity) with CPU core boost clocks that top out at lofty 4.4GHz. In addition, AMD's top-end part, the A10-6800K, has been validated for use with DDR3-2133MHz memory. The rest of the APUs max out at with a 1866MHz DDR memory interface."Link to Original Source
47125547
submission
MojoKid writes
"If Haswell's debut on the desktop has left you feeling a bit flat, the company's mobile efforts may be the pick-me-up you've been hoping for. Intel's major mobile push with ultrabooks is meant to simultaneously beef up design capabilities while cutting rated power consumption in two types of designs — those that put processors in the base of the product (traditional laptops), and those that drop the CPU behind the screen (tablets and convertibles). To make this happen, the company is introducing its new low-power Y-series with a Scenario Design Power (SDP) of 6W. SDP is a new metric that measures platform power consumption in tablet workloads and uses different metrics to establish a lower figure. Intel is also expanding ultrabook requirements and baseline capabilities. WiDi (Intel Wireless Display) is now a requirement, as are longer stand-by times, faster wake, mandatory antivirus protection, and a higher emphasis on ultra-thin designs."Link to Original Source
47068021
submission
MojoKid writes
"Hot Hardware recently set out to design a custom mini desktop system with the popular Raspberry Pi single board computer. The Raspberry Pi is a Linux-driven, ARM processor-based micro computer that is known for its low cost and small size. People have configured the device for a variety of applications, from micro-servers to low cost media players. Basically, the goal was to turn what is currently one of the cheapest bare-bones computer boards into a fully enclosed mini desktop computer that could be taken anywhere without the need for cabling or setup. This small DIY project is just one of many examples of the flexibility of the Raspberry Pi's open architecture. And to think you can even run Quake and Minecraft on it."Link to Original Source
47035565
submission
MojoKid writes
"Intel is officially launching Haswell today, their 4th Generation Core processor technology for the desktop market, with a follow-on release of dual core and mobile Haswell offerings coming up quickly on June 3rd. Haswell marks a number of firsts for Intel, including leading-edge technologies like on-chip voltage regulators, eDRAM, and their first graphics engine that fully supports the DX11.1 specification and OpenGL 4.0. With these new features alone, Haswell is primed to offer significant performance and feature enhancements. That said, Intel's 4th Generation quad-core desktop variant, the Core i7-4770K that Intel showcased today honestly feels a little tepid, in terms of its modest gains over previous generation Ivy Bridge performance. Haswell currently feels like its biggest play will be in the mobile space, at least until higher-end Haswell desktop CPUs come to market. Haswell mobile CPUs with Iris and Iris Pro Graphics engines, will undoubtedly shine even brighter, especially when you look at performance-per-watt and battery life metrics. That said, Haswell is the proverbial foundation for Intel's next round of products and product life cycle. Intel's 4th Generation Core processor technology has been enabled with new functional blocks and features that will provide much-needed platform hooks for future generation enhancements and performance gains."Link to Original Source
46975699
submission
MojoKid writes
"It was just last week that NVIDIA launched the GeForce GTX 780, which is essentially a scaled-back GeForce GTX Titan, at much more palatable—but still relatively high—price. Today marks the arrival of that card's little brother, the GeForce GTX 770. The GeForce GTX 770 looks much like the GTX 780 and Titan, but underneath its cooler assembly lies a different sort of animal, built around NVIDIA’s GK104 GPU, the very same chip that powers the GeForce GTX 680. There are some significant differences between the GeForce GTX 770 and GTX 680, however. First, all GeForce GTX 770s will ship with 7Gbps DRAM, which is the highest clocked GDDR5 memory employed on a graphics card thus far. Peak memory bandwidth at that speed is 224.3GB/sec, or about 15% more memory bandwidth than the GeForce GTX 680. NVIDIA’s board partners will offer the GeForce GTX 770 in two configurations, one with 2GB and a higher-end model with 4GB. The GeForce GTX 770 also features the same GPU Boost 2.0 technology used in GeForce GTX TITAN and GTX 780. The base clock speed of the GeForce GTX 770 reference board is also somewhat higher at 1046MHz, with typical Boost clock speeds is 1085MHz range. At those clocks, the card offers a peak texture filtering rate of 133.9 GTexels/s, up from 128.8 on the GeForce GTX 680. Performance-wise, in the benchmarks, the GeForce GTX 770 is significantly faster than its predecessor and at more mainstream price tag than the expensive GeForce GTX 780."Link to Original Source