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Sunday, 30 May 2010 |
Scouting a brand new mainboard for that fancy new Phenom II X6 CPU you just picked up? You might wish to hold off a minute, significantly if you happen to're also planning on searching for a number of new GPUs as well. Sizzling Hardware has managed to get their paws round an upcoming motherboard from ASUS, the CrossHair IV Extreme. Much like the Maximus III Excessive that we noticed final November, this one also ships with the RoG Join function, enabling a secondary Bluetooth system (like a netbook or smartphone) to tweak overclocking settings from the sidelines. What actually makes this one stand out, however, is not the compatibility with all Socket AM3 Phenom and Athlon CPUs, nor the flowery new 890FX chipset. No -- it is the inclusion of Lucidlogix's practically-forgotten Hydra solution, which permits users to mix-and-match GPUs (makes and fashions are regardless of right here) in an effort to create essentially the most from no matter graphics cards you've gotten sitting around. There is not any point out of when this fellow will ship, however we'll be protecting a watch out at Computex just in case.
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Friday, 28 May 2010 |
Thought the Chevy Volt's OnStar apps had been spectacular? You may not have to buy a Volt to get them. Normal Motors says it would like to prolong such infotainment past its flagship plug-in hybrid, and has partnered with a undisclosed tech agency to help make it happen. Talking to CNN Cash, OnStar president Chris Pruess teases that we might see some of Volt's features -- distant locking, charging and perhaps air con choices -- on other OnStar vehicles, or even different ventures (the exec says they're wanting "beyond automotive") the auto producer might resolve on. The big query, in fact, is whether or not this mysterious accomplice would possibly restrict smartphone performance to a specific handset or service -- after all, after we think of cell phone manufacturers who've both labored with GM and recently acquired automotive property, one specifically comes to mind.
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Tuesday, 25 May 2010 |
Once upon a time, it meant one thing to have a digital audio player that went upwards of two full days without needing a charge. Since then, we have seen many, many examples, and it is just not that thrilling anymore. But you understand what? It is nonetheless not that usually we see a DAP with 60 hours of battery life and a three-inch, QVGA TFT LCD that plays ten hours of DivX, Xvid, WMV and H.264 video to boot, so we predict Samsung's YP-RB would possibly deserve an honorable mention. The participant was just lately spotted in a Korean distributor catalog in 4, eight and 16GB varieties, and we hope (but doubt, given difficult patent licensing points) that we'll see one stateside someday soon.
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Saturday, 22 May 2010 |
Linux development strikes at a rapid pace and, quicker than you'll be able to say Lucid Lynx, Canonical has now unveiled two new major additions to its Ubuntu bag of tricks. The first of those is the so-known as "Unity" desktop, which will be the new desktop setting for Ubuntu 10.10 Netbook Version (slated to debut in October of this 12 months). Amongst different things, it boasts a range of enhancements for netbooks and touch-primarily based units, including a pared-down interface and a new panel and utility launcher that provides you fast entry to your favorite apps. The other big news is Ubuntu Gentle, which is Canonical's tackle an instant-on OS, and is targeted straight at OEMs to be used on netbooks and different cellular devices. While it may be used on its own, Canonical largely sees it being utilized in a twin-boot surroundings with Home windows (giving Canonical an even bigger foothold within the process). Like other immediate-on OS's, it is going to integrate with Home windows and offer you entry to things like music, images and other information, in addition to provide all the fundamental apps you need. Sadly, there isn't one catch-all model of Ubuntu Gentle that you can download since it'll must be tweaked for every device, however it is out there to OEMs instantly -- nonetheless no word of any devices that can be using it, though.
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Wednesday, 19 May 2010 |
RIM thought it'd save everyone a while (us included) by bundling each the 14- and 20-key variants of its upcoming Pearl 3G in a single FCC submitting, which is terribly good of them. The phones you're looking at here are each working on WCDMA Bands II and V, which implies they'll work swimmingly on Bell, Telus, Rogers, and AT&T (although Telus and Rogers have both introduced the 20-key version alone, and neither Bell nor AT&T have mentioned a peep on the matter). At any price -- contemplating that RIM has promised a Could launch window -- we will not imagine it'll be lengthy earlier than we get the remainder of the main points (learn: your move, AT&T).
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Friday, 14 May 2010 |
"We're number two" won't be the chant everybody's after, but we now have a sense that Google is greater than happy with that on this case... for now. According to market analysis firm NPD, Google's Android working system edged up into second place within the US smartphone market in the course of the first quarter of the 12 months, leaving it nonetheless effectively behind RIM's BlackBerry OS, however marking the first time that it has moved ahead of Apple's iPhone OS. Particularly, NPD discovered that RIM maintained a robust 36 % market share for the quarter, with Android coming in at 28 percent, and iPhone OS in third at 21 percent. The expansion for Android was attributed largely to robust carrier help -- like Verizon's buy-one-get-one free provide which, incidentally, also helped Verizon preserve a 30 % smartphone market share, which is just barely behind AT&T at 32 percent, and forward of T-Cellular and Dash at 17 and 15 p.c, respectively.
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Monday, 10 May 2010 |
Intel's churning out the mobile chips like nobody's business -- no sooner does it admit the existence of Core i5 and Core i3 ULV CPUs, the chipmaker finds itself with more explaining to do. That's because dedicated Hewlett-Packard fans just found references to three new standard-voltage Core 2010 chips in the service manuals for the new HP Envy 17 and Envy 15 gaming laptops. The i7-840QM appears to be Intel's new top-of-the-line quad-core CPU, sporting a 1.86GHz clock that turbos up to 3.20GHz (or 3.20MHz, if you believe the above screencap) and 8MB of L3 cache; the i7-740QM is two steps down with 1.73GHz / 2.93 GHz clocks and a 6MB L3 cache; and the i5-450M appears to be indistinguishable from the existing i5-520M with 2.4GHz / 2.93 GHz clocks and 3MB of L3 to help it along. Given the megahertz typo above and the fact that none of these new processors appear anywhere else in the documentation, we wouldn't be surprised if these specs weren't rock-solid... but if they are, the new Envy may well live up to its name. Full PDF available below.
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Wednesday, 05 May 2010 |
We already heard that Hitachi, Panasonic and Toshiba would be delivering 60GHz wireless products in the latter half of this year, but it looks like a whole heap of other companies will be as well after this bombshell drops. The Wi-Fi Alliance and WiGig (which just nailed down a final spec in December) have finally got their respective ducks in a row, and thanks to a new partnership announced today, 60GHz WiFi products are now possible. For those unaware, 60GHz airwaves are typically reserved for high-bandwidth applications -- think streaming a Blu-ray flick from a player to an HDTV sans any cabling. The two will be working in unison in order to create a next-generation certification program for products operating in the 60GHz band, and best of all, a "significant portion, if not all, of these devices are expected to also support traditional WiFi networking in the 2.4GHz and 5GHz bands." There's no mention of when exactly the first 60GHz WiFi wares will begin to ship, but we can certainly say we're eager to update this here tutorial when tri-band becomes reality.
Update: The rival WirelessHD alliance (updated to 1.1 today with support for 3DTV, HDCP 2.0, data applications and data rates in excess of 10Gbps) says it will support WiGig with dual-mode WirelessHD/WiGig silicon now available from SiBeam for sampling. Hey, what would a standard be if we didn't have options?
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