Hardware Post: 03/25/11

Friday, March 25, 2011

Device with Windows 7 Tablet PC Acer Iconia W500 with docking keyboard

At the bottom there are two docking ports, through which you connect the Tablet PC with the keyboard. To make the Iconia necessary, a netbook-like computer. Above all, make a longer text entries are more comfortable with the keyboard. For wired network connections available to the PC via a network jack.

External devices connect via USB port. For wireless data exchange with the Tablet PC is equipped with WLAN and Bluetooth. UMTS-compatible versions are also available. On the Tablet PC is the latest Microsoft operating system "Windows 7" is used. The essential hardware components are made by AMD: the graphics-chip Radeon HD6250 "" C-50 "processor to the side.

Who's the loudest: Intel, AMD or ARM?

iSuppli has done its accounts and concluded on the respective market shares of Intel and AMD over the global market for microprocessors in 2010. Surprise? Not surprise: Intel finished the year by controlling 81% of the market is 0.4 points more than in 2009 and has allowed AMD to 11.4% of the market (- 0.8 points).

AMD has particularly suffered in the last quarter of the year, losing 1.3 points compared to 2009. iSuppli considers not only the x86 CPU: RISC are also included and therefore all ARM chips from shelves. Overall the market has shown over the year a turnover of 40 billion dollars, 25% better than 2009.

Mac OS X and the TRIM: "The" hack

With the release of the latest MacBook Pro Mac OS X began to manage the famous TRIM control, guaranteeing the sustainability performance of SSDs. However, only owners of the latest Mac and Apple could benefit from SSD. Our colleagues MacBidouille got down to break the shackles, with success. The blockage is at the level of a kernel extension for Mac OS supports storage devices.

This extension contains a detection procedure which verifies that the DSS is called well-installed Apple SSD. He "just" so to replace that string with the name of the DSS really present in the machinery that TRIM is activated. More exactly, it must be limited to the first 9 characters of the DSS for not varying the size of the file.

Finally blocks compact PLC

Netgear has announced a new generation of PLC blocks and - good news - they are finally compact. The new range of "Nano" (AV 200 Powerline Nano XAVB2101) is considerably smaller than older models and functions are the same: a connection to 200 Mbps in theory and about 70 Mbps in practice. To get an idea, Nano measuring 67 x 55 x 34 mm, conventional models are 90 x 53 x 32 mm (they are much longer) and models with a female are 138 x 65 x 40 mm.

Kingston broad range of microSDHC Card Class 10.

Kingston, one of the largest manufacturers in terms of memory products, announces the launch of new cards microSDCH Class 10 with 4GB and 8GB sizes, joining the 16GB model, also class 10, then include a 32GB model in the second quarter. MicroSDHC cards use Class 10 compatible with mobile phones, cameras, high definition (HD) or tablets, is intended to provide a more rapid transfer rate, thus satisfy all users, both in speed and storage capacity.

Reaching only 12 V power supplies?

Interestingly, the new generation of Intel chipsets could help simplify power. Currently, a PC power supply provides three voltages: 3.3 V, 5 V and 12 V (-5 V and sometimes for old ISA cards). Professional for chipsets with Sandy Bridge, we could move to a single voltage: 12 V. Indeed, in a typical PC, a lot of needs is on this tension and components that require a voltage of 5 V or 3.3 V are rare.

Mac OS X natively supports the Radeon 6000 GPU and 5000

A specific operating system update to Mac OS X 10.6.7 MacBook Pro includes native support for several graphics cards AMD Radeon series 5000 and 6000. Thanks to this new Quartz Extreme and CoreImage received an interesting performance boost when used on these GPUs. In addition to technical aspects, support also means that the Radeon HD 6xxx in the list below, can be used for the next models with Sandy Bridge processors expected in April.

Motorola develops its own mobile operating system

Motorola is putting up a team of developers to create their own mobile operating system and eliminate its dependence on Android. Engineers, Information Week report, have arrived in recent months from Adobe and Apple. A computer engineer, Gilles Drieu, had led to the development team of Apple apps and rich media content, participating in the ratification of web standards under the supervision of the W3C.

Then, the least expensive 25 nm Flash?

The first Intel 320 Series, aka Postville Refresh newly listed LDLC by allowing us to know their prices. Definitely less expensive flash memory 25 nm? Well, no, or at least not yet. A 169 € the 80 GB, the new 320 Series range comes at the same price as the previous one. In addition, 220 € the 120 GB is not very well placed in relation to essential Vertex 2 OCZ (205 € with the same dealer).

It may also prefer to spend a little more to gain speed with Vertex 3 or ... an Intel 510 Series, both SATA 6, and 250 € to 120 GB

Domino wins the Orange screen

The 'Domino' Orange wins a screen. This small device can actually do what the majority of smartphones offering lately: sharing a 3G wireless connection Proposed for two years at Orange, the original is a Domino Huawei E5830 while the new model is a Huawei 585. Operation is simple: the Domino accepts a SIM card and can then share the connection with Wi-Fi 802.11g to 5 devices.

It is 3G compatible (up to 7.2 megabits per second) but also EDGE and GPRS. Good idea, the unit accepts microSD cards and can therefore serve as storage media. In addition to Wi-Fi, the device can also connect via USB, so classic, and serve as a key 3G. Autonomy announced is 5 hours and - new - a screen to check the type of connection used, the number of customers and especially the volume of data exchanged.

Additional cuts on the Radeon

The statement at the end of March is quite similar to what we were doing a month ago: If the NVIDIA graphics medium and high end do not see their prices drop significantly (at best, the GeForce GTX 570 loses 4 %), it is instead the case of the Radeon. Thus, the Radeon HD 6870 and 5870 receive a discount of not less than 10%.

The first comes close to the price of the GeForce GTX 460 when it is at the very least 20% more efficient. She confirmed her status more than ever graphics card for player broke that we had found during his introduction. When the second, still stocking our opinion about it does not vary from the preceding month, for one simple reason: the Radeon HD 6950 has also seen its price fall from around 6%.

Gigabyte also exceeds 3 TB

The problem of managing hard disks larger than 2 TB per motherboards BIOS are increasingly solution. Besides those from Seagate and Asus, Gigabyte now announcing its utility 3TB + Unlock Utility. We have not yet been able to test this software and Gigabyte is not very forth on its operation. It requires prior installation of a specific driver and promises to create a virtual storage space of over 2048 GB via virtual partitions of 2048 GB Gigabyte therefore incorporates a logic similar to that of the Disk Utility Asus Unlocker.

Raidmax BLACKSTORM: Designed for gamers.

The new BLACKSTORM Raidmax presents a practical design that allows for proper distribution of the elements found on the front two USB ports, two audio jacks and an e-SATA port, which facilitates the connection without having to resort to the rear. Among its main features, the BLACKSTORM has four bays covered with a grid, thus improving the airflow of the box, also can be easily removed with a single click making installation of the components not only tools required for installation hard drives or other devices.

AMD is first on the USB 3.0 (well almost ...)

AMD has just received certification for two USB 3.0 chipsest Hudson, ahead of Intel, which should take care that this bus at the exit of its chips Ivy Bridge. The certifications will chip in Hudson D3 (AMD A75 FCH) for desktops and M3 (AMD A70M FCH) for laptops. (See "Three Hudson chipsets for AMD Llano) Llano They will decorate the platform that is expected for September 2011.

Taking a step back to the classic match Intel - AMD, VIA is who was the first manufacturer to have received such certification (see "The first controller is USB 3.0 certified"). Texas Instrument is also seeing some certified controllers, but as you have noticed, motherboards, hard drives and other products already offer USB 3.0, even without certification, which causes problems with images USB-IF.

Microsoft buys $ 7.5 million for IPv4

Microsoft has just bought 666,624 IPv4 addresses belonging to the Canadian operator that went bankrupt Nortel for $ 7.5 million. A sign that Microsoft and the rest of the world are not ready to move to IPv6, the firm decided to take the lead in buying a large block of addresses to $ 11.25 per unit. 470 000 of them will be available immediately.

The rest will be made available to Microsoft once the liquidation is complete. Prices are rising, but rumors in the bodies responsible for distributing the addresses would argue that Microsoft simply decided to buy and resell for profit. Others believe that Microsoft made a reservation to address future needs.

Honeycomb Android is not open source

Google said it would not release the source code of its operating system Honeycomb, as it did for other versions of Android. We remember the famous words of Andy Rubin, manager at Google, "the definition of open mkdir android, android cd; repo init-u git: / / android. git. kernel. org / platform / manifest.

git; repo sync; make '. He was responding to attacks from Steve Jobs (see "Apple breaking records and Jobs to loose") explaining that open meant it was possible to download the system source code to compile it, it is of course impossible to do with IOS. Nonetheless, it appears that Google has decided to change his mind.

Nintendo 3DS unfolds

Finally available, the 3DS is an evolution rather important for Nintendo that we were accustomed to a certain conservatism with its latest handhelds. Screwdriver and our crazy to be seized with a sudden craving ...

Nintendo 3DS (homepage) Nintendo 3DS (wikipedia)

Apple's operating system is celebrating its birthday: Ten years of Mac OS X

Stockbrokers and Apple fans have become accustomed to the ritual: At the end of a business quarter, the manufacturer reports from Cupertino, California new record figures. Largely responsible for this are the iPhone and iPad. Both the text and the Tablet PC running the operating system "IOS" - a special version of Mac OS X.

Apple on the sunny side. That was not always so. Flashback: In the late '90s, the company with their backs to the wall. With Mac OS 9, Apple and only a lame compared to "Windows 95" and "Windows 2000" obsolete operating system. The main reason: Steve Jobs, computer pioneer and ingenious company co-founder, is no longer on board.

Action game for PC, PS3, Xbox 360: Duke Nukem will come later: And he does it again!

In the year of our Lord 1248 in Cologne, work began on the cathedral. Completed, the church building until 1880 - 632 years after the groundbreaking ceremony. From this period dates the mocking Cologne saying: "If the dome is finished, go to the world." The reason for the long construction period were financial problems and fresh aesthetic ideas.

A similar fate has befallen the action game "Duke Nukem Forever". announced More than fourteen years, the game disappeared with the insolvency of the developer's team in the 2009 sinking of 3D Realms. Game publisher Take-Two took over 2010, almost ancient tracks, and reveals in a press release: Cathedral of the video game industry will not appear until 2630, but on 3 May 2011.