ASUS Eee 1201N Tips Up

A mainstream 64bit enabled Atom 330 laptop from ASUS may be coming soon.

I've been anticipating an Atom 330 based laptop for long. Some models have shown up here and there, but seeing them on the retail is a problem. The appeal is great: x86-64 support, 8w of power consumption and about 200-260% more performance per watt than AMD's 1.6GHz Athlon Neo - about the same as the dual core Athlon Neo X2.
The new Eee features also an Ion chipset(GeForce 9400M) which adds very good graphical and video playback capabilities to an already decent processor. HDMI and VGA ports are also available for enhanced connectivity.
This new laptop seems poised to hit a sweetspot for people looking for good performance and excellent mobility.

There's also a similar 1201HA model available, which features an Atom N280, Intel chipset and no HDMI. Both models are expected to hit retail towards the end of the month.

Radeon 5770 And 5750 NDAs Are Up

The Radeon HD 5750 and 5770 is here. After a better look at the cards, the 5750 keeps it's appeal and the 5770 doesn't look any better.

Just like with the 5800 series, the 5770 card delivers not much extra performance for the hefty price premium. From Anandtech's review, the card does perform well in CryEngine 2 benchmarks:


Compared with the Radeon HD 4850, results are pretty good, although due to AA, these results are affected by the lack of available memory on the Radeon HD 4850.

Crysis: Warhead performs better in the 4850, the new 5700 series still take the lead:


The main problem with these cards is their price - it's kind of high compared to current offerings, although they do lack the extra features. The 512MiB 5750 is not really appealing, as most games do need the extra memory right now, and the 5750 still costs $129. The 5770 costs an extra $50 and doesn't show performance to justify it at all. The 4870, which is selling for less than the 5770 currently, outperforms it considerably everywhere, so that will be a good pick if you plan to change the graphics card by the time DX11 are widely available.

It remains to be seen if voltage capping doesn't affect the ability of the 5750 to overclock because, if that's not the case the card becomes an excellent proposal for gamers on a budget.
With no competition from Nvidia for some months to come, there really isn't other options on the market for the mainstream in the short term. For now, the 4870 cards and some 4890 cards can still provide better performance for almost the same price but it's up to you to sacrifice DX11 support.

Nvidia Tegra Inside Next-gen Nintendo Portable

As Nvidia starts to change its focus to other areas that don't involve desktop graphics, the rumor mill delivers a juicy rumor.

The story goes like this: Nvidia has an ARM11 based SoC(system on chip) and Nintendo has an ARM based Nintendo DS/DSi. Put the two together int the same room and you have GeForce 6 class graphics features on an handheld device and serious possibilities for retro compatibility with the DS/DSi consoles currently on the market.

Nvidia is expected to announce the Tegra 2 soon, a new SoC upgrade with a CUDA capable GPU core and the ARM Cortex-A9 CPU core. It's still uncertain which one will make it's way to the Nintendo device. Microsoft has chosen not to wait and went with the Tegra for the new Zune HD but since the new console shouldn't be out this year, it might very well feature Tegra's successor.

Source: Yahoo! Games UK