tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-85915506629214364362012-02-01T19:25:57.462ZThe hardware crazeTiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.comBlogger5591100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-33076587801749159472011-09-14T05:33:00.001+01:002012-02-01T19:17:21.964Z

Introduction First I would like to mention that it is not the first time that someone brings problems with Multi GPU implementations into the spotlight, as you may already have heard about "micro stuttering". Micro stuttering was described as an uneven frame rate when using two GPUs, something that may happen for other reasons like lack of RAM, software accessing the HDD at the same time,

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-17867700777443926122011-09-05T18:20:00.000+01:002011-09-05T18:32:56.224+01:00

As some of you may know from my previous Xbox 360 dissections, it is one of those devices that has suffered massive failures from bad solder quality since the world as switched to the eco friendly lead free solder. Even though this kind of solder has been around for a few years now, the new formulas still seem to exhibit some problems in the long term, which is what I noticed on a pre-production

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-59261457152827310832011-09-03T19:09:00.001+01:002011-09-05T17:01:07.293+01:00

So it seems someone from Gigabyte unknowingly posted a BIOS updated too soon. We now know what more to expect from AMD's upcoming FX processors, based on the "Bulldozer" architecture. Besides previously announced dual and triple module variants (each with two integer cores), we know have more details on the clock speed and Turbo modes. While I previously speculated that, given targets of up to

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-47028350253144228022011-08-27T02:04:00.000+01:002011-08-27T02:04:05.091+01:00

Notice that yellow sticker? Asus has the habit of not letting you mess with your hardware or you will get your warranty void. Want to change a CPU? You're out of luck. Memory and HDD are typically ok but have a look online if the part you want to change is easily accessible. One thing that worries me considerably is that if one needs to clean the fan + heatsink assemly, most commonly one will

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-50373463964897614152011-08-24T18:00:00.002+01:002011-08-24T18:01:08.684+01:00

Couldn't help it, had to drop a post about this. I must say you have to go a good while back to remember such low profile coolers on CPUs that aren't built for HTPCs or for laptops. Good to see, in one way, as the new Pentiums based on "Sandy Bridge" cores do pack a considerable bang for the buck. Still, and this is the main topic of this post, this was what we saw three years ago, after a

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-86251124111965093952011-07-16T16:34:00.000+01:002011-07-16T16:34:09.381+01:00

And it's that time of the week, where AMD releases a product that has such an absurd model number that one has to wonder what floats in the air of Sunnyvale. Take a wild guess at the performance and specifications of the new Radeon HD 6990M, which is targeted at performance oriented laptops. Please, go ahead. For sure your mind isn't ready for the amount of bullshit coming your way. The Radeon

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-49080688943128557542011-06-29T17:20:00.001+01:002011-06-29T17:20:55.508+01:00

The model is the Aspire 5253 and comes equipped with one screen that is... wait for it... 15.6" diagonal. Nice... So, although not uncommon for Acer, they are now sticking very low end CPUs(1GHz dual core) on 15.6" laptops and charging the same than what you would pay for a Pentium or AMD Phenom based laptop. Comparing with other AMD offerings, this one offers better battery life and decent

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-92064579057616847692011-04-29T00:03:00.003+01:002011-04-29T01:10:53.127+01:00

Giddy up for another AMD "Bobcat" based E-350 media center hardware with Zotac. Specs after the jump. This motherboard packs mostly everything you would want in a media center and it can even double up in some other duties, courtesy of the dual SO-DIMM slots. Passively cooled, it packs quite the cooler but again disappoints the "picky" me, which can't stand low end, high electrical noise

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-7537749033846782022010-11-27T19:57:00.003Z2010-11-27T19:58:47.489Z

Intel processors have been among the most confusing lines of CPUs yet, since they feature completely different naming schemes compared to the hardware on Desktop CPUs. For instance: Core i5 760  in desktop: 2.8GHz, 3.33GHz Turbo, 4 cores, no HyperThreadingCore i5 450M in laptops: 2.4GHz, 2.66GHz Turbo, 2 cores, HyperThreading So, it should come as no surprise that the desktop CPU is more than

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-43246149357914018812010-11-11T19:20:00.001Z2010-11-11T19:20:32.406Z

OLPC Lead Software Engineer Chris Ball writes: Hi all, OLPC Engineering had a trip to Taipei for the XO-1.75 motherboard bringup last week.  The 1.75 machine lives in the same industrial design (display, case, batteries) as the XO-1/XO-1.5, but uses an ARM system-on-chip from Marvell -- the Armada 610/MMP2. There's still a great deal of driver and basic bringup work ongoing, but we're at a

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-73918851753310334682010-11-04T01:55:00.003Z2010-11-08T23:04:45.926Z

I have already spilled some beans about the two upcoming architectures from the big players in the x86 game: AMD's Bulldozer Intel's Sandy Bridge But it was not until just now, while doing some research, that I actually stumbled on some clarifications from Intel about AVX support in "Sandy Bridge". Well, it turns out that while Intel will have 256 bit FPUs per core but one big problem with first

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-49703784822254889072010-10-30T17:20:00.004+01:002010-10-30T17:25:55.727+01:00

To The Point The good:Very nice performance for the $200 range. Improved filtering algorithms. Improved idle power consumption. Slightly improved. The architectural balance that Radeon HD 5800 series should have had. HDMI 1.4a, DisplayPort 1.2. 5 digital outputs. Tesselation performance improved. The bad:No 64 bit FPU limits GPU computing. Compute performance is not great sometimes. The ugly

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-84080537113290756932010-09-14T17:36:00.003+01:002010-09-14T17:38:13.871+01:00

Earlier I asked if AMD's leaked Bobcat based Fusion processor die shots were real or another PR show off, this update sets some ideas straight. Supposedly, those squares on the top are the cores. This may be feasible if we take a look at the floor plan of the Bobcat core that AMD provided:   Now take a look at the picture of the core:    Yup, it sure looks like we have cores on the top of the

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-76806380282293185532010-09-13T17:31:00.001+01:002010-09-13T17:31:39.071+01:00

Intel's Daniel Pohl once again delivers exciting new prospects about real time ray tracing on regular CPUs, this time with another id Software title. Daniel has already brought several ray traced versions of popular games, including Enemy Territory: Quake Wars, running on Intel's "Nehalem" based servers, last year. The frame rate wasn't great but it provided a glimpse of things to come.

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-29294171436499289452010-09-13T17:04:00.002+01:002010-09-13T17:05:18.808+01:00

The card is out for reviewers and there are no surprises in store since I last had a look at leaked pictures of the card and benchmarks. It's a 192 shader card with a 128 bit bus, based in the GF104 updated "Fermi" design. More after the jump. The GF106 chip is just a cut down GF104 with only one GPC, cut down to 256KiB of L2 cache and which keeps the three 64 bit memory controllers and 24

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-69821595186255608252010-09-07T18:59:00.001+01:002010-09-20T23:52:42.502+01:00

A closer look at AMD's upcoming "Fusion" APU based on the Bobcat ultra low power core. The core is rather different than everything I ever saw and I'm wondering if this isn't another fake die shot for Intel to look at. My best guess at layout is: This is based on the fact that both the presence of two cores and the GPU requires a good amount of cache and registers(a lot for the GPU). Again,

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-68568001590650245192010-09-06T11:08:00.002+01:002010-09-06T11:14:41.589+01:00

AMD's shows a picture of a Bulldozer 4 module die at a Global Foundries event. Is it for real? We have look. "Orochi" is the codename for AMD's upcoming core with eight integer units, based on four Bulldozer modules and not an AMD Fusion part, at least for what is known currently. There are some problems with this supposed picture of the die though: There are lot of inconsistencies that can

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-47831011896972696212010-09-04T12:14:00.000+01:002010-09-04T12:14:08.154+01:00

Leaked shots of a GeForce GTS 450 show some interesting details about the new generation of more affordable performance cards based on the "Fermi" architecture. Clocks after the jump. Being that the GF104, GeForce GTX 460 has already proven itself as a decent card with very good clocks, Nvidia is poised to keep the trend going with the new cut down version codenamed GF106. Default clocks for

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-13280988416620064732010-08-17T18:58:00.003+01:002010-08-17T18:59:53.941+01:00

Flash memory capacities keep increasing with new methods and 25nm Flash chips. Press release and analysis after the jump. Intel, Micron First to Sample 3-Bit-Per-Cell NAND Flash Memory on Industry-Leading 25-Nanometer Silicon Process TechnologyCompanies Announce Industry's Highest Capacity, Smallest NAND Device Providing Cost Advantages for a Wide Range of Consumer Storage ApplicationsSANTA

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-41774677438401353952010-08-08T12:13:00.002+01:002010-08-08T12:26:45.729+01:00

Just bought an HP DM1 laptop with Intel CULV processors on a pretty nice discount. List price hovers around 450-500eur and I managed to snatch one for 350eur. The problem is that I just found out Intel has different grades of Speedstep... and one that is almost nonexistent. This particular DM1 model I got has the Celeron SU2300 processor and there are some models with the Pentium SU4100. It

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-45089944669826653652010-08-05T13:26:00.001+01:002010-08-05T13:27:02.475+01:00

The Intel FTC suit was announced a while back to be in its final steps towards an agreement(please see Intel Settles Lawsuit, Again) and that deal was announced yesterday. The settlement involves no monetary compensation for anyone but does bring a good amount of restrictions on business practices for years to come. Intel After some reading(PDFs here), I found the following points more

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-6460281521781740902010-07-27T23:41:00.001+01:002010-07-27T23:41:58.435+01:00

ASRock delivers a myth bust concerning ACC and core unlocking - the old AMD 480X chipset gets Phenom II X6 support and core unlocking. Much has been written about AMD processors core unlocking and I've even detailed some steps on some occasions. It all started when AMD introduced the SB750 southbridge, which featured something called A.C.C. - Advanced Clock Calibration. It helped Phenom CPUs

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-74847510488319440532010-07-27T22:27:00.001+01:002010-07-27T22:29:43.930+01:00

Intel touts light interconnects as the future for interference free motherboard wiring. Intel just released a press release concerning the replacement of copper wiring on the motherboards with small optical connections that can enable 50Gb/s per link. This research is parallel to the one Intel has been conducting about Light Peak, which is aiming to replace USB as the standard for I/O ports.

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-22874257705398920922010-07-12T03:30:00.000+01:002010-07-12T03:30:33.230+01:00

It's already the 12th on this side of the Atlantic and the GF 104 SM and GPC diagrams popped up on my inbox - special thanks go to the anonymous reader who left them at the previous post about the chip. If you've read the previous post, you know I was speculating about a 3x8 CUDA cores SM and no L2 cache on the GF104. Thankfully I was totally wrong about the L2, which is a good thing to have

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-20289526327962127742010-07-08T14:06:00.002+01:002010-08-07T10:08:28.276+01:00

AMD's Ultrathin "Nile" platform keeps crippled floating point units. AMD's Ultrathin "Nile" Platform will use AMD's 880G chipset with Radeon HD 4200 class graphics and TDPs below 15W. All CPUs support AMD-V hardware virtualization instructions. Turion II Neo - HT @ 3.2MT/s, 2MiB L2 cache, 15W TDP K665 - 1.7GHz, dual core K625 - 1.5GHz, dual core Athlon II Neo - HT @ 2MT/s, TDP 12W, 64 bit

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-73466070293354024012010-07-04T21:30:00.010+01:002010-12-09T15:40:44.243Z

AMD recently unleashed an updated mobile lineup with some unpleasant surprises regarding FPUs. The current lineup of mobile processors is codenamed "Champlain" and uses K10 CPUs with AMD 880M chipset and SB810 southbridge."Caspian" will follow the same trend but will feature quad core Phenom II and Athlon II based processors, notably based on the "Deneb" quad core and "Callisto" dual core

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-29751072219383395752010-06-30T23:48:00.007+01:002010-07-12T03:36:49.949+01:00

GeForce GTX 460, GTX 465 "revision 2" rumors investigated. Leaked pictures show a smaller PCB and a better cooler. The GPU is not square, which we will see how this may be possible given the first GF100 chip as a basis. UPDATE Please see: GF104 Updates post for more accurate specs. A Recap, Then The Details Nvidia has been having lots of problems building GF100 chips, which has most recently

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-26125971603091676922010-05-25T20:45:00.002+01:002010-06-03T11:09:37.381+01:00

AMD is throwing some freebies in the form of $39 processors that are based on the "Deneb" core. This is an example of what I meant when I said that it could still be possible to fetch some "Thuban" hexa-cores to unlock from even cheaper processors than the missing Phenom II X4 960T. This Read on for details. The first thing you might notice is that AMD is not selling these processors as

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-31726610445095202732010-05-24T20:46:00.004+01:002010-05-25T20:14:54.137+01:00

Galaxy has just released a special edition, overclocked version of the GeForce GTX 470, that features a fan that allows easy access to the heatsink. This is an incredibly useful feature and one I would pay to have on any graphics card, especially these high performance cards.With high performance cards frequently touching, or even exceeding, 90ºC in graphics loads, regular cleaning of the

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-28677109435935164462010-05-15T18:31:00.002+01:002010-05-15T23:27:35.481+01:00

In another testament to how well AMD's 45nm process has matured, a new record has been set on the Phenom II X6 1090T: 6.7GHz with the help of sub-zero cooling. Such a high clock is rivaling what is achievable with Intel's new "Gulftown" 32nm Core i7 980X, which currently hovers anywhere from 6.4 to 6.6GHz with the same help from sub-zero cooling. The AMD screenshot: This is, of course, a

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-57353514649585352272010-05-05T19:09:00.000+01:002010-05-05T19:09:37.925+01:00

In an unexpected move, AMD has announced it will rebrand mainstream and low end chips based on the RV700 architecture: RV710 and RV730. The new chips are being rebranded as the Mobility Radeon 560v for the Radeon HD 4600 equivalent and Mobility Radeon 540v and 530v. It is still not public if these models differ in clockspeed from the Mobility Radeon HD 4000 parts but they may well not. The

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-60083422240170362612010-03-25T02:47:00.000Z2010-03-26T02:49:40.520Z

AMD's Turbo Core techonology details further unveiled.  Norwegian retailer MicroPlex was caught listing the Phenom II X6 1090T too soon, unveiling further details about the new "Thuban" and "Zosma" based processors. The processor features a Turbo Core boost of 400MHz, up from the base clock of 3.2GHz to 3.6GHz when only one core is running at full load.Other models with lower clocks are able to

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-67523861607035809372010-03-23T11:59:00.006Z2010-03-26T02:48:23.227Z

AMD will soon be releasing it's six core Phenom II X6 CPUs, codenamed "Thuban". The processors are very similar to "Istanbul" based Opterons that have been on the market for more than 9 months now. Together with "Thuban" six-core processsors also come Phenom II X4 "T" processors, codenamed "Zosma". The Phenom II X6 will feature 6MB of L3 cache and six cores, together with a new feature that is

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-81633283463511976092010-03-17T10:29:00.002Z2010-03-17T10:31:41.916Z

EVGA releases it's workstation class motherboard compatible with LGA 1366 Xeons, providing support for up to 24 threads when used in conjunction with the new 6 core Xeon 5600 processors. The new motherboard is based on the enterprise Intel 5520 chipset, more common in servers and high performance computing than the gaming market. While EVGA hasn't revealed pricing yet, expect it to be close to

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-30158070907939161262010-03-10T19:42:00.000Z2010-03-10T19:42:34.225Z

Last week, the AMD 890GX was officially released, marking the debut of the first chipset featuring SATA 6Gbps support. What else is new? Compared to the AMD 785G, not much, especially regarding integrated graphics performance. The first bad news comes for overclockers, which now have to buy select motherboards to enjoy core unlocking features, whereas with the old SB750 and SB710 most

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-7410698416616414602010-02-21T16:23:00.003Z2011-10-28T05:18:31.299+01:00

 On September 23rd, hot on the release of Radeon HD 5800 GPUs, I wrote: The previous Radeon HD 4000 cards hit the sweetspots just right, both in price, chip cost and performance. While the 3870 from previous generations was an underpowered card, the 2.5x increase in shaders provided enough power to compete with Nvidia and the GT200 based cards. The RV740 was even better, just building itself

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-47568520770314834552010-02-01T19:16:00.002Z2010-02-02T01:18:32.141Z

The OCZ Solid Series SSD is a low end product based on the JMicron JMF602B controller. I have a look at performance of this low-end SSD solution. The SSD comes packaged in a typical OCZ box, in an anti static bag and with some manuals. There are no SATA cables provided nor an USB mini cable to interface with the USB port present. The manual shows some specifications of the device, although

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-16334097191721813692009-12-23T23:41:00.001Z2010-05-13T18:50:59.958+01:00

Santa Clara, we have yield problems. The upcoming Tesla 20 series cards from Nvidia will bring massive improvements over the previous generation of cards, the Tesla 10 series, and was also supposed to be released with 512 cores. This number was not born out of speculation but of actual documents from Nvidia and a big event sponsored by the company, the GPU Technology Conference(GTC), where the "

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-21937535524774159342009-12-21T12:49:00.005Z2009-12-21T14:23:05.312Z

Meet the H57 chipset: it brings digital and analog video outputs to the "Nehalem" based processors, the ones that feature the new iGPU core embedded in the CPU package. The iGPU brings exciting performance improvements to integrated cores, even surpassing AMD and Nvidia's low end discrete parts. The P7H57D-V EVO is an high end motherboard for the LGA 1156 platform, replacing the P55 offerings

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-25611478008601934182009-12-16T22:22:00.002Z2009-12-17T16:59:18.415Z

The FASTRA II is the successor of a custom made super computer that used eight 9800 series GPUs to replace a 512 processor cluster. The FASTRA II brings as much as thirteen GT200 GPUs. The FASTRA II is built from commodity hardware with some tweaks: Lian Li PC80 P6T7 WS Supercomputer Core i7 920 12GiB Corsair DDR3 1333 MHz Thermaltake Toughpower 1500MHz 3 x Thermaltake PowerExpress 450W

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-22778178110826947242009-12-15T20:06:00.001Z2009-12-15T20:32:49.571Z

"Pineview" is the codename for Intel's successor to the current models of the Atom processor and will feature an integrated memory controller and graphics processor, akin to the upcoming Intel "Clarkdale" generation of processors. One of Intel's first product to feature the "Pineview" Atom will be the D510MO mini-ITX motherboard, which features the dual core Atom D510 processor, two DIMM slots,

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-42533230669337224612009-12-12T03:37:00.001Z2009-12-13T19:29:15.504Z

MSI shows off one of the first high end AM3 motherboards based on the upcoming 890FX chipset from AMD. The motherboard features new technologies like SATA 3 support and USB 3.0 but perhaps the most interesting feature is the presence of the six full length x16 slots of an unknown lane configuration. The 890FX chipset supports 32 lanes with up to 4 x8 slots and the last one should be an x4 slot

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-31942563036638725292009-12-09T17:37:00.000Z2009-12-09T17:37:39.161Z

After the general look revamp last week, Silicon Madness forums were launched today. Silicon Madness will also be fetching updated news links on the sidebar, which we're calling "Silicon News". Silicon News will be updated everyday with news from everywhere around the web, so do drop by if you're looking for your daily fix. We're also aggregating reviews in the "Review Depot" and a software

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-25769386709464502842009-12-08T22:20:00.002Z2009-12-08T22:21:23.074Z

Let the re-branding begin. Nvidia has taken the 48 shader DirectX 10.1 GT 220 card and has started to re-brand it for the launch of the GeForce 300 series early next year. The model number may suit the card but the lack of DirectX 11 support is surely a major loss and may generate confusion among the uninformed buyer since the GeForce 300 series will feature high end cards with DirectX 11

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-18647098297429500412009-12-05T19:01:00.003Z2009-12-06T02:02:32.432Z

The battery life when the laptop is suspended (but running the backlight and the WLAN) of an XO-1 and an XO-1.5 were compared. The XO-1 lasted 10h 20m. The XO-1.5 lasted 12h 15m. WLAN wakeups were disabled on the XO-1 to even the playing field, as the build I was using on the XO-1.5 (os48) doesn't have them yet. These are preliminary tests on the battery life of the updated OLPC XO 1.5, run by

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-78956023919020633942009-12-02T16:59:00.005Z2009-12-04T14:35:52.067Z

Now with certified TRIM support for G2 drives. The new firmware update from Intel can be grabbed here and adds TRIM support for 2nd Generation solid state drives. The TRIM Command enables solid state drives to maintain better performance when used to close to the full capacity and also make a more efficient use of the low number of erase cycles available in MLC NAND flash chips like the ones

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-49614423137946211302009-11-30T23:07:00.003Z2009-12-04T14:37:09.088Z

I review an already established HDD for servers and networked storage, now at a much affordable price. Given its low power and noise, it's also a suitable drive for HTPCs. The 1TB Caviar Green has gone through several iterations before reaching its current form: the first device had four platters and only 16MB of cache and latter transitioned to three platters while retaining the WD10EACS

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-52902567408174361622009-11-27T16:34:00.003Z2009-11-27T16:36:01.300Z

The Egg has lots of deals going on only today. Have a look while stocks last @ Newegg.com

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-57712194227284499462009-11-27T14:39:00.007Z2009-12-21T00:42:30.226Z

In the midst of chipset cancellations, Nvidia's CEO speaks it's mind. "Kicking Intel's ass" is still the goal. But let me ask you- when was the last time you saw a company as big as Intel sue another smaller company? They’re scared and you can write this down- We will kick their ass when we go to court next year.” This is purely investor talk. Nvidia is in the middle of heavy restructuring and

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-78715369035349335202009-11-27T12:43:00.005Z2009-11-27T14:38:13.059Z

Friday only deals:- Save $400 off a customized HP Pavilion dv7t Quad Edition series Notebook PC with FREE Blu-ray drive + FREE shipping at the HP Home & Home Office Store using coupon code NBN4RK3WS. The offer is limited to the first 1,500 coupons redeemed. 1 redemption per person or address. Not valid with other promotions, Friends & Family, or HP Academy. Not combinable with instant rebates

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-11689304277095133312009-11-25T22:18:00.004Z2009-11-26T01:27:54.717Z

Memory prices have continued to fall since last week, with the biggest drop being accounted to DDR2 chips once again. These chips have fallen around 11% since last week and demand continues to be scarce.DDR3 has also dropped slightly, not more than 5%.

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-88059286225364644022009-11-24T17:12:00.006Z2011-12-27T02:08:34.302Z

AMD revealed some details about it's next generation microarchitecture, codenamed "Bulldozer". From the looks of it, this architecture has been in the drawing board for years and could have been the cause of rumors about the K9 processor and it's cancellation. As we can see from the above picture, AMD's "Bulldozer" core will feature two integer clusters per core - this will provide an increase

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-26417360641888630592009-11-23T02:19:00.005Z2009-12-11T02:38:48.521Z

Intel's P55 PCH chipset is enabling a new category of high performance SFF PCs. DFI is one of the first to deliver a Mini-ITX P55 motherboards. The motherboard is called LanParty MI P55-T36 and features support for all LGA 1156 Core i5 and Core i7 processors, two DDR3 DIMMs and a PCI-Express x16 slot. The CPUs are powered by a 6 phase digital PWM which are coupled with solid capacitors only.

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-90221710359248096632009-11-20T19:42:00.003Z2009-11-20T20:15:30.400Z

More details released about game and hardware compatibility.During development, Lucid's Hydra PCI-e switch chip was touted as the next revolution in multi GPU setups for gaming purposes. In reality, the earlier scenario presented has been less than pleasant: there is a list of compatible games and performance isn't worth mentioning over regular SLI or CrossFire setups.Case and Cooling France has

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-84305591451731546672009-11-19T19:08:00.003Z2009-11-19T20:34:40.451Z

Good news for prospective buyers this week, as memory prices have declined around 15% since last week's update. The biggest drops were registered in DDR2 memories, which are now considerably cheaper than DDR3 chips. The difference currently stands at 20% but since this pertains only to the chips, the cost of the PCB will dilute this margin.

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-8475849385530197202009-11-18T20:22:00.009Z2010-06-28T11:58:38.971+01:00

Nvidia unveils more details about it's number crunching baby and we take a look deeper inside the chip. The following new specs were released: 520-630 GFLOPS/s Total Memory: 3 or 6 GiB GDDR5, 2.625 or 5.625 GiB when using ECC Power consumption: 190W Two models: Tesla C2050 and Tesla C2070 ECC is optional, which is great as far as I'm concerned. Power consumption is not bad and the desktop

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-83053050727022210632009-11-16T20:27:00.004Z2009-11-17T00:27:18.135Z

Newegg has received batches of the "Lynnfield" based LGA 1156 Xeon X3440 CPU for $239. The CPU is the cheapest one with Hyper Threading support and will work in P55 based motherboards, albeit clocked at 133MHz less than the non-HT capable Core i5 750.The 2.66GHz Xeon X3450 is also available but comes priced at a slightly higher $269.Both these Xeons are lower entry barriers to a quad core

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-81193341733492576252009-11-12T16:28:00.004Z2009-11-17T01:21:21.135Z

Today was the day that AMD's legal efforts finally paid off.In a joint statement the two companies commented, "While the relationship between the two companies has been difficult in the past, this agreement ends the legal disputes and enables the companies to focus all of our efforts on product innovation and development.""We really couldn't keep appealing forever, and this time they really had

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-69497934713938349822009-11-11T23:50:00.001Z2009-11-12T00:28:59.062Z

The Lucid Hydra is supposed to be revolutionary: the new chip helps create more efficient Multi-GPU solutions by splitting work between the GPUs at a more fundamental level than what current software based Multi-GPU load balancing can do, although it hasn't been detailed exactly how that works, yet.Lucid has said that it may allow to mix cards from different vendors although full support won't be

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-55650437863240826002009-11-11T22:48:00.006Z2009-11-11T23:21:01.842Z

AMD is... "ahead of schedule".What do you think when you see "Ahead of schedule" in all slides of a roadmap presentation?I think they know they're pretty late on the CPU front.The six-core processor, codenamed "Thuban", also known as Phenom II X6, is ahead of schedule? The graphics cards are, AMD is the first to market; but ahead of schedule on a desktop version of a server CPU launched 5 months

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-3925872969711904022009-11-10T17:26:00.003Z2009-11-10T19:26:39.758Z

Creative's Zii Labs subsidiary releases the updated ZMS-08 chip, brings a GHz Cortex-A8 ARM core inside.Specifications galore:Blu-ray Quality 1080p H.264 Video Decode1080p H.264 Video Encode720p H.264 Video ConferencingAccelerated OpenGL ES 1.1/2.0Xtreme Fidelity X-Fi Audio TechnologyMulti Format Media CODECsARM Cortex-A8 at 1GHzAccelerated Graphics and CompositingAdvanced Image Signal

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-32910593436084926202009-11-05T00:09:00.002Z2009-11-06T03:50:29.134Z

Nvidia releases a preview of it's toolkit update, sheds some light into new functionality.The CUDA Toolkit 3.0 Beta is now available to GPU Computing registereddevelopers.Highlights for this release include:* CUDA Driver / Runtime Buffer Interoperability, which allowsapplications using the CUDA Driver API to also use librariesimplemented using the CUDA C Runtime.* A new, separate version of the

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-1661516584512420842009-11-04T02:23:00.005Z2009-11-05T02:41:38.429Z

Yesterday I talked about VIA. Today, they are back in the news by announcing an updated Nano processor which, sadly, is not the anticipated dual core version of the chip.The new chip is part of the new 3000 series Nano processor and VIA is touting some impressive idle power numbers, with clockspeeds remaining about the same:100mW of idle power is a very good thing, the problem is VIA doesn't

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-31966097904775126902009-11-04T02:01:00.001Z2009-11-09T01:23:04.518Z

Sapphire unleashes an overclocked, better cooled and higher priced 5870.The new card comes clocked at 870MHz for the core and 5GHz for the RAM, versus 850 and 4.8 in the standard model. It also comes with a better cooler, one that Sapphire says will shave 15ºC of the load temperature of typical 5870 coolers. It will also heat up your case but it's a decent compromise: if you had a look at the

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-3266941050996263932009-11-03T23:07:00.004Z2009-11-03T23:58:02.768Z

Nvidia looking for some x86 love?"We believe Nvidia could enter the x86 CPU business," said analyst Doug Freedman of Broadpoint AmTech. "Nvidia could become a supplier of x86 CPUs by necessity to preserve both GPU and chipset revenue."Ok, so, that much we already knew it could be a good way to go for Nvidia: Intel has locked Nvidia out of it's platforms and will be doing the same for graphics if

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-68322159428167983022009-10-30T20:11:00.008Z2009-11-03T01:16:25.472Z

Intel's upcoming hexa core looks promising for workstations and future proof high-end desktops.It has been public knowledge that Intel will be releasing their first six core processor in the coming months but new details have only been released sparsely and no exact release date has been unveiled so far.What we do know is that the CPU will be called Core i9 and that it will be based on the

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-9317455942283636332009-10-29T18:10:00.003Z2009-10-29T18:23:33.277Z

Yesterday's article, which detailed that MSI would introducing the Lucid Hydra chip in computer motherboards soon, was a mistake on my part.Official confirmation indicates that the Trinergy motherboard is instead based on the NF200 bridge chip from Nvidia and that the Lucid Hydra chip will come later on a motherboard named "Fuzion" that fits in the same "Big Bang" series of motherboards, hence

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-43074029439151557572009-10-28T21:57:00.006Z2009-10-29T18:21:47.200Z

Triple SLI High End P55 motherboard.ERRATA: This motherboard is only based on NF200 and P55, Lucid's Hydra chip will be put on another motherboard, to be announced soon.The MSI "Big Bang" motherboard was previewed a while back as the first consumer motherboard to feature the new Lucid Hydra chip. MSI seems to have expanded the "Big Bang" series to more enthusiast class models featuring high-end

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-42654624324478668872009-10-28T15:17:00.005Z2009-10-28T16:36:06.396Z

It was two years ago that Silicon Madness came to existence, back then as simply siliconmadness.blogspot.com, now moved to siliconmadness.comSilicon Madness is a personal effort of mine to bring a new point of view on the hardware industry, one where critical opinions can be expressed without the need to please a hardware sponsor or other dogmas of the industry.SM's aim is to provide independent

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-2451651484263914172009-10-27T00:46:00.008Z2009-10-27T18:32:48.854Z

Overclocked, runs 12 cores at an impressive 3GHz.Impressive, to say the least: current "Istanbul" Opterons run at 2.8GHz in the high end with 1.3v and these new cores are manufactured at the same 45nm process. The new engeneering samples are holding at 3 GHz with just 1.16v, which is also necessary to keep power consumption low.Also, a screenshot running lower clocks but showing that the system

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-61542243959313075732009-10-25T12:41:00.008Z2009-10-25T13:21:14.767Z

Gizmodo has had a laid back look at the new OS:The VerdictWindows XP was a great OS in its day. Windows Vista, once it found its feet several months in, was a good OS. With Windows 7, the OS is great again. It's what people said they wanted out of Windows: Solid, more nimble and the easiest, prettiest Windows yet.OK... Let me see if I got that one right? XP was great back in it's day... Huh?!?

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-23647762468949450582009-10-21T21:58:00.003+01:002009-10-21T22:03:35.667+01:00

Micron’s new MLC Enterprise NAND device achieves 30 thousand write cycles – a 6x increase in endurance when compared to standard MLC NAND, according to the company. For enterprise applications that are more performance driven, Micron today also introduced a 34nm SLC Enterprise NAND device that achieves 300 thousand write cycles – a 3x increase in endurance when compared to standard SLC NAND.These

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-80379032969607682422009-10-21T21:23:00.006+01:002010-01-31T20:48:04.998Z

Complete with Youtube video of the feat, which was made possible with the help of some liquid nitrogen(LN2). 6.6GHz, unlocked to quad-core. The AMD Phenom II X2 555 Black Edition is the successor to the well known Phenom II X2 550, which has made its rounds through the online media a while ago, due to the ability that some samples have of being unlocked to a full Phenom II X4. This new X2 555

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-10985596009961159432009-10-19T20:00:00.010+01:002009-10-19T22:52:17.280+01:00

Marketing slides, from AMD to Nvidia, with too little love in between. These are excerpts, the most interesting ones, so let's start by the end. It's the most important slide, left to be completely disregarded in a stack of more than twenty. It shouldn't be, since it sheds much light to what follows below. Remember: "may contain technical innacuracies".Yup, all valid points. That Fermi was built

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-68323919121247699112009-10-14T23:15:00.004+01:002009-10-14T23:26:31.674+01:00

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.

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-80301644413519344332009-10-14T16:26:00.002+01:002009-10-14T23:15:37.764+01:00

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

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-40605274142952030312009-10-13T23:44:00.005+01:002009-10-14T03:04:11.861+01:00

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

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-44284193958234767212009-10-09T15:12:00.006+01:002009-10-09T16:38:47.124+01:00

AMD's new mainstream card, codenamed "Juniper", is unveiled sooner than expected, brings 800 SPs.These are the architectural details, slight less than the rumored 1120SPs that I mentioned on the Radeon HD 5870 article, a figure given in the Anandtech review of the card. Contrary to the 4770, the cards are already pushing GDDR5 to great hights, so it will be harder to compensate on bandwidth by

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-4430440106652263052009-10-08T20:31:00.008+01:002009-10-09T12:26:27.340+01:00

Motherboards and graphics cards can come with no DVI->HDMI adapter and no HDMI output but still claim that they can do HDMI audio. Some people wonder if this works, but it does indeed.The test subject:This motherboard has no HDMI and no adapter, just the DVI. The audio codec for HDMI is embedded and it brings drivers for Windows and Linux support exists from Linux 2.6.30 kernel at least. Linux

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-12288937627814391242009-10-06T22:47:00.002+01:002009-10-06T23:08:33.939+01:00

Memory prices are up slightly since last week, still moving up but now not as sharply. DDR2 moved closer to DDR3, up 3% since last week, while DDR3 raised 2%.The recommendation stands as previously: if you need to buy memory on the short term, do it ASAP.

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-26734673707470435362009-10-05T22:39:00.003+01:002009-10-05T22:57:56.905+01:00

A patch is all you need.Last week, Nvidia started pulling off the recently introduced support for PhysX on Nvidia cards and graphics rendering on AMD Radeon cards - which became possible with Windows 7 - with the latest driver update. This week the software check was hacked by someone obviously bothered with the decision and both vendors can now happily coexist in the same PC.The steps to get

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-86337102600810281932009-10-05T22:28:00.005+01:002009-10-05T22:51:07.597+01:00

Remember when I mentioned that Fermi being a shorter card would be totally feasible? It surely can be smaller than the desktop cards but the picture above is one of a dummy card.See the PCI-e 6pins connector without any pins on the PCB? That was one indication but the card has plenty more problems like that one. The whole situation got so out of hand that an Nvidia Vice President admitted that

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-50282707686281413892009-10-05T22:13:00.005+01:002009-10-05T22:25:09.016+01:00

Intel has a prototype processor that aims at being more energy efficient in all product ranges, from mobile to server markets. The new processor performs tuning based on various parameters, including clockspeed, temperature and voltage.By using some of die space, Intel's engineers are able to do way with some of the methods used today in processor binning. Intel will still choose the best silicon

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-72320712571937944982009-10-03T12:57:00.007+01:002009-10-10T22:28:48.356+01:00

As the release of the new XO 1.5 nears, 30 B2 versions are available for hardware and developers and they start shipping next week to the ones with the best proposals.The revamp to the current Geode LX based OLPC XO-1 laptop features various improvements, including an updated C7-M @ 1GHz, 1GiB for DDR2 RAM, replaceable internal flash memory and the VX855 chipset with hardware HD video decoding

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-42767345429196518112009-10-02T01:48:00.002+01:002009-10-03T02:45:18.047+01:00

I had cautioned last month that we might not ever see an Nvidia chipset for LGA 1156 CPUs. We now have a confirmation of this from Nvidia but the chipset woes don't stop there.The story about the ditching is from Fudzilla and goes on like this: "Nvidia confirms to us that it won't make a DMI chipset due to legal pressure from Intel".Given that Fuad has been very pro-Nvidia lately and this is bad

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-75790440566391388342009-10-01T16:07:00.008+01:002009-10-01T18:40:10.520+01:00

Image courtesy of bit-tech.netYesterday, on the new GPU Technology Conference organized by Nvidia, the new Tesla cards were shown and the chip's architecture was exposed - the focus is again on CUDA.The new chip is huge:It's expected to be close to 500mm2 while AMD's Radeon 5800 Series weighs in 334mm2. It is manufactured at 40nm at TSMC but we still don't know any specifications regarding core,

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-43759684514068596362009-09-30T20:16:00.008+01:002009-09-30T20:35:46.053+01:00

ASUS delivers a new high-end motherboard for LGA 1156 processors.The new motherboard is part of the "TUF" series - The Ultimate Force - which ASUS targets at computer enthusiasts mainly - that roughly translates to a big price tag.The higher price does bring high quality along though, as the motherboard supports SLI(licensed from Nvidia), high end components like all solid capacitors and a 16

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-86545134013634800142009-09-30T11:29:00.004+01:002009-09-30T12:03:58.901+01:00

This week Nvidia has been on the news twice, for rather unusual(or should I say desperate) business practices:Batman: Arkham Asylum, a game part of "The way it's meant to be played" program from Nvidia, only let's you enable Anti Aliasing features on Nvidia cards.PhysX support has been disabled on systems that also have am AMD graphics card installed, to ensure you don't buy a cheap green card

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-29704959906544718522009-09-30T10:05:00.004+01:002009-09-30T11:27:53.721+01:00

Smaller, cheaper and performs admirably.The Radeon HD 5850 is an interesting card: it features all the capabilities of the big brother but a cut down memory bandwidth, TMUs and shader units. The card only has 1440 active shader cores, 72 TMUs and memory bandwidth is provided by slower 4GHz GDDR5 chips, vs 4.8GHz for the 5870. The lower specs aren't enough to slow down performance much but the

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-33017716814405460962009-09-28T22:13:00.004+01:002009-09-28T22:56:51.359+01:00

Memory prices have risen again since last week's update, to the tune of 5% on average, as the DXI shows on the graph. DDR2 memory rose as much as 8%, with a rise of 2% accounted today. DDR3 prices have stabilized and dropped 0.5% today although they are still up around 3% since last week.DDR2 and DDR3 1Gb chip average prices are now within 2.5% of each other with DDR3 being more expensive than

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-14741591037139466952009-09-25T15:36:00.001+01:002009-09-25T23:53:06.194+01:00

AMD has, unofficially, responded to the somewhat disappointing performance of the new Radeon HD 5870. Below is reproduced the post by user "CarrelK", which is apparently Carrel Kilbrew, the lead engineer of the excellent RV770 design. Carrel has a good relationship with AnandTech lately, as you can see from this story. With no more delays, the post(top of page 17):If a game ran almost entirely

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-39668413796746926712009-09-23T15:14:00.013+01:002010-10-22T11:57:39.647+01:00

NDAs up are up, reviews are plenty and the Radeon 5870 leaves too little good thoughts in my mind. Summing the reviews up, for the impatient: Performance you might have already read about, it's quite similar to AMD's internal testing, although deflated by 20%, averaging about 40% better performance than the GTX285, GTX 275 and Radeon HD 4890. If you want the a great gaming rig without

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-46066937923793823192009-09-22T19:13:00.000+01:002009-09-22T19:17:25.920+01:00

AMD slides detailing the new "Evergreen" architecture.The previous post about the new Radeon 5800 series already detailed that AMD might have glued two RV770 SIMD blocks together, this seems true although with some caveats detailed further below. The most interesting tidbits here are CRC support and the ability to down clock the memory clock without screen flicker. The latter helps achieve the

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-419452666768419362009-09-22T17:39:00.003+01:002009-09-22T18:34:00.859+01:00

Gigabyte's OC version tips up, brings DirectX 10.1 support.The new graphics card is base on the new GT216 chip from Nvidia:128 bit GDDR3 memory @ 1.6GHz (25GB/s)720MHz core clock48 shaders @ 1567MHzDirect X 10.1 supportCuda capability 2.0Purevideo 3The stock clocks of the GeForce GT 220 chip are 615/1333/1580 MHz for the core, shaders and memory, so this card delivers an improvement of around 15%

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-41937260646811486602009-09-17T23:59:00.004+01:002009-09-22T03:36:58.440+01:00

Both AMD and Nvidia have promised that GPUs would accelerate everyday computing tasks. It's an effort to sway people from using processors more than anything, a market where Intel is dominant and where AMD will profit either way.Most of the consumer grade software that has become available has failed providing either proper performance or quality when compared with software that runs on the CPU.

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-30459686923170992682009-09-17T21:20:00.004+01:002009-09-17T21:52:39.706+01:00

Yesterday marks the release of the $99 quad-core, the Athlon II X4. AMD delivers the new "Propus" core, a cut-down Phenom II X4 without L3 cache.The new CPU is very capable and doesn't even compromise much to the Phenom II X4 in some situations, like rendering applications. What is more interesting perhaps, is the CPU's ability to outperform the old "Agena" core without posessing any L3 cache:

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-77103573417800823312009-09-17T20:54:00.002+01:002009-09-17T21:14:30.804+01:00

PCPerspective benchmarks the new midrange champion.Now that someone has actually benchmarked the thing, it is more than safe to go out and buy one. My verdict is still the same, as all estimates about performance turned out true:Great CPU for gamingCheaper than going with the LGA 1366 platformNot as good as the i7 860 for SLI/CrossFire or bandwidth intensive applications.The Xeon 3440 is still

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-90427915792562637772009-09-16T23:50:00.009+01:002009-09-22T03:36:50.806+01:00

Ever plugged some piece of shiny new hardware to your, still very capable, two/three year old PC just to find out they don't work together? I did too many times, so many that I eventually found how to fix most of these problems.Meet the candidate, an AMD Athlon X2 3800+, 2GB of DDR2 800 and the Asus M2NPV-MX :It is still a very capable machine, a dual core and enough RAM for most games. The

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-87078888570570185702009-09-15T23:46:00.001+01:002009-09-16T00:59:33.669+01:00

ASUS launches LGA 1156 based Xeon motherboards.Earlier I posted about how Intel has released an interesting variety of "Lynnfield" based Xeon processors, namely the Xeon 3440, which only costs slightly more than the Core i5 750 but comes with HyperThreading support albeit at a slightly lower 2.53GHz clock. While availability of these new Xeons is still scarce, the launch of motherboards will soon

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8591550662921436436.post-38955858647202329062009-09-14T23:16:00.002+01:002009-09-22T19:10:43.282+01:00

Technology details, six monitors support et al.AMD has presented it's graphics cards to the press in the USS Hornet aircraft carrier last Friday. Some details have surfaced, including those of a Radeon 5800 card that supports output to six monitors, aptly named Radeon HD 5870 Six:Picture courtesy of PC PerspectiveThis new multi display technology is named EyeFinity and is implemented just right.

Tiago Marquesnoreply@blogger.com0