Hasta La Gadget!

We heard of a bezel-hating LG Shuriken display sneaking its way onto Acer laptops recently, but the Korean company has wisely opted to debut that cutting-edge technology in its own portable computers first. The 14-inch P430 and 15.6-inch P530 mark the start of LG’s new Blade series of laptops, which are the result of some obsessive slimming work at the LG labs — display thickness is 4.5mm and 4.7mm, respectively, while the bezel on the 14-inch model is so narrow as to fit its screen within the dimensions of a traditional 13.3-inch laptop. Weight, at 1.94kg on the P430 and 2.2kg on P530, is also said to be on par with machines offering significantly smaller screens, but that’s not at the sacrifice of construction materials as brushed aluminum is used to strengthen LG’s new slimsters. A Core i7 CPU and GeForce GT520M GPU will provide the internal firepower, though the rest of the hardware specs are as yet unannounced. The P430 will launch in Europe, Asia, the Middle East, and South America at the end of May, to be followed by the P530 in June. Full PR after the break.

Continue reading LG P430 and P530 Blade laptops bedazzle with slim bezels, aluminum bodies, and Core i7

LG P430 and P530 Blade laptops bedazzle with slim bezels, aluminum bodies, and Core i7 originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 03 May 2011 00:58:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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If the previous Alienware M11x R3 spec leak got you all giddy, then we have some good news for you: according to a manual dug up by one of our eagle-eyed readers, it appears that this year’s M11x refresh will indeed be coming with second-gen Core i5 ULV and Core i7 ULV options, along with a faster DDR3 bus (1333MHz instead of 800MHz), a higher-res webcam (2MP instead of 1.3MP), an HD TrueLife LCD, and optional 3G / 4G mobile broadband. But of course, the real meat on this laptop is its graphics card, which turns out to be an NVIDIA GeForce GT540M with either 1Gb or 2GB of dedicated memory — not bad for a laptop of this size. Unsurprisingly, no dates or prices are mentioned here, but given the early start of inventory clearance, it shouldn’t be long before Round Rock reveals all.

[Thanks, Matt]

Manual for Alienware M11x with Sandy Bridge confirms NVIDIA GT540M graphics originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 08 Apr 2011 03:08:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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1,024 total CUDA cores, 94 ROPs, and 3GB of GDDR5 RAM on board. Yup, the NVIDIA GeForce GTX 590 is indeed a pair of GTX 580 chips spliced together, however power constraints have meant that each of those chips is running at a tamer pace that their single-card variant. The core clock speed is down to 607MHz, shaders are only doing 1.2GHz, and the memory clocks in at 3.4GHz. Still, there’s a ton of grunt under that oversized shroud and reviewers have put it to the test against AMD’s incumbent single-card performance leader, the Radeon HD 6990. Just like the GTX 590, it sports a pair of AMD’s finest GPUs and costs a wallet-eviscerating $699. Alas, after much benchmarking, testing, and staring at extremely beautiful graphics, the conclusion was that AMD retains its title. But only just. And, as Tech Report points out, the GTX 590 has a remarkably quiet cooler for a heavy duty pixel pusher of its kind. Dive into the reviews below to learn more, or check the new card out on video after the break.

Read – AnandTech
Read – HardOCP
Read – Tech Report
Read – PC Perspective
Read – Guru 3D
Read – X-bit labs
Read – Hot Hardware
Read – techPowerUp!
Read – TechSpot

Continue reading NVIDIA’s dual-GPU GeForce GTX 590 emerges, can’t slay the Radeon HD 6990 titan

NVIDIA’s dual-GPU GeForce GTX 590 emerges, can’t slay the Radeon HD 6990 titan originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 24 Mar 2011 09:17:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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We suspect that some other laptop manufacturer will be coming out of the woodwork in around 4.98 seconds here to refute Gigabyte’s claim, but as of now, the 15.6-inch P2532 above is the planet’s thinnest laptop with a second-generation (Sandy Bridge) Core i7 CPU. It’s not “ultrathin,” per se, but for packing such a serious amount of horsepower, it’s definitely on the anorexic side of things. Our pals over at TweakTown managed to get their paws on one, and they noted that it was sporting a 1920 x 1080 resolution display, a 500GB (7200RPM) hard drive, NVIDIA’s GeForce GT550M (2GB) with Optimus technology, a DVD burner, two USB 3.0 ports, an HDMI port, four speakers, a makeshift subwoofer and more ventilation ports than would normally be considered healthy. The company’s also offering up a smattering of interchangeable lids, with the pastel yellow one in particular catching our eye — can’t say it’s for the right reasons, but we digress. Sadly, there’s no price or release date to share just yet, but there is a hands-on video just past the break. Head on down and hit play, won’t you?

Continue reading Gigabyte’s 15.6-inch P2532: world’s thinnest second-gen Core i7 laptop (video)

Gigabyte’s 15.6-inch P2532: world’s thinnest second-gen Core i7 laptop (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 22 Mar 2011 16:56:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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It wasn’t that long ago that we were commending ATI on the stellar regularity of its product launches while NVIDIA was floundering, yet now the roles are reversed and we’re seeing NVIDIA flesh out its second generation of Fermi products with the midrange GeForce GTX 550 Ti presented today. Its biggest attraction is a $150 price tag, but it makes a major concession in order to reach that pricing plateau — there are only 192 CUDA cores inside it, equal to the previous-gen GTS 450, but less than the celebrated GTX 460. NVIDIA tries to ameliorate that shortage of parallel processing units by running the ones it has at an aggressive 1800MHz allied to a 900MHz graphics clock speed, and it also throws in a gigabyte of RAM running at an effective rate of 4GHz. That too is constrained somewhat, however, by a 192-bit interface, rather than the wider 256-bit affair on its bigger brother GTX 560 Ti. What all these specs boil down is some decent performance, but few recommendations from reviewers — mostly due to the abundance of compelling alternatives at nearby price points. Hit up the links below for more.

Read – AnandTech
Read – Tech Report
Read – Guru3D
Read – PC Perspective
Read – techPowerUp!
Read – Hexus

NVIDIA sends GeForce GTX 550 Ti into the $150 graphics card wars originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 15 Mar 2011 09:20:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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