Hasta La Gadget!

If you’ve enjoyed NVIDIA’s fine tradition of merely bumping along its GPUs time and again and affixing a new badge, you’ll like the GeForce GTX 560M — it’s much like last year’s GTX 460M, but with more bang for the buck than ever. ASUS, MSI, Alienware, Toshiba and Clevo have all committed to new notebooks bearing the graphics processor in light of the potent performance NVIDIA claims it will bring: Namely, those same 192 CUDA cores (now clocked at 1550MHz) and up to 3GB of GDDR5 memory (now clocked at 1250MHz, with a 192-bit bus) should enable the latest games to run at playable framerates on a 1080p screen with maximum detail — save antialiasing. Of course, that assumes you’ve also got a recent quad-core Sandy Bridge processor and gobs upon gobs of RAM, but NVIDIA also says that with the built-in Optimus switchable graphics, those same potent laptops should be able to manage five hours of battery life while idling.

If you’re looking for some inexpensive discrete graphics, however, NVIDIA’s also got a refresh there, as the new GeForce GT 520MX bumps up all the clock speeds of the GT 520M. When can you expect a mobile GPU to knock the GTX 485M off its silicon throne, though? Glad you asked: a chart shows a “Next-gen GTX” coming late this year. Meanwhile, see what NVIDIA says the GTX 560M’s capable of in the gallery below and a video after the break.

Continue reading NVIDIA refreshes notebook graphics with GeForce GTX 560M, attracts ASUS, MSI, Toshiba and Alienware

NVIDIA refreshes notebook graphics with GeForce GTX 560M, attracts ASUS, MSI, Toshiba and Alienware originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 29 May 2011 20:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Madfinger Games, the Czech Republic-based company behind Samurai II: Vengeance, has just announced Shadowgun — a futuristic, shoot ’em up game for Tegra 2-equipped Android phones and tablets. Available on both the Tegra Zone app and Android Market, Shadowgun promises to bring console-quality graphics and performance to mobile platforms — presumably with the extra geometric detail and high-res textures we’ve seen in other Tegra 2-tailored games. Madfinger is also developing a version for devices powered by NVIDIA’s forthcoming quad-core processor, alluringly known as Project Kal-El. Price and availability have yet to be announced, but you can find more information in the PR after the break.

Continue reading Madfinger announces new Shadowgun game, with Tegra 2 and Kal-El support

Madfinger announces new Shadowgun game, with Tegra 2 and Kal-El support originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 26 May 2011 10:22:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Google spent a lot of time yesterday talking up WebGL, but UK security firm Context seems to think users should disable the feature because it poses a serious security threat, and the US Computer Emergency Readiness Team (CERT) is encouraging people to heed that advice. According to Context, a malicious site could pass code directly to a computer’s GPU and trigger a denial of service attack or simply crash the machine. Ne’er-do-wells could also use WebGL and the Canvas element to pull image data from another domain, which could then be used as part of a more elaborate attack. Khronos, the group that organizes the standard, responded by pointing out that there is an extension available to graphics card manufacturers that can detect and protect against DoS attacks, but it did little to satisfy Context — the firm argues that inherent flaws in the design of WebGL make it very difficult to secure.

Now, we’re far from experts on the intricacies of low-level hardware security but, for the moment at least, there seems to be little reason for the average user to panic. There’s even a good chance that you’re not vulnerable at all since WebGL won’t run on many Intel and ATI graphics chips (you can check by clicking here). If you’re inclined to err on the side of caution you can find instructions for disabling WebGL at the more coverage link — but come on, living on the cutting edge wouldn’t be anywhere near as fun if it didn’t involve a bit of danger.

[Thanks, Tony]

WebGL flaw leaves GPU exposed to hackers originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 12 May 2011 15:49:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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NVIDIA may be kicking all kinds of tail on the mobile front with its ubiquitous Tegra 2 chipset, but back on its home turf of laptop and desktop graphics, things aren’t looking so hot. The latest figures from Jon Peddie Research show that the GPU giant has lost 2.5 percentage points of its market share and now accounts for exactly a fifth of graphics chips sold on x86 devices. That’s a hefty drop from last year’s 28.4 percent slice, and looks to have been driven primarily by sales of cheaper integrated GPUs, such as those found inside Intel’s Clarkdale, Arrandale, and most recently, Sandy Bridge processors. AMD’s introduction of Fusion APUs that combine general and graphics processing into one has also boosted its fortunes, resulting in 13.3 percent growth in sales relative to the previous quarter and a 15.4 percent increase year-on-year. Of course, the real profits are to be made in the discrete graphics card market, where NVIDIA remains highly competitive, but looking at figures like these shows quite clearly why NVIDIA is working on an ARM CPU for the desktop — its long-term survival depends on it.

NVIDIA losing ground to AMD and Intel in GPU market share originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 04 May 2011 08:29:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Graphics card companies don’t live and die by the enthusiast market alone. That may be where the glory is, but it’s the budget cards that really bring in the bacon. For the entry level, AMD just unleashed a trio of sub-$100 cards, the Radeon HD 6670, 6570, and 6450. How do they perform? Well, let’s just say you get what you pay for. Reaction from reviewers has been one of mild indifference. Depending on manufacturer, fan noise does appear to be an issue, possibly precluding the cards from being a viable HTPC choice. Otherwise, even the lowly, $55 6450 is a worthy upgrade over an integrated graphics chip or a two-year-old discrete card, but it can’t match the performance of NVIDIA’s GT 430, which can be had for only a few dollars more. Consensus was that, with prices of the older 5000 series being slashed, purchasers can get more bang for their GPU buck by sticking with last generation cards (like the Radeon HD 5750) if they’re looking for pure gaming prowess. That said, the GDDR5 flavors of the 6670 provide perfectly playable performance on most modern games (it averaged 45 FPS in Call of Duty: Black Ops) for just $99 (the 6570 runs about $79). Just beware those models shipping with GDDR3. Benchmarks galore below.

Read – Hexus
Read – techPowerUp 6450
Read – techPowerUp 6670
Read – Guru3D
Read – Tech Report
Read – Tom’s Hardware 6670 and 6570
Read – Tom’s Hardware 6450
Read – TweakTown
Read – AnandTech
Read – HotHardware

AMD elevates the low-end with trio of sub-$100 cards: Radeon HD 6670, 6570, and 6450 originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 19 Apr 2011 17:53:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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