Hasta La Gadget!

It’s not the first time we’re run into CUPP Computing‘s unique ability to blend the x86 and ARM platforms into one device — at least in prototype form — and just before the start of Computex 2011 here in Taipei we got a chance to experience the company’s latest iteration called PunkThis. The product is meant to replace your computer’s 2.5-inch SATA hard drive with a board featuring a complete ARM-based system along with a mini-PCIe socket — the latter capable of accommodating a physically smaller SATA SSD to handle the missing storage for the x86 host. PunkThis is built around a Texas Instruments DM3730 1GHz ARM CPU with 512 MB of RAM and includes a WiFi radio, as well as connectors and cables to interface the board with existing video, audio, and USB facilities on the host computer (no soldering required).

The netbook we got to play with was running Android 2.3 (Gingerbread) but was lacking WiFi support. It ran perfectly alongside Windows 7 which was powered by the existing Atom processor. Switching OS-es is just a hotkey away, and battery life is supposedly doubled when the main x86 CPU is shut down and the only the daughter board is operational. PunkThis also provides two microSD card slots — one for system storage used by the ARM-based OS (Android in this case), the other for mass storage visible to both environments (shared space). Pricing is supposed to remain below $200 and availability is expected in 8 weeks. That’s pretty hardcore, but with a name like PunkThis would you expect anything less? Feast your eyes on our gallery and peek after the break for our hands-on video along with the obligatory PR.

Continue reading CUPP PunkThis hands-on (video)

CUPP PunkThis hands-on (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 30 May 2011 00:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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You might think yourself too grown-up to be wowed by shiny, glittery things, but we doubt many will be able to watch NVIDIA’s new Glow Ball tech demo without a smidgen of childlike glee. Built to run on the company’s quad-core Kal-El processor, it shows us the first example of true dynamic lighting on mobile devices and also throws in some impressive physics calculations like fully modeled cloth motion. Instead of the pre-canned, static lights that we see on mobile games today, NVIDIA’s new hardware will make it possible to create lighting that moves, fluctuates in intensity, and responds realistically to its environment — all rendered in real time. The titular glow ball can be skinned with different textures, each one allowing a different amount and hue of illumination to escape to surrounding objects, and is directed around the screen using the accelerometer in your tablet or smartphone.

NVIDIA demoed the new goodness on a Honeycomb slate with 1280 x 800 resolution and the frame rates remained smooth throughout. In order to emphasize the generational leap that we can expect with Kal-El, the company switched off two of the four cores momentarily, which plunged performance down to less than 10fps. That means the simulations we’re watching require a full quartet of processing cores on top of the 12-core GPU NVIDIA has in Kal-El. Mind-boggling stuff. Glow Ball will be available as a game on Android tablets once this crazy new chip makes its way into retail devices — which are still expected in the latter half of this year, August if everything goes perfectly to plan. One final note if you’re still feeling jaded: NVIDIA promises the production chip will be 25 to 30 percent faster than the one on display today. Full video demo follows after the break.

Continue reading NVIDIA’s quad-core Kal-El used to demo next-gen mobile graphics, blow minds (video)

NVIDIA’s quad-core Kal-El used to demo next-gen mobile graphics, blow minds (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 29 May 2011 23:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Intel's Atom series of processors debuted in May of last year. We may see the latest generation — code-named "Oak Trail" — in tablets this summer. Photo courtesy Intel

Long absent from the mobile-device arena, Intel processors may arrive in tablets as soon as this summer.

Acer will launch a tablet powered by Intel’s “Oak Trail” processor, which could start selling as early as July, according to sources cited by DigiTimes. Asus and Lenovo will follow Acer’s lead shortly thereafter, say the sources.

While none of the hardware manufacturers that Wired.com contacted were willing to confirm any specific dates or deals, some were eager to drop hints of what was to come.

“While we cannot pre-announce our customers’ product plans,” Intel spokesperson Suzy Ramirez told Wired.com, “we are seeing success today with the Intel Atom processor Z670, formerly code-named ‘Oak Trail,’ in a variety of designs from leading OEMs.”

Ramirez said we’ll see a number of those designs debut next week at Computex, Taipei’s annual computer expo.

“We are certainly intrigued by the concept,” Asus spokesperson Gary Key told Wired.com, “and are fully supportive of Intel’s upcoming Oak Trail platform but at this time cannot confirm a tablet design based on Intel’s new architecture.”

Acer and Lenovo did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

Intel’s presence has been conspicuously missing in the tablet and smartphone arena to date. Thus far, the rival ARM-licensed processor architecture has been the dominant force in the market.

“The big issue is power consumption,” Richard Fichera, an analyst at Forrester research told Wired.com. “ARM was designed from the get-go to be low-power consumption.”

Because mobile devices like smartphones are notorious for sucking down battery power faster than so-called “dumbphones,” ARM’s architecture has thus far been a good fit. Intel’s processors, while powerful, have not been as power-efficient as ARM’s.

The Oak Trail line is Intel’s step toward changing that power-efficiency gap. As one of Intel’s low-voltage Atom processors, the company claims its Oak Trail processors will improve mobile battery life “without sacrificing performance.”

Intel recently announced its first mass-produced 3-D transistor, which will be featured on another new line of chips, dubbed “Ivy Bridge.” The new transistors include a thin silicon fin jutting out from the top, differing from traditional planar transistors and allowing for more surface area to squeeze more transistors closer together.

Ivy Bridge chips will use less than half the power of Intel’s current 2-D transistors, while increasing performance by 37 percent. Although these chips won’t be readily mass-produced until the beginning of 2012, the drastic decrease in power consumption makes these chips look ready-made for mobile devices.

In the company’s annual shareholders meeting this month, CEO Paul Otellini commented on Intel’s forthcoming push into mobile, saying embedded devices are the “fastest growing sector” of Intel’s business. “The tablet race is nowhere near finished,” Otellini said.

Bad Intel! Microsoft has issued a strongly worded response to comments this week from Intel SVP Renee James describing the future of Windows 8 on ARM as fragmented and backwards-incompatible. Those statements, says Microsoft, were “factually inaccurate and unfortunately misleading,” though we’re left without clarification as to what specifically was untrue. James claimed that legacy x86 programs won’t be running on the ARM architecture, requiring a re-write for developers and probably a re-purchase for users. She also went on to suggest that each of the four hardware suppliers for Windows 8 systems-on-chip will have a different code stack, incompatible with the rest, which sounds like a far worse allegation to us. Now the issue is to try and figure out which of those two big accusations Microsoft has taken offense to. The Redmond team had nothing more to say on the matter, offering only a reminder that Windows 8 is still at the tech demo stage and there’s still a long way to go.

Microsoft rebuts Intel’s claims about Windows 8, calls them ‘factually inaccurate’ originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 19 May 2011 05:07:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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So it’s not going to replace your big-boy PC anytime soon, but Globalscale’s latest plug computer, the D2 Plug, does deliver some decidedly desktop-like traits. The latest lilliputian Linux / Android kit touts Marvell’s PXA510, a 1GHz ARMv7 processor that supports 1080p video playback and 3D graphics. According to its makers, the D2 Plug runs on two watts and features 1GB of DDR3 memory, 8GB of NAND flash, an SD card slot, eSATA port and multiple points of connectivity, including two USB 2.o ports, gigabit ethernet, HDMI, and VGA. It measures a mere 6.7 x 3.22 x 1.3 inches, and sports a $249 price tag — not exactly a small price, but there are plenty of other mini PCs in the sea.

Globalscale D2 Plug offers HD video, 3D graphics in little Linux / Android machine originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 16 May 2011 08:23:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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