ASUS rumored to have 13-inch Android laptop on its mind, NVIDIA expected to provide ARM CPU

Some might argue that ASUS already has an ARM-powered Android laptop in its inventory thanks to the Eee Pad Transformer, however the company’s now been identified as planning a more spacious 13-inch notebook device, whose power and pricing could well be even more attractive than the Transformer’s. We should naturally be wary of the source here, DigiTimes having a record that’s as patchy as the grass at Wimbledon after the first week’s play, but the Taiwanese rumormonger says ASUS has already made launch plans for this 13-incher and will be using “NVIDIA’s processor” inside. What’s intriguing here is that in the paragraph immediately preceding that revelation, DigiTimes mentions quad-core ARM SOCs — of which the one nearest to release is NVIDIA’s Kal-El. Given the non-specificity of which NVIDIA processor we can expect, Kal-El’s projected August release date, and the fact that the chip has already figured in an ultraslim Windows 8 prototype laptop, we’d say there’s plenty of circumstantial evidence to stimulate dreams of quad-core Android laptop action. Additionally, DigiTimes points out that multiple vendors are gunning to offer ARM-powered notebooks with sub-$299 price points, aiming to gobble up market share with rock bottom pricing. Bring ’em on, we say.

ASUS rumored to have 13-inch Android laptop on its mind, NVIDIA expected to provide ARM CPU originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 23 Jun 2011 01:24:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink eeepc.it  |  sourceDigiTimes  | Email this | Comments

BAPCo calls ‘liar, liar’ on AMD, Intel still its golden prince

Benchmarks can be a bit of a back and forth schoolyard screaming match — there’s plenty of yelling, but not always much brute force to back it up — so let’s take this case of ‘he said / she said’ with an even coarser grain of salt. BAPCo, a non-profit whose members include major tech industry heavyweights, slapped back at AMD today for publicly dissing the SYSmark 2012 benchmark it had an 80 percent hand in creating and for claming the group forced them out of the club. The chip maker had similar beef back in 2007 over Intel’s benchmark-friendlier chips, and this appears to be the final straw that broke its GPU’s back. On Monday, VIA and NVIDIA also joined the ranks of the recently defected, but refrained from any superfluous PR finger-wagging. Wherever the truth may lie, for sure someone’s got a case of the green-eyed monster, and it’s definitely not us. We’re looking at you, AMD.

[Thanks, Muhammad; image courtesy BAPCo]

BAPCo calls ‘liar, liar’ on AMD, Intel still its golden prince originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 22 Jun 2011 15:29:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink Maximum PC  |  sourceSemi Accurate  | Email this | Comments

Intel plans exascale computing by 2018, wants to make petaflops passé

Sure, Fujitsu has a right to be proud of its K supercomputer — performing over 8 petaflops with just under 70,000 Venus CPUs is nothing to sneeze at. Intel isn’t giving up its status as the supercomputing CPU king, however, as it plans to bring exascale computing to the world by the end of this decade. Such a machine could do one million trillion calculations per second, and Intel plans to make it happen with its Many Integrated Core Architecture (MIC). The first CPUs designed with MIC, codenamed Knights Corner, are built on a 22nm process that utilizes the company’s 3D Tri-Gate transistors and packs over 50 cores per chip. These CPUs are designed for parallel processing applications, similar to the NVIDIA GPUs that will be used in a DARPA-funded supercomputer we learned about last year. Here we thought the war between these two was over — looks like a new one’s just getting started. PR’s after the break.

Continue reading Intel plans exascale computing by 2018, wants to make petaflops passé

Intel plans exascale computing by 2018, wants to make petaflops passé originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 20 Jun 2011 20:13:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink TG Daily  |   | Email this | Comments

Acer unveils Aspire Ethos laptops built to please eyes and ears in the US and Canada

We got acquainted with Acer’s new Aspire Ethos 8951G and 5951G laptops a week ago, and told you all about its hot hardware and its £999 price in the UK. Well, now these marvelous multimedia machines have journeyed across the Atlantic and brought their nifty detachable touchpads, which double as multimedia remotes, with them. The North American versions (named AS8951G and AS5951G) also pack the same 18.4-inch and 15.6-inch HD displays and USB 3.0 ports as their British counterparts. There’s Core i5 and Core i7 Sandy Bridge silicon and GeForce GT 555M graphics to give you plenty gaming grunt, and to ensure that the sounds match the visuals, both models pump out 5.1 channel surround sound. Low end audio in the AS5951G comes courtesy of a bass booster, while its big brother has a small subwoofer stuffed in its underside. So, what’s the damage to your wallet for these two black beauties? The AS5951G and AS8951G run $1,400 and $1,600, respectively, here in the States, while prices start at $1,200 and $1,500 CAD for our friends in the Great White North. Interested parties can find the full nitty gritty in the PR after the break.

Continue reading Acer unveils Aspire Ethos laptops built to please eyes and ears in the US and Canada

Acer unveils Aspire Ethos laptops built to please eyes and ears in the US and Canada originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 16 Jun 2011 08:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |   | Email this | Comments

Olivetti’s OliPad 110 tablet runs on Honeycomb, olive oil

Just a few months after unleashing what it called Italy’s first tablet, Olivetti is turning its attention to what might be Italy’s first tablet upgrade — the OliPad 110. Much like its predecessor, this 1.3-pound slate rocks an NVIDIA Tegra 2 processor and a 10-inch touchscreen, but runs on Honeycomb and boasts a higher-res, 1280 x 800 display. There’s also a two-megapixel camera strapped to the front, a five-megapixel lens ’round back and 16GB of onboard memory. No word yet on pricing or availability, but you can check out more pics of this bella signorina at the source link, below.

Continue reading Olivetti’s OliPad 110 tablet runs on Honeycomb, olive oil

Olivetti’s OliPad 110 tablet runs on Honeycomb, olive oil originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 15 Jun 2011 12:31:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |  sourceNotebook Italia  | Email this | Comments

New LG P330 laptop has it all: brains, brawn, and beauty

LG P330

Well, look what we have here. It’s the LG P220’s big brother, the P330, and, as you can tell, good looks run in the family. Glancing at the spec sheet (after the break) it’s pretty clear this guy has been hitting the gym — there’s plenty of muscle inside in the form of an NVIDIA GT 555m. This 13.3-inch laptop isn’t just some meathead though, it’s got brains to spare thanks to a Sandy Bridge class Core i7. But, that’s not all — it’s also a sharp dresser that looks quite fetching in its magnesium and aluminum suit, and just try not to get lost staring into that beautiful IPS screen. We don’t know how much you’ll have to shell out to spend time with this svelte 3.6-pound beauty, but it should be making the retail rounds this September.

Continue reading New LG P330 laptop has it all: brains, brawn, and beauty

New LG P330 laptop has it all: brains, brawn, and beauty originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 10 Jun 2011 21:43:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |  sourcenDevil  | Email this | Comments

Madfinger demos and dishes details on its forthcoming Shadowgun game

Shadowgun looked good when we saw footage of it last month, and at E3 2011 we got to chat with the game’s creators about the Tegra-optimized title. Madfinger, the game’s creator, worked closely with NVIDIA to wring the maximum performance possible out of the Tegra 2 platform, but it said Shadowgun will still look stunning on other silicon. The game is built on the multi-platform Unity engine and will be coming to iOS and Android devices around the world in September (prices TBD). As you can see in the video above, it runs smooth as silk on an LG G2x (55-60fps) and Motorola’s Xoom (30fps). Madfinger said we can also expect 60fps on the iPad 2 and devices packing Kal-El chips, and 30fps on other Android handsets and the iPhone 4 when the game debuts. If you’ve got a hankering for some more video of the game, check the official trailer after the break.

Continue reading Madfinger demos and dishes details on its forthcoming Shadowgun game

Madfinger demos and dishes details on its forthcoming Shadowgun game originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 09 Jun 2011 15:22:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |   | Email this | Comments

Dell Streak 10 Pro tablet to launch in China this summer, US may get it next year

John Thode, Dell’s Vice President for mobile devices, has shared a Honeycomb-flavored snippet of his company’s tablet roadmap with CNET. The 10-inch Android tablet that we saw at CES and suspected could be with us this month will indeed be making its debut in the summer, according to Thode, but its launch market will be China, not the US. He points to a number of “inhibitors and barriers to success” in Dell’s homeland — such as mobile carriers dictating pricing models that stifle the adoption of tablets and users being unaware of “what exactly Android is bringing” — as the causes for Round Rock’s atypical decision. The Streak 10 Pro, as it’ll officially be known, comes with a Honeycomb-standard 1280 x 800 resolution screen, an edge-to-edge glass surface, two cameras (one of them reaching a 5 megapixel res), an SD card slot, a thickness of 12mm, and 1080p video playback capabilities courtesy of an unspecified NVIDIA Tegra dual-core processor. An additional dock will allow the 10 Pro to act as a USB host, while augmenting its connectivity with HDMI, Ethernet, and, obviously, a set of USB ports. The US may still get to enjoy this bounty of options, but we’re told it won’t happen until 2012. By which point we’ll probably have a taste for fresher, icier versions of Android.

Update: Dell has confirmed all of the foregoing in a blog post.

Dell Streak 10 Pro tablet to launch in China this summer, US may get it next year originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 09 Jun 2011 02:04:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |  sourceCNET, Dell  | Email this | Comments

Gigabyte M2432 laptop with GeForce GT 440 graphics card dock hands-on

Gigabyte’s no stranger in the field of dockable computing devices, and its M2432 laptop shown off at Computex is yet another example proving just this. Let’s focus on the actual machine first: here we have a Core i5-2410M (2.3GHz to 2.9GHz) rig packing a 14-inch 1,366 x 768 LCD, Intel HD Graphics 3000, 4GB of DDR3 RAM, 500GB 7200rpm hard drive, and a DVD burner that can be swapped with a secondary battery. You’ll also find 802.11 b/g/n WiFi, Bluetooth 3.0, HDMI-out, VGA-out, 1.3 megapixel webcam, an eSATA/USB 2.0 combo port, and two USB 3.0 ports on this Windows 7 Home Premium laptop. All of this weigh 1.8kg (3.97lbs).

There’s a bit of a surprise inside the expansion dock: by laying the M2432 on top of it, not only are you adding six extra USB 2.0 ports plus DVI-out and another HDMI-out, but you’re also kicking up its graphics power with the built-in desktop-class NVIDIA GeForce GT 440 with 1GB video RAM. So essentially, the dock doubles as an external graphics card. No word on prices or availability just yet, so stay tuned.

Gigabyte M2432 laptop with GeForce GT 440 graphics card dock hands-on originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 04 Jun 2011 03:02:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |   | Email this | Comments

NVIDIA Kal-El reference tablet hands-on (video)

As if showing up in two of the first four reference devices for Windows on ARM wasn’t enough of an achievement for NVIDIA’s quad-core Kal-El superchip, it decided to visit us in person here at Computex to demonstrate its splendid graphical prowess. Running Android 3.1 on a 10-inch, 1280 x 800 screen, it gave us a first-hand look at the Glow Ball demo that wowed us in video form just a couple of days ago. What we saw on the dev tablet before us was no less impressive; lighting was being rendered in real time and scattered over a multiplicity of surfaces, while the cloth simulation was, to use a terrible pun, silky smooth. NVIDIA also ran us through a sightseeing tour of the Unreal Development Kit and Lost Planet 2, noting that the PC game took only a couple of months to port over to work on the Kal-El architecture. Unfortunately, no new details were forthcoming about when Kal-El devices might be coming or what developers we should expect to see coding games and other content to exploit the platform’s evidently mighty capabilities. For now, we’ll just have to sate ourselves with the video after the break.

Continue reading NVIDIA Kal-El reference tablet hands-on (video)

NVIDIA Kal-El reference tablet hands-on (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 02 Jun 2011 04:11:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink   |   | Email this | Comments