Jul 24, 2010

Storage-n-Harddrives. Where are we and where are we going?

Grab a fifth or your favorite 70 proof or higher beverage and read on

Recently hard drives and the storage industry in general has been a tough thing to write about, because frankly, nobody really cares!  It’s much more fun and exciting to get caught up in the hype surrounding the latest multi-core CPUs running at orgasmic clock speeds, or exotic video cards that need their own power reactors but have enough FLOPs under the hood to calculate the single precision meaning of life.  In fact the only time we give our trusty storage things a second thought (and exhaust our dictionaries of naughty words) is when they die and take our data along with them.  Well, to help remedy this journalistic conundrum, we’ve developed a drinking game to aid in your consumption of this article.  Every time you see a storage related suffix (MB, GB, TB, etc.) you take a shot.  Ready?  Good, because you’re up to three already.
UPDATED
 
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Jul 23, 2010

Intel to limit Sandy Bridge overclocking?

At least according to leaked slides

IF WE’RE TO believe what is meant to be Intel presentation slides of its upcoming Sandy Bridge processors that were embedded in a video posted on YouTube by HKEPC, it looks like Intel’s LGA-1155 processors will have very limited overclocking potential. The reason for this is because Intel decided to “help” with the cost cutting by implementing a clock generator built into the chipset, rather than relying on an additional chip on the motherboard.
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Jul 19, 2010

Intel drops a few CPU prices

And adds a few new CPUs to boot

ALTHOUGH IT’S ABOUT a month since we reported Intel’s price drop and new processor launch, it has finally happened. We’ve got a few new processors in the market and Intel has dropped the price on some of its models by as much as 47.6 percent. So if you’re looking for a bargain deal on a new CPU, then there might be something that’ll fit your needs.
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Jul 15, 2010
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AMD releases Q2 financial results, and Ontario details galore

40nm supply problems persist

Another day, another quarterly earnings conference call.  AMD came in with their latest and greatest batch of numbers, tidbits of product information, and future guidance for the company.  While your man was unable to squeeze any questions in this time around, (and apparently vuvuzelas are frowned upon during these conference calls for some reason) there were still plenty of interesting nuggets of information dropped along the way, so let’s begin.
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Jul 14, 2010

Intel blames datacenter group for record quarterly profits

Increased Gibson hacking not a factor they claim

While listening in on hour-long industry financial conference calls should be the most fulfilling part of any geek’s day, for some reason people expect outfits like us to break it all down into nice bite-size chunks that they can assimilate over morning coffee. Whatever, who are we to judge?  Bottom line, Intel is on a tear this year and has just announced record quarterly; revenue ($10.8B), gross margin (67%), operating income ($4.0B), and earnings per share ($0.51).
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Jul 14, 2010

Renesas launches new USB 3.0 host controller

85 percent more power efficient than the current model

WE BROKE THE news about Renesas new USB 3.0 host controller back in April.  Back then we reported that the new controller was going to have a reduced power consumption, but at the time we didn’t know by how much. Renesas has finally unveiled the new host controller and has managed to reduce the power consumption by 85 percent when no peripherals are attached to the controller’s ports.
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Jul 12, 2010

GTX 460, Cash Cow or Market Share Tourniquet?

Component Price Breakdown

What a difference a “4” makes.  The NDA on Nvidia’s new midrange GTX 460 (GF104) cards was lifted last night to a general reception of “right performance at the right price”.  No doubt, after reading over many different reviews this card appears to be the real deal at the $200 price point (for now). Despite the glowing reviews however one nagging question remained; considering that GF104 has an estimated die size of 320mm2  (which is nearly 96% of AMD’s high end Cypress part at 334mm2), can Nvidia actually make money on this part, or is it simply designed to put pressure on the market share laceration that’s been bleeding out lately.
 
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Jul 12, 2010

Gigabyte’s Cloud OC and Hotkey OC gets official

Overclocking a different way

IT’S NOT EASY to differentiate yourself as a motherboard manufacturer these days when it comes to hardware features, as very few things are exclusive to one manufacturer, bar possibly power regulation design and a few other little features. This means that we’ve started to see a lot more in-house software features, some of them rather good, while others have proven to be less useful. Today, Gigabyte announced two new software features for overclockers, Cloud OC and Hotkey OC.
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Jul 12, 2010

Nvidia changes desktop G86 for no reason

Bumpgate: Deny, spin, duck dodge

Editors Note: From time to time, SemiAccurate will be republishing some older articles by its authors, some with additional commentary, updates and information.  We are mainly reprinting some of the oft referenced articles that originally appeared on the Inquirer. Some will have added content, but all will be re-edited from the originals as per contractual obligations. You may see some slight differences between the two versions.
This article has had some of the original links removed, and was published on Monday, August 25, 2008 at 5:15PM.
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Jul 12, 2010

Nvidia 55nm parts are bad too

Bumpgate: Changed for ‘no reason’ once again

Editors Note: From time to time, SemiAccurate will be republishing some older articles by its authors, some with additional commentary, updates and information.  We are mainly reprinting some of the oft referenced articles that originally appeared on the Inquirer. Some will have added content, but all will be re-edited from the originals as per contractual obligations. You may see some slight differences between the two versions.
This article has had some of the original links removed, and was published on Thursday, August 28, 2008 at 7:47PM.
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