UBUNTU LINUX 10.10 came out today on, well, 10/10/10. Maverick Meerkat is out for the same price as it’s predecessor, free as in beer, and free as in freedom.
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TWO SMALL LARGE flash memory devices came out this week, pushing the bounds of packaging. Kingston now has a 32GB microSD card, and SuperTalent crammed 64GB into their Pico-C format.
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SO FAR NOT a lot of information has made its way out from AMD with regards to its upcoming Fusion platforms, but we’ve gotten our hands on some information that is about to change that. AMD is readying three chipset solutions for its upcoming mobile Fusion processors, one for Ontario and two for Llano and there are some real surprises at hand.
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IN A SHOCK to no one, SandForce announced the SF-2000 family of SATA3 SSD controllers. These new parts basically double throughput, and add a few new features as well.
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JUDGING BY THE multitude of leaks pertaining Intel’s upcoming Sandy Bridge processors, we know we’re getting closer and closer to the January launch. A few more details about some of the unknown factors about the new CPUs and chipsets have made their way online, alongside detailed specifications of Intel’s LGA-1155 Xeon processors based on the Sandy Bridge core.
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DESPITE THE CELLULAR network operator’s best efforts to control what their customers can and can’t do on the devices that they use with the various cellular services, the biggest bugbear of most network operators has been, and still seems to be, Skype. Today Skype announced its Android client software, something that is already causing quite a stir, especially as the software is limited to Wi-Fi networks only in the US, while in most other countries it can be used over the networks data service.
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NOT TOO LONG ago it was almost impossible to find an ultra-portable consumer notebook and now it seems like there are almost too many of them competing for a fairly small, but growing market. It’s beginning to look like the netbook book is dead as a market segment the last two years, as the 11.6-inch notebooks are coming from above and tablets from below which means the humble netbook is going to end up being a niche product in the not so very distant future.
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GIGABYTE HAS BEEN trying very hard to differentiate itself from other notebook manufacturers and it all started with the original BookTop, the M1022 which came with a vertical dock. This was later followed up with the M1305 and M1405, both of which featured a regular horizontal dock, but with a standard desktop graphics card fitted inside it.
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KINGSTON WAS SHOWING off three goodies at IDF, a USB3 SSD, the final version of water cooled DRAMs, and last, but not least, a USB3 memory stick. If you don’t think USB3 is worth it, read on.
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WE’VE SEEN A fair few netbooks targeting kids from both Asus and Dell to mention a couple of companies that have tried to cash in on the educational market, but it now looks like Toshiba has decided to one-up everyone with a laptop for children. We’re not quite sure what makes it specific for children, but the press release claims that it has been made “for children aged five to 10”.
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RUMOURS ARE SUGGESTING that HTC is readying its first Android tablet and it’s said to be powered by Nvidia’s Tegra 2 SoC which features an ARM Cortex-A9 dual core processor. This would indeed be a major design win for Nvidia, especially as it seems like the company is struggling to find partners that are willing to take on its Tegra 2 SoC.
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IT HAD TO happen sooner or later, Intel is starting to put out 25nm flash chips. At IDF last week, prototype chips were spotted on a prototype drive with a prototype Sandforce SSD controller.
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THERE ARE ALREADY a few USB 3.0 Flash drives on sale, but it looks like we might be getting some more affordable solutions once VLI’s VL750 controller hits the market as in typical VIA fashion, this new controller should be more affordable than what’s currently available. That is, of course, pending USB-IF certification, but hopefully this shouldn’t be too much of a problem for VIA to gain.
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ONE SCARY THING about IDF is the RFID tracking, and how people tacitly accept it. The badges each have an RFID chip in them, and you can be tracked wherever you go, and wherever Intel wants to watch you.
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SUPERTALENT LAUNCHED THEIR new USB3 Express drive with an added DRAM cache last week. The real question is whether or not the DRAM caches added any real performance or it is just a marketing ploy.
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