Intel® Atom™ Processors Go Everywhere; Netbooks Apps Now Available

INTEL DEVELOPER FORUM, San Francisco, Sept. 14, 2010 – During keynote presentations today at the Intel Developer Forum, Intel Corporation executives outlined several software and hardware-related efforts as the company intensifies its system-on-a-chip (SoC) product plans based on the Intel® Atom™ processor family.

Amid predictions of billions of additional Internet-connected devices going online, Renée James, senior vice president and general manager, Intel Software and Services Group, and Doug Davis, vice president, general manager, Embedded and Communications Group, discussed the expansion of these processors into high-growth areas including netbooks, tablets, CE, embedded, and smart phones.

Renee James, “The Best Experiences are Created on Intel Architecture”

Vice President and General Manager, Intel Software and Solutions Group

During her keynote, James outlined how tightly integrated and optimized software and platforms will deliver new levels of performance, along with fresh capabilities and the importance of creating an innovative experience across the personal computing continuum – from PCs to smart phones to tablets and cars, as well as any number of Internet-connected consumer devices.

• Intel® AppUp center – James announced the general release of Intel’s first netbook application store for consumers. The Intel® AppUp^SM center  heightens the user experience with applications optimized for the mobility and screen size of netbooks. To encourage consumers to discover new applications, the Intel AppUp Center features a free 24-hour “try before you buy” period for all paid applications.
  • Best Buy*, UK-based Dixons* and India-based Croma* are also backing Intel AppUp with plans to open and distribute their own Intel AppUp center-based storefronts on select netbooks the retail chains sell.
  • Netbook manufacturer ASUS* announced its own version of the Intel AppUp Center, called the “asus app store,” which will be available on every Asus netbook shipped after October.

• Intel and Adobe* AIR Applications – Intel and Adobe joined forces to help developers create Adobe® AIR netbook applications for the Intel AppUp center^SM, and Intel announced that the Intel AppUp Center supports Adobe AIR runtimes. As a result of the collaboration, over 100 Adobe AIR AppUp applications are expected to be available for free download or purchase by the end of September. 

• Intel AppUp Developer Program – The Intel AppUp Developer Program (IADP), through appdeveloper.intel.com, provides products and resources developers need to create and market applications for Intel® Atom™ processor-based devices and an application storefront framework to enable OEMs, service providers and others to deliver customer-facing storefronts for distributing applications and developer assets, for example software utilities, direct to consumers and developers. IADP helps drive innovative applications for end users and new revenue opportunities for independent developers and software vendors through programs such as the Intel Million Dollar Development fund and the new “On Intel AppUp” ISV identifier to help developers tie their applications to the Intel AppUp center.

• MeeGo TV – Internet TV pioneer Amino Communications* demonstrated a MeeGo-based smart TV solution, which supplements traditional digital TV programming with additional content supplied over an Internet connection. With the help of the MeeGo operating system, the Amino Freedom over-the-top device also delivers a full Internet experience via a browser and support for Microsoft* Silverlight and Adobe Flash.

• DeviceVM and MeeGo —  DeviceVM, a worldwide leader in instant-on computing, previewed the next generation of its award-winning Splashtop instant on platform on stage. The flagship Splashtop product has already shipped on millions of netbooks and notebooks worldwide from leading PC OEMs. The company now plans to offer a MeeGo-compliant version of the popular companion OS to all existing OEM customers, while enabling current users of Splashtop-powered systems to take advantage of a seamless upgrade in the first half of 2011.

• MeeGo Home Phone –Gemtek is demonstrating the first media phone with an Intel® Atom™ processor and pre-release of MeeGo v1.1. Codenamed “Zeus,” this product will be part of a family of media phone products with screen sizes ranging from 7-10 inches from Gemtek. “Zeus” is targeted to be the new-generation home communication device with VoIP and regular phone line capability, video telephony, multimedia communication with media sharing via DLNA, and will provide a full internet browser experience. Zeus includes a cordless handset and a docking station with a removable tablet/communication device.

Doug Davis, “Smart, Connected, Transformed Experiences”

Vice President, General Manager, Intel Embedded and Communications Group

Discussing the important role the Intel Atom brand plays in delivering intelligent computing to connected devices everywhere, Davis outlined the complete Intel Atom processor line and how the company is delivering solutions based on Intel® Architecture beyond the PC. Davis also emphasized how Intel Atom processor-based solutions can provide the ideal platform for Internet connectivity, intelligence and ease of design with customer port of choice.

• Intel® Atom™ E600 – Intel today launched the Intel® Atom™ E600 SoC processor series (formerly codenamed “Tunnel Creek”) for embedded applications; for more information, please see the product Fact Sheet.

• Visteon IVI Solution – Upton Bowden of Visteon joined Davis on stage to showcase the Visteon development platform for an intelligent, connected in-vehicle experience. He explained how the additional hardware integration and IOH flexibility of the new Atom E600 series make it easier to design and build an in-vehicle infotainment system and offers more customizable solutions for their customers.

• Intel® Atom™ processor CE4200 — Formerly codenamed “Groveland,” this third- generation IA-based SoC is designed and optimized for the smart TV experi­ence, including the seamless integration of Internet, television and personal content with search capability. The highly integrated SoC pairs a powerful 1.2 GHz  Intel Atom™ processor core and 512K L2 Cache with integrated functional units to help bring increased performance and headroom for the rapid development of interactive, open and personalized applications for TV. These applications (e.g. social networking, advanced user interfaces, intelligent search engines, 3-D gaming) are at the heart of the smart TV experience. ADB*, Sagemcom,* Samsung* and Technicolor* have announced plans to build advanced set-top boxes based on the Intel product.

• Intel® Atom™ processor CE4200 builds on Intel’s high performance SoC architecture for Consumer Electronics – The SoC features 3-D-TV decoding and processing capabilities and support for leading-edge multi-stream, high-definition hardware decoding and processing capabilities, including MPEG2, H.264, MPEG4-2 and VC-1¹. It also includes an integrated high-definition H.264 HD video encoder to enable new applications such as video conferencing, in-home network video streaming, hard drive storage savings and flexible “sync-n-go” connectivity with mobile devices. The SoC helps to address energy requirements by supporting a number of standby modes and power levels to help meet the industry-specified platform power consumption requirements.

• Microsoft announces Windows Embedded Standard 7*, with Windows Media Center*, on Intel® Atom™ processor CE4100-based platforms — Microsoft has ported Windows* Embedded Standard 7, with Windows Media Center*, to the Intel® Atom™ processor CE4100. Up until now, customers needed a high-end PC platform to enjoy the full experience of Windows Media Center. The port to the CE4100 will enable OEMs to build a connected media device (CMD) such as a set top box or DVR that will deliver content and services directly to a TV, and at a competitive price point. The hardware accelerators on the CE4100 enable an outstanding media experience for HD content. Davis was joined onstage by Barb Edson, senior director of marketing, Microsoft Windows Embedded Business, to showcase two prototype set top boxes from Acer* and ASUS*. She demonstrated the Windows Embedded platform, showing a customizable start page, live TV, recorded TV, Internet TV, as well as the ability to stream personal content, such as photos and videos, into the Media Center display on the TV.  The new products from Acer and ASUS are expected to be available in 2011.

• D-Link and Boxee* Announce Boxee Box* based on the Intel CE4100 — D-Link and Boxee announced a new media device capable of playing popular digital media formats from home media collections and the Internet. Based on the Intel® Atom™ processor CE4100, the Boxee Box gives users access to on-demand entertainment through movies, shows and applications, including social networking. Products are expected to begin shipping in November in the United States, Canada, the EU and Australia.

• Smart TV Momentum – Intel highlighted two smart TV-enabling products powered by the Intel® Atom™ processor CE4100 and Google TV* that are expected out this fall. The Sony* Internet TV and the Logitech Revue* add-in box will seamlessly combine access to the Internet with the TV viewing experience through the combination of Intel processors and Google TV based on the Android* OS. The demonstration highlighted how an individual could get a rich experience while on the Internet, watching TV and watching a video posted on Facebook* using a TV connected to the Logitech Revue box.

• Intel Consumer Electronics Network – A member-based community of hardware, software and services providers aimed at speeding the delivery of Intel® architecture-based connected CE devices. Seven new member companies have joined the network: Fluendo*, JetHead Development, Inc.*, PrimeSense Ltd*, Schematic*, Solekai Systems*, TransGaming Inc.* and Tripleplay Integration*.

• Intel Powers Tablet and Netbook Hardware, Software with MeeGo – Based on the Intel® Atom™ processor N450, WeTab* will ship the first tablet based on the MeeGo* open source operating system this month. The tablet will ship with a WeTab touch interface and the ability to run Adobe Flash, Adobe Air, Qt and Java applications. For more information, visit http://wetab.mobi/en. In addition, two local Russian OEMs – 3Q and iRU – and Russian retailer DNS, will introduce MeeGo-based netbooks and entry-level desktops into the local market beginning in the fourth quarter. Linux Center will be the local MeeGo operating system vendor for all three companies.

• Intel Experiences Netbook Momentum – Following the launch of the mobile dual-core Intel Atom processors, netbooks based on the new processor have helped drive sales and leading OEM support. Netbooks based on the dual-core Intel® Atom™ processor N550 offer consumers Internet access on the go with new levels of support for applications such as games. Netbooks have Adobe Flash support and a more responsive experience in the same compact form factor, with DDR3 memory support and long battery life. Intel has seen impressive ramp up of netbooks with more than 70 million sold to date. For more information, visit www.intel.com/products/processor/atom.

• “Oak Trail” is the codename for the upcoming Intel® Atom™ platform optimized for tablets and sleeker netbook form factors due to its reduction in power consumption and thermals. Available to customers in early 2011, the SoC Intel® Atom™ processor-based platform will deliver up to a 50 percent reduction in average power consumption with full HD video playback and targeting software choice including MeeGo*, Windows* 7 and Google operating systems. Devices powered by the SoC will also feature compatibility with various operating systems, including Android*, MeeGo and Windows 7*.

• Dell Innovating on Intel® Atom™ — Davis was joined onstage by Dell to preview its upcoming convertible mobile device, equipped with an upcoming dual-core Intel Atom processor. The innovative form factor will be available later this year. The ultra-small design contains a 10-inch swiveling screen that transforms seamlessly into a tablet, supports Microsoft Windows* 7 and will feature a Dell-developed touch interface that provides one-touch access to applications and content.  

Nokia Sharpens Focus to Connect Next Billion to the Internet

SINGAPORE, September 15, 2010 – Nokia today unveiled a strategy to connect the “next billion” people to the Internet by leveraging its unique capability to provide emerging markets with powerful yet affordable mobile phones and locally relevant Ovi services. Nokia’s vision of “Connecting People” beyond telephony was a highlight at the final day of the annual Nokia World event, and complemented yesterday’s rollout of a powerful new family of smartphones and updated Ovi services. To demonstrate its commitment to emerging markets, Nokia also updated a portfolio of feature-rich mobile phones and underscored Internet services that cater to a world in which four out of five people are within reach of a cellular signal.

Mary McDowell, Nokia’s executive vice president for Mobile Phones, said in her keynote that the company is ideally placed to capture much of the projected growth in the global marketplace and that the company intends to maintain its leadership in voice and data for the masses.

“More people will join the information age using a mobile phone than a PC,” McDowell said. “With 80 percent of the world’s population in reach of a cell tower, it is the mobile phone that will offer the first PC-like experience for many of the next billion people who will come online.”

She added that Nokia will leverage its local knowledge of consumers, distribution strength and scale to innovate and deliver what consumers deem is valuable at prices they can afford.

Innovation and portfolio renewal

Following the recent launch of the Nokia X3 Touch and Type, Nokia unveiled its second touch and type phone: the Nokia C3 Touch and Type, which combines a touch screen and traditional phone keypad.  An affordable design classic, this Series 40 phone also features a full stainless steel chassis, 3G, WLAN, a 5 megapixel camera with flash, a music player, FM radio and support for up to a 32GB memory card.  The phone has fast access to messaging and email plus applications and games from the Ovi Store.  Priced at approximately EUR 145, excluding taxes and subsidies, it is expected to be available in Q4.

McDowell also emphasized that in addition to well-made, well-priced devices, consumers everywhere crave apps that deliver globally and locally relevant content. And they want it quickly, easily and affordably.

“New kinds of services and powerful software typically associated with smartphones are becoming more important in the traditional mobile phone space,” she explained. “We are rolling out targeted services to meet consumer demand for connectivity, access to information and affordability.”

Responding to a higher consumer demand for information and services

Nokia is responding to higher demand on a number of fronts delivering to the needs of people in growth markets, including the integration of Ovi services.  In addition, Nokia provides wide-scale business opportunities for third-party Series 40 developers.

Ovi Mail

Ovi Mail has attracted more than 14 million email activations, the large majority of which are new users coming from emerging markets. In the last six months alone, 60 percent of new Ovi Mail accounts are from Southeast Asia Pacific and Africa, and more than 77 percent of people in the Middle East and Africa are now signing-up for Ovi Mail on their Nokia mobile phone instead of a PC.  In addition, more than 80 percent of Ovi Mail consumers globally are accessing their mailboxes from their mobile device.

Ovi Browser in Beta

Through its recent acquisition of Novarra, Nokia brings new browser technology and the power of cloud services to Series 40, enabling more Internet users in emerging markets to get more out of what the Web has to offer.  Ovi Browser is now in beta release and makes Series 40 browsing faster, more affordable, easier to use, and more personalized.

Ovi Music

A hyper-local approach to music services has seen Nokia become the single largest source of digital music revenue in markets including Brazil, Mexico and India, when Nokia digital billings for 2009 are compared against IFPI (International Federation of the Phonographic Industry) estimates. With music services live across 38 markets, Nokia now offers the most globally scaled digital music footprint.

Ovi Store on Series 40

With hundreds of millions of Series 40 devices in use today, Ovi Store provides easy discovery and access to apps as well as high-volume business opportunities for developers.  With Series 40 as the world’s largest mobile platform, Nokia believes there is plenty of opportunity for third parties to develop locally relevant apps and achieve volumes. Nokia recently extended its reach by launching a fully commercial Ovi Store in China.

Enabling emerging market consumers’ journey into services

Ovi Life Tools and Nokia Money are among the best examples of catering to the needs of emerging markets. They are positively impacting consumers’ lives by providing access to the Internet for education, entertainment, health, business improvement and self improvement.

Today Ovi Life Tools is available in India, Indonesia and China, and now has more than 4.7 million users.

Nokia Money aims to offer consumers with mobile phones access to basic financial services.  Together with YES BANK and Obopay, Nokia’s pilot in Pune, India, called Mobile Money Services by YES BANK, – has  moved to full commercialization.  The next step for an India-wide rollout is the city of Chandigarh.

You probably know about the OCZ RevoDrive which has amazing IOPs. At the Sandstorm booth at IDF technology Showcase, the latest RevoDrive x2 is sighted at the Sandforce booth.

The new OCZ RevoDrive X2, which is a PCI Express-based SSD that features four Sandforce controllers in what’s essentially a 4-way RAID configuration looks just like the the existing RevoDrive, but with a daughterboard attached with two additional controllers and some additional NAND. The RevoDrive X2 also sports Intel NAND flash memory. The device offers a max read speeds in the 740MB/s range with writes approaching 730MB/s. Using IOMETER, 4K random writes are rated at up to 120,000 IOPS.

Source

LG has officially announced the arrival of the LG Optimus One and Optimus Chic, both of which come packing Google Android 2.2.

The products were shown off at a press conference in Seoul, where LG’s head of mobile Skott Ahn announced that LG’s expectations for the Optimus One and Chic is that they “should sell more than 10 million devices”.

The two smartphones have Froyo on board, which essentially means Google Voice Actions, Google Voice Search and Google Goggles are all compatible with the devices. The two smartphones will also turn into portable Wi-Fi hotspots.

The LG Optimus One has a 3.2-inch wide HVGA screen, a long-life battery which can handle 450 minutes of talk time and the touchscreen is capacitive. It also houses a 3MP camera, microSD card slot (up to 32GB) and a 600MHz CPU.

The Optimus Chic is for the style conscious and also has a 600MHz CPU, but can only handle 330 minutes of talk time. It does come with DLNA connectivity and LG Air Sync, and there’s also a 3.2-inch HVGA capacitive touchscreen on board.

Camera wise, there is a 5MP sensor inside, a MicorSD card slot (up to 32GB) and video recording at 30fps.

The LG Optimus One has a UK release date of October, while the LG Optimus Chic’s UK release date is in November.

Source

M1 Press Release

M1 partners LASALLE in creative

fund-raising project for disadvantaged youths

SINGAPORE, 14 September 2010 – M1 has teamed up with one of Singapore’s leading arts institutions, LASALLE College of the Arts, to raise funds creatively for underprivileged youths from Beyond Social Services (BSS).

The M1 LASALLE T-shirt Design Contest is inviting students from LASALLE to submit designs for T-shirts based on their interpretation of the benefits that they enjoy as students on M1 mobile plans. These exclusive student privileges include unlimited free local SMS and MMS, free campus calls within various tertiary institutions, free data bundle and unlimited free calls to 3 M1 numbers.

Designers who are able to communicate these benefits in the most creative way will be shortlisted. Their works will be uploaded onto www.liveunlimited.sg, a M1 website dedicated to meeting the communications needs of Singapore’s youths. Members of the public can visit the website from 16 October to vote for their favourite T-shirt design.

The three LASALLE students with the highest votes will not only win attractive prizes but also see their works printed on T-shirts which will be sold at M1 shops in November. All proceeds will be donated to BSS to help them fund programmes to fight delinquency among children and youths.

“We are excited to embark on this community project which combines the elements of charity and youths and the creativity of LASALLE College of the Arts students. It is also a new and refreshing channel to reach out to our target audience. Most importantly, we have created an opportunity for the whole community to come together for a good cause, especially in getting young people to lend a helping hand to their peers,” said P. Subramaniam, Chief Marketing Officer of M1.

“LASALLE College of the Arts’ students are honoured to part of this community outreach programme to help unprivileged youth. This project serves as a good opportunity for our students to show their passion for design through their work. We look forward to working on such projects in the near future and we thank M1 for their support,” said Joselyn Sim, Programme leader, Design Communication, LASALLE College of the Arts.

Intel detailed several new and improved features for its upcoming 2nd Generation Intel® Core™ processor family for laptops and PCs. This will be Intel’s latest processor, with a rich visual experience built-in.
Expected to be in production later this year with new laptops and PCs available starting in early 2011.
Chips will further expand Intel’s battery life and performance leadership.
First public demonstrations of Intel’s next-generation Xeon™ server platforms, for both dual and multi-processing servers.

SAN FRANCISCO, Sept. 13, 2010 – Intel Corporation revealed today several significant design features for the company’s 2011 2nd Generation Intel® Core™ processor family at the Intel Developer Forum. The new and enhanced features will further extend Intel’s chip performance and battery life leadership, and add a number of visually related features built right into the chips.

Codenamed “Sandy Bridge,” the chips will be based on Intel’s first new “visibly smart” microarchitecture produced on the company’s cutting-edge manufacturing factories, or “fabs,” at 32-nanometer (nm is a billionth of a meter) process technology with second- generation high-k metal gate transistors.

“The way people and businesses are using computers is evolving at an explosive rate, fueling demand for an even more powerful and visually appealing experience,” said Dadi Perlmutter, executive vice president and general manager of the Intel Architecture Group. “Our upcoming 2nd Generation Intel Core processor family represents the biggest advance in computing performance and capabilities over any previous generation. In addition to offering these features inside Intel-based laptops, we plan to scale these advances across our server data center and embedded computing product portfolio.”

The processor family will include a new “ring” architecture that allows the built-in processor graphics engine to share resources such as cache, or a memory reservoir, with the processor’s core to increase a device’s computing and graphics performance while maintaining energy efficiency.

The 2nd Generation Intel Core processor also includes an enhanced version of Intel® Turbo Boost Technology. This feature automatically shifts or reallocates processor cores and processor graphics resources to accelerate performance, tailoring a workload to give users an immediate performance boost when needed.

Laptops and PCs powered by the 2nd Generation Intel Core processor family are expected to be available early next year.

New Visual Experience – Visibly Smart
Intel’s new processor graphics delivers enhanced visual features focused on the areas where most users are computing today: HD video, 3-D, mainstream gaming, multi-tasking and online socializing and multimedia.

To obtain and view video faster, Perlmutter demonstrated hardware accelerated video editing using the architecture’s dedicated silicon for media processing, which allows users to quickly convert video to other formats.

The 2011 chips also come with Intel Advanced Vector Extensions (AVX). AVX delivers improved performance, rich functionality and the ability to better manage, rearrange and sort data. A new 256-bit instruction set accelerates floating point intensive applications such as digital photo editing and content creation.

Intel also demonstrated a dual processor, next-generation Intel® Xeon® processor server running Vidyo* video conferencing software that utilizes the 32 threads available on the system, and takes advantage of the AES New Instructions set (AESNI). Next-generation Xeon™ processors for 2 socket servers and workstations run 8 cores and 16 threads per processor and are on schedule for production in the second half of 2011.

ROG iDirect is now available on the Apple Store

Still overclocking your PC in old-fashioned way? Let ROG iDirect bring you the whole new tweaking experience on your iPhone/iPad! Thanks to the Bluetooth card that coming with the selected ASUS Republic of Gamers motherboards, you’ll be able to monitor your PC, tweak parameters such as voltages and frequencies in real time wirelessly from your iPhone/iPad!

FEATURES:

Overclocking: Allows to overclock your PC on-the-fly on iPhone/iPad. This feature gives you the access to all turning and tweaking options required for overclocking.
Hardware Monitor: Real-time monitor system information, critical part’s temperatures, voltages, frequencies, and fan speeds on your PC.
Remote Control: Remote access to restart and forced shut down your PC

Click here to download application

IDF 2010 : Gigabyte’s Sandy Bridge Motherboard sighted at IDF 2010

The first Gigabyte board with Intel P67 chipset using the Socket 1155 is sighted at IDF 2010 in San Francisco.

Gigabyte showcase two boards model P67A-UD5 and P67-UD7. Both are high end board with a blue and a black PCB respectively.

Intel P67 is a discrete chipset unlike the H67. It is suppose to support both CrossFire X and SLI. It is suspected that the Gigabyte P67 might licensed SLI support through the use of the NF200 SLI chipset from NVIDIA.

The P67-UD5 has 2 x USB 3.0 ports while the P67-UD7 has 4 instead. Native support of SATA 6.0Gbps (SATA 3) is now embedded within the Intel chipset. Thus, it doesn’t require additional supporting chips for that.

Both boards are suspected to be ready by Jan 2011 when the CPU is launched.

This release contains a few changes you should find useful in your work:

- AVX instruction set (Sandy Bridge): extensive support in all benchmarks: Multi-Media (integer & float), Memory Bandwidth (integer & float, buffered and unbuffered/streaming), Cache & Memory (non-streaming).

- Support for up to 256 threads on Windows 7/Server 2008 R2! We’ve only tested up to 80-threads, but if you have more we’d love to hear from you! It also supports systems with holes in CPU list (e.g. CPU numbers not sequential) though it’s best not to have holes wherever possible.

- Blu-Ray: we are launching Blu-Ray test disks in addition to the DVD and CD-ROM test disks!

- OpenCL: upports nVidia 3.1 and ATI/AMD 2.2 SDK versions.

- Ranking Engine: is now on-line and localised in all the languages Sandra supports:

http://www.sisoftware.net/rank2009/

the new version automatically downloads aggregated results from the ranker if the feature is enabled.

GIGABYTE GV-N450OC-1G Graphics Card GIGABYTE GV-N450-1G Graphics Card

Taipei, Taiwan, September 13th, 2010 – GIGABYTE Technology Co. LTD., a leading manufacturer of motherboards and graphics cards, is pleased to launch the latest GeForceTM GTS 450 series, GV-N450OC-1GI and GV-N450-1GI. Built on highly anticipated NVIDIA® Fermi architecture, GV-N450OC-1GI and GV-N450-1GI are designed from the ground up for DirectX® 11 tessellation that they are able to bring users incredibly vivid visual experience. GV-N450OC-1GI features industry-leading innovative cooling design, WINDFORCETM 2X-Smart Dust-Reducing. It effectively reduces fan dusts and creates ultimate silent environment. For GV-N450-1GI, copper core fan helps lower the temperature by 14%. GIGABYTE GTS 450 series is also equipped with the latest graphics technologies including NVIDIA® 3D VisionTM and PhysX® to set a new standard for HD gaming.

WINDFORCETM 2X: Smart Dust-Reducing Cooling

GV-N450OC-1GI features GIGABYTE WINDFORCETM 2X-Smart Dust-Reducing cooling design. Adopting anti-turbulence inclined dual fans, GIGABYTE WINDFORCETM 2X is able to minimize turbulence between fans and enlarge air channel in the graphics card vents. What’s more, users are given two fan mode options, Dual Power Mode and Smart Alternate Mode to satisfy all their needs. Under 3D gaming, users can use Dual Power Mode to enjoy cool gaming environment. Under 2D usage, users can manually switch to Smart Alternate Mode to have fan dusts cleaned. Users will enjoy longer fan life span by this smart design. In addition, WINDFORCETM 2X is quipped with 2 copper heat-pipes to strengthen the speed of heat dissipation.

To provide better cooling system, GV-N450-1GI is equipped with copper core fan. Large copper rod contacts GPU directly to enhance heat dissipation. Along with ultra quite PWM fan, GV-N450-1GI is cooler by 14%.

GV-N450OC-1GI

WINDFORCE™ 2X Smart Dust-Reducing Fan Modes

Dual Power Mode
(Dual Fan Operating Mode)
Smart Alternate Mode
(Single Fan Operating Mode)

2 fans spin 10 minutes, and then take turns to spin
30 seconds to speed up fan dust reduction.
Each fan takes turns to spin
for 4 minutes to reduce fan dusts.

To satisfy 3D enthusiasts, GV-N450OC-1GI and GV-N450-1GI provide eye-popping 3D effects in games, Blu-ray 3D, photos, and streaming 3D over the web through NVIDIA® 3D VisionTM. GIGABYTE GTS 450 series are also designed for gaming and great home theater solution.

Intel IDF is round the corner. For the PC DIY users, most readers would be interested in the new Sandy Bridge, the next generation microarchitecture. Sandy Bridge is the next generation platform that will replace today’s Core i3, i5, i7 based on Lynnfield. As mentioned before, Sandy Bridge will comprise of new processors made on a 32nm process. It inherits that embedded GPU just like the current processors.

Unfortunately, it will require a new socket type LGA1155, so it wont be compatible to existing mainboards. We expect the new boards incorporating the new chipset to go on sale as early as Jan 2011 in line with the new processors.

We should also be hearing more about the PCI Express 3.0. With 128- and 130-bit encoding and data rates of 8 gigatransfers per second, it would benefit graphics cards that makes use of the extra bandwidth.

USB 3.0 and Light Peak will be another major turning point if Intel supports the USB 3.0. As we know, USB 3.0 is currently found on most boards with the NEC USB 3.0 chipset. If Intel were to support it, adoption would be way faster. So, will Intel make any announcement about USB 3.0 support, that remains to be seen.

In a pre-show event, Intel demonstrated their project at Intel Research Labs. The Object-Aware Situated Interactive System – or OASIS. The technology involves using a 3D camera, projector, and sophisticated software algorithms to create a touch-sensitive environment on everyday household surfaces.

The software can recognise and remember objects (3D). The software is smart enough to know when you’ve grabbed an object. Hold an apple and various recipes are projected on to the surface. Below is a video that demonstrates that.

Stay tuned for more.

Digitimes reports that Acer is taking another step forward with the possibility of launching tablet PCs based on the Android OS to compete with iPad.

Acer is slated to introduce a tablet pc this Q4 powered by Wintel platform and an Android-enabled device in early 2011.

In addition to tablets or pads, Acer will continue to focus on Android. It intends to ship 2 million smartphone in 2010 and 5-6 million in 2011. Currently, there are no news about it’s plans on Win mobile 7 smartphones.

AMD next generation graphics card series Radeon HD6000 series has leaked on the net. The pictures include the stripped down version of the card with exposed GPU. So far, there isn’t much information about the card. What is revealed is that it uses GDDR3 1GB/64bit with core/mem at 650/800MHz. It also has a HDMI 1.4 interface as output.

Check out the Chinese edition for more pictures.

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Google and Huawei have announced an Android smartphone that runs the Android 2.2 mobile OS. Huawei says the IDEOS phone is the first mass-market handset to be offered with the Android 2.2 OS preinstalled.

The Huawei IDEOS will carry a SIM-free price tag of between US$100 and $200 depending on where it’s bought. Huawei is currently in active negotiations with a number of carriers keen to offer the Google-branded device. The phone is set for “commercial launch” in mid-October in Europe and Asia-Pacific.

The Huawei IDEOS Android smartphone offers 3G HSDPA connectivity as well as 80.11n Wi-Fi. This, explained Nicola Philbin, Huawei’s director for terminals, UK and Ireland, offers web connection speeds up to six times faster than standard Wi-Fi. The phone also supports 3G tethering, allowing it to act as modem for a laptop to connect to the web where a Wi-Fi or Ethernet broadband connection is not available.

The Huawei IDEOS smartphone sports a 2.8in QVGA capacitative touchscreen, has a 3.2Mp camera, Bluetooth A2DP and 512MB of internal memory. Running a Qualcomm 528MHz processor, the IDEOS handset has its own media player and accepts microSD cards up to 32GB.

The Huawei IDEOS was co-developed by Google and the Chinese hardware manufacturer and is effectively a successor device to the high-end Nexus One smartphone that Google co-developed with HTC. While the Google Nexus One showcased the Android 2.1 clair version of the mobile operating system and was pitched against the likes of the Apple iPhone, the IDEOS is a mass market handset thats natural rivals are the HTC Desire and Legend.

Preinstalled applications include Google Talk, Google Maps and the Android Market app download service. Since the Huawei IDEOS is equipped with the newest version of the Android OS, it will support the ability to run applications stored on a microSD card, deftly getting around the limitations of the handset’s 512MB internal memory.

The HTC Desire handset was the first device on which the Android 2.2 Froyo upgrade was offered, having originally been sold as a 2.1 clair smartphone. HTC and its partners have come under fire for the tricksy upgrade path for the HTC Desire, caused in part by the Vodafone 360 and Samsung TouchWiz user interfaces overlaid on the standard Android interface.

The IDEOS handset will be available in blue, black, purple or yellow versions. The front of the smartphone is black, though largely dominated by its bright, responsive capacitive touchscreen, while the rear has a colourful backplate and is branded ‘with Google’. It is named the IDEOS because of its industrial design, evolutionary status and its innovative operating system. These elements, Huawei believe, fit neatly with its company philisophy of a “simple device; smarter world”.

- Google TV to launch in US this autumn, worldwide in 2011

- CEO says new Chrome OS to run tablet computers

- Tablet partnerships to be announced later this year

According to Reuters news, Google will launch its service to bring the Web to TV screens in the United States this autumn and worldwide next year, said it’s CEO Eric Schmidt.

Google TV will allow full internet browsing via the TV and it will be free. Google will work with a variety of programme makers and electronics manufacturers to bring it to consumers.

Sony last week had agreed to have Google TV on it’s TV sets and Samsung is looking into it. This come as a challenge to Apple TV which was announced just earlier.

On the tablet front, the Galaxy Tab is powered by Android 2.2. Google on the other hand is pushing Google’s Chrome OS (due to be launched soon) for the tablets.

ASRock’s front USB 3.0 mainboard leads the industry

Innovate innovate and innovate. Mainboard manufactuers are doing their best to bring out the best features on their mainboards.

ASRock, being on the frontier of innovation and technology brings us more surprises one after another.

ASRock is the first manufacturer to incorporate more than 2 USB 3.0 ports powered by the NEC USB 3.0 chipset. As we all know, USB 3.0 gives a boost to data thoughput of up to 5Gbps instead of the 480Mbps of USB 2.0.

ASRock is the first to bring the ports to the front by introducing bundling a front panel bracket with the new boards.

With front USB 3.0, you are now able to tap the speed by plugging your USB 3.0 devices directly from the front panel, saving you time grouping around in the dark finding the right USB port at the backplane.

The front panel USB 3.0 was first introduced on the P55 Extreme 4. This mainboard comes with 4 USB 3.0 ports (2 back and 2 front). In addition, you also get 4 SATA3 ports on board.

To cater to different market segments, ASRock brings the Front USB 3.0 support to 3 more boards, namely the 890FX Deluxe 4, 890GX Extreme 4 for the AMD platform and X58 Extreme 6 for the Intel X58 platform.

The 890FX Deluxe 4 is based on the AMD 890FX chipset support 2 front and 2 back USB 3.0, it also support up to 8 SATA3 ports on board.

The 890GX Extreme 4 also has 4 USB 3.0 ports, 2 front and 2 back and has 5 SATA3 ports.

The X58 Extreme 6 is the highest end board in this range. It is based on intel X58 chipset. It supports te new 6 core processors and has 6 USB 3.0 ports. THere are 4 for the rear and 2 for the front. It is equipped with 6 SATA3 ports too.

All 4 boards comes with the Front USB 3.0 front panel bundled in for free.

Watch out for review of some of these boards at OCWorkbench.com soon. Also check out our ASRock forums on announcement of lucky draw for these boards in the upcoming days-weeks.

Intel will launch new series of P67 and H67 chipsets in Jan 2011 with 25% graphics improvement

It is annual update with chipsets. Intel is slated to launch the P67 and H67 chipsets in Jan 2011. Board manufacturers are eagerly awaiting for the new processors and chipsets as they already have the boards ready for the new yr.

For those who have seen our report of Computex 2010, you would have seen some early static boards of P67 or H67.

Basically, the P67 and H67 do not differ much from it’s predecessors the P55 and H55. Basically the P67 is discrete while the H67 has graphics output ports on the mainboard.

One thing to note is that the P67 and H67 will support new series of processors with LGA1155 socket. Thus, your current processors won’t run on the new boards with new chipsets.

The new processors with 1155 is slated to be lanuched in January 2011 or so. The new embedded graphics on these processors is said to have a 25% improvement in performance over the current LGA1156 processors.

Currently, Intel P55 and H55 boards support overclocking. Unfortunately, the next generation H67 will not support overclocking. So, if you need to overclock, you would have to go for discrete solution, the P67.

Nokia C6 Review

Nokia C6 is a mid-range 3.2″ resistive touchscreen smartphone with a slide out QWERTY keyboard and comprehensive social messaging software suite. The C6 runs Symbian^1 (but with pervasive kinetic scrolling and widget homescreen, N97-style) and features a 5 megapixel camera, integrated GPS and comprehensive connectivity options. It ships with a full range of Ovi services, including Ovi Maps (free car and pedestrian navigation), Ovi Store (content downloads), Ovi Music (music store), and Nokia Messaging (email and instant messaging).

Nokia is emphasizing the social messaging capabilities of the phone, with Nokia Messaging handling a comprehensive range of email accounts, with various on-board tools for interacting with social networks and with Ovi Store giving access to a range of IM applications.

The 5 MP camera can capture image at the resolution of 2592 x 1944 pixels. Autofocus, LED flash, geo-tagging, face and smile detection are part of the feature set. The handset is available with GPRS and Wi-Fi for internet access. Several other internet features can be enjoyed such as Yahoo! Messenger, Google Talk and Windows Live Messenger.

Here is how the package looks like :