Slashdot Mirror

The reality is that there apparently already are motherboards that have probably died because of AMD's egregious violation of the specs

"Egregious violation", really? Even the standard tolerances apparently allow for up to 82 W. Not to mention that other designs won't have the same problem and improved drivers won't have the same problem. That's really an end-of-the-world situation, is it?

Now we have a bigger mess... the cards, running IN spec, don't perform the same as all the benchmarks that have been done.

Don't perform the same? Yeah, some people measured that they're actually up to 5% faster. :D

It only takes a queue depth of 2 or 3 for maximum linear throughput.

I haven't any idea why you are so up voted, because your flat out wrong, 5 minutes with a benchmark like ATTO allows you to see the performance with small sequential IO and queue depth. Another benchmark showing ATTO sequential IO's for small transfers

And, your sort of right the OS will do a certain amount of prefech/etc but that doesn't help when things are fragmented or the application/whatever is requesting things in a pattern that isn't easily predictable (say booting without a readyboot optimized system).

Try it out yourself, get the old sysinternals Disk Monitor and watch the size size attribute. Its in 512 byte sectors, and on my machine probably 1/3rd of the IO's are listed as "8". AKA 4k. Heck the example screenshot on the listed page is all 8 except for one 16.

So, yes small IO transfers are still an issue, and will be until we get OS's that can solve the hard problem of consolidating unpredictable IO streams. Heck a lot of people turn superfetch off because it slows things down. AKA aggressive prefetch isn't necessarily faster.

http://hexus.net/tech/reviews/...

Look at the benchmark with a discrete graphics card at the bottom.

Or the gaming pages on this review: http://www.legitreviews.com/in...

Just pair it with a decent budget card, like the 750 Ti or R9 270, and you got a solid budget gaming machine.

Or for a ready-to-populate and run system at $129:

Intel Bay Trail NUC Kit DN2820FYKH:

http://www.legitreviews.com/intel-bay-trail-nuc-kit-dn2820fyk-arrives-just-128_134400

-- kjh

do people really need a $500 video card?

People running 4k displays or multi-monitor displays with the latest games do.

PowerPC was an instruction set architecture based on the POWER ISA; a few instructions were removed, and a number were added; more were added to PowerPC over time. The POWER3 processor implemented the full 64-bit version of PowerPC, and I think it also implemented some of the POWER instructions removed from PowerPC. PowerPC ended up getting renamed "Power ISA" - not to be confused with the all-caps "POWER ISA" mentioned earlier - as part of the "Power Architecture".

I don't know what stuff this consortium is dealing with. There's already Power.org for the Power Architecture, including the Power ISA. I'm guessing that this is for licensing the microarchitecture of the POWERn microprocessors; that seems to be what some of the articles are saying. Then again, some articles are calling it OpenPOWER and other articles are calling it OpenPower, so who knows?

This site has some nice pics from the E3 event, focused on booth babes: http://www.legitreviews.com/article/2216/

Seems to work for this stand:
http://www.legitreviews.com/article/2216/1/

In protest of rapant neo-puritanism: E13 2013 Booth Babe Pics

The first 4 GHz are easy.

Here's Ivy Bridge chips pushing ~220 Watts to reach 4.7 GHz
http://www.legitreviews.com/images/reviews/1924/power-consumption.jpg

/AMD's FX-9xxx series uses a 32nm process.
/Intel's Ivy Bridge and Haswell use a 22nm process.

7000watt? Are you running 3 GPUs?

http://www.legitreviews.com/article/1924/9/

Overclocked 4.7ghz Intel i7 pulling 220watt/hr at the wall. Throw on a 200watt GPU and you have under 450watt peak. Few applications outside of distributed number-crunching and peg a multi-core CPU or GPU.

My 5 year old computer sits around 15% cpu and 8% GPU when getting 60+FPS in EvE/WoW and similar CPU and about 30%-60% GPU when playing FPS games with 4x AA @ 1080p at ultra settings.

More modern CPUs and GPUs consume even less power. The newer model GPU in the same price range is rated for nearly 1/2 the TDP and almost double the performance. The similar newer model for my CPU is about 2/3 the TDP, but about 1/5 the idle and about 6x the peak performance.

Next year, Intel's new high-end CPU is ging to be rated for around 20-40watt TDP and around 250milliwatt idle

Tell me again how modern computers need these 700watt PSUs.

Enthusiasts will command less relative market share, but their absolute market size will grow significantly
A repost with the absolute size.

That's only if you're polling, like you would for a normal human input, like a mouse/keyboard.

SSDs over USB3 can still get sub 0.1ms latencies.

http://www.legitreviews.com/article/1882/13/

BTW if anybody has an article on these 'small caching SSDs for desktops" I'd sure like to read it. I've heard of small drives being used for servers, where it is basically just being used to bootstrap the OS into RAM, but I haven't seen anything about using small SSDs as caching drives on desktops. hell does Win 7 even properly support something like that, or is it just being used like Readyboost? Like i said if you have a link I'd sure like to read it, I've still got 3 SATA II slots free on my PC, wouldn't mind a cheap speed boost.

Google; still a useful tool.

http://www.pcworld.com/article/248828/how_to_set_up_intel_smart_response_ssd_caching_technology.html

http://www.legitreviews.com/article/1587/1/

http://www.anandtech.com/show/4329/intel-z68-chipset-smart-response-technology-ssd-caching-review/3

but I had a few free seconds to help ya out there.

-AI

and many, many, moooreeee

-mainconcept http://www.lostcircuits.com/mambo//i...&limitstart=17
-mediashow http://www.guru3d.com/article/amd-fx...ssor-review/14
-h.264 http://www.guru3d.com/article/amd-fx...ssor-review/14
-vp8 http://www.guru3d.com/article/amd-fx...ssor-review/17
-sha1 http://www.guru3d.com/article/amd-fx...ssor-review/17
-photoshop cs5 http://www.lostcircuits.com/mambo//i...&limitstart=14
-photoshop cs5 http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/...x,3043-15.html
-winrar, faster than 2600k http://www.techspot.com/review/452-a...pus/page7.html
-winrar, improves over x6 http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/...x,3043-16.html
-7-zip better than 2600k here: http://images.anandtech.com/graphs/graph4955/41698.png http://www.anandtech.com/show/4955/t...x8150-tested/7
-7-zip same perf as 2600k http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/...x,3043-16.html
-POV-ray, faster than 2600k http://www.legitreviews.com/article/1741/10/
-POV-ray http://www.nordichardware.se/test-la...art=15#content
-x264(2nd pass AVX enabled) http://www.anandtech.com/show/4955/t...x8150-tested/7
-x264 (2nd pass, better overall than 2600k) http://www.bjorn3d.com/read.php?cID=2125&pageID=11108
-x264 (2nd pass +.3 than SB2600k) http://www.legitreviews.com/article/1741/7/
-handbrake; http://www.legitreviews.com/article/1741/9/
-truecrypt; http://www.bjorn3d.com/read.php?cID=2125&pageID=11111
-solidworks; faster than 2600k http://www.techspot.com/review/452-a...pus/page7.html
-abbyy filereader http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/...x,3043-16.html
-C-Ray, as fast as $1k i7-990X, http://i664.photobucket.com/albums/v.../c-rayir38.png

and many, many, moooreeee

-mainconcept http://www.lostcircuits.com/mambo//i...&limitstart=17
-mediashow http://www.guru3d.com/article/amd-fx...ssor-review/14
-h.264 http://www.guru3d.com/article/amd-fx...ssor-review/14
-vp8 http://www.guru3d.com/article/amd-fx...ssor-review/17
-sha1 http://www.guru3d.com/article/amd-fx...ssor-review/17
-photoshop cs5 http://www.lostcircuits.com/mambo//i...&limitstart=14
-photoshop cs5 http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/...x,3043-15.html
-winrar, faster than 2600k http://www.techspot.com/review/452-a...pus/page7.html
-winrar, improves over x6 http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/...x,3043-16.html
-7-zip better than 2600k here: http://images.anandtech.com/graphs/graph4955/41698.png http://www.anandtech.com/show/4955/t...x8150-tested/7
-7-zip same perf as 2600k http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/...x,3043-16.html
-POV-ray, faster than 2600k http://www.legitreviews.com/article/1741/10/
-POV-ray http://www.nordichardware.se/test-la...art=15#content
-x264(2nd pass AVX enabled) http://www.anandtech.com/show/4955/t...x8150-tested/7
-x264 (2nd pass, better overall than 2600k) http://www.bjorn3d.com/read.php?cID=2125&pageID=11108
-x264 (2nd pass +.3 than SB2600k) http://www.legitreviews.com/article/1741/7/
-handbrake; http://www.legitreviews.com/article/1741/9/
-truecrypt; http://www.bjorn3d.com/read.php?cID=2125&pageID=11111
-solidworks; faster than 2600k http://www.techspot.com/review/452-a...pus/page7.html
-abbyy filereader http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/...x,3043-16.html
-C-Ray, as fast as $1k i7-990X, http://i664.photobucket.com/albums/v.../c-rayir38.png

and many, many, moooreeee

-mainconcept http://www.lostcircuits.com/mambo//i...&limitstart=17
-mediashow http://www.guru3d.com/article/amd-fx...ssor-review/14
-h.264 http://www.guru3d.com/article/amd-fx...ssor-review/14
-vp8 http://www.guru3d.com/article/amd-fx...ssor-review/17
-sha1 http://www.guru3d.com/article/amd-fx...ssor-review/17
-photoshop cs5 http://www.lostcircuits.com/mambo//i...&limitstart=14
-photoshop cs5 http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/...x,3043-15.html
-winrar, faster than 2600k http://www.techspot.com/review/452-a...pus/page7.html
-winrar, improves over x6 http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/...x,3043-16.html
-7-zip better than 2600k here: http://images.anandtech.com/graphs/graph4955/41698.png http://www.anandtech.com/show/4955/t...x8150-tested/7
-7-zip same perf as 2600k http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/...x,3043-16.html
-POV-ray, faster than 2600k http://www.legitreviews.com/article/1741/10/
-POV-ray http://www.nordichardware.se/test-la...art=15#content
-x264(2nd pass AVX enabled) http://www.anandtech.com/show/4955/t...x8150-tested/7
-x264 (2nd pass, better overall than 2600k) http://www.bjorn3d.com/read.php?cID=2125&pageID=11108
-x264 (2nd pass +.3 than SB2600k) http://www.legitreviews.com/article/1741/7/
-handbrake; http://www.legitreviews.com/article/1741/9/
-truecrypt; http://www.bjorn3d.com/read.php?cID=2125&pageID=11111
-solidworks; faster than 2600k http://www.techspot.com/review/452-a...pus/page7.html
-abbyy filereader http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/...x,3043-16.html
-C-Ray, as fast as $1k i7-990X, http://i664.photobucket.com/albums/v.../c-rayir38.png

http://www.pcper.com/reviews/Processors/Intel-Sandy-Bridge-E-Review-Core-i7-3960X-and-X79-Chipset-Tested
http://www.hardocp.com/article/2011/11/14/intel_core_i73960x_sandy_bridge_e_processor_review
http://www.legitreviews.com/article/1773/1/
http://www.anandtech.com/show/5091/intel-core-i7-3960x-sandy-bridge-e-review-keeping-the-high-end-alive

Hardware accelerated XLS. It's very good for benchmarks. http://www.legitreviews.com/article/1060/9/

Several developers have indicated Lion does support Trim.

http://www.legitreviews.com/news/10150/

Good question, I don't have a direct answer however I found a desktop memory review here. Given that they found a 7W difference under full load and power scales to voltage squared (1.64^2) / (1.34^2) = 1.5 you can estimate it draws 14W at low voltage and 21W at high voltage.

Of course in a laptop you'll have a quite different low-power RAM like you have low-power CPUs but I'm guesstimating that yes it's significant. If you have a CPU that draws 30W at max, the RAM probably draws 5-10W too. Divide everything by two for the ULV versions. Also more RAM may mean more get cached so the hard disk rests more and the CPU can get faster back to idle, so the effect on real world power consumption isn't that easy to say.

So the rumors are true: according to the article all Sandy Bridge CPUs are Socket LGA 1155, replacing the 18 month old LGA 1366 and 17 month old LGA 1156.

I'm all for bigger and better but it's a pain to throw away a $500 motherboard every 18 months because Intel decided they want to change the socket.

On the other hand the latest 6-core processors from AMD still support 3+ yr old AM2+ motherboards. It's nice to see someone still looking out for the budget shopper.

Summary is a bit light on sources... pcper.com is good, but you should be looking at multiple reviews to get a well rounded perspective.

Here's a few:
http://www.overclockers.com/intel-i7-2600k-sandy-bridge-review
http://legitreviews.com/article/1501/1/
http://www.tweaktown.com/reviews/3754/intel_core_i7_2600k_and_core_i5_2500k_sandy_bridge_cpus/index.html
http://www.hitechlegion.com/reviews/processors/7689-intel-core-i5-2500k-processor-review

HotHardware Mobile: http://hothardware.com/Reviews/Intel-Core-i72820QM-Mobile-Sandy-Bridge-Processor-Review/
HH Desktop: http://hothardware.com/Reviews/Intel-Core-i72600K-and-i52500K-Processors-Debut/

Anandtech: http://www.anandtech.com/show/4083/the-sandy-bridge-review-intel-core-i5-2600k-i5-2500k-and-core-i3-2100-tested
Tech Report: http://techreport.com/articles.x/20188

Legit Reviews: http://legitreviews.com/article/1506/1/ (mobile)
Legit: http://legitreviews.com/article/1501/1/ (desktop)

HotHardware Mobile: http://hothardware.com/Reviews/Intel-Core-i72820QM-Mobile-Sandy-Bridge-Processor-Review/
HH Desktop: http://hothardware.com/Reviews/Intel-Core-i72600K-and-i52500K-Processors-Debut/

Anandtech: http://www.anandtech.com/show/4083/the-sandy-bridge-review-intel-core-i5-2600k-i5-2500k-and-core-i3-2100-tested
Tech Report: http://techreport.com/articles.x/20188

Legit Reviews: http://legitreviews.com/article/1506/1/ (mobile)
Legit: http://legitreviews.com/article/1501/1/ (desktop)

http://www.pcper.com/article.php?aid=1034
http://www.hardocp.com/article/2010/11/09/nvidia_geforce_gtx_580_video_card_review
http://www.anandtech.com/show/4008/nvidias-geforce-gtx-580
http://www.legitreviews.com/article/1461/1/
http://www.techreport.com/articles.x/19934
http://www.bit-tech.net/hardware/graphics/2010/11/09/nvidia-geforce-gtx-580-review/1

Have you played any of the S.T.A.L.K.E.R. games? Unlike Fallout 3, they're more towards the FPS end of the spectrum rather than RPG, but they're also a lot more realistic than the wacky 50s sci-fi feel of the Fallout games and a hell of a lot more bleak. GSC Game World is based in Kiev and they've made multiple trips into the exclusion zone, the maps and the layout of places like Pripyat and the entire Chernobyl Nuclear Power Plant are very faithfully reproduced in-game, they did an amazing job.

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_RDiKxVBLJZo/SxIu6zDfuFI/AAAAAAAAANE/lnC7nXgLZxs/s1600/stalker-Shadow-of-Chernobyl_03.jpg
http://www.legitreviews.com/images/reviews/490/stalker.jpg
http://www.tweakguides.com/images/STALKER_13.jpg

I think they capture the atmosphere really well, the environment is feral and hostile and you really have to be on the lookout for radiation and anomalies. Shadow Of Chernobyl was the first game, the prequel Clear Sky was a bit of a letdown, but Call Of Pripyat is by far one of the best and most atmospheric games I've ever played.

> writes are bad, especially small random ones

Some of the first SSDs had big trouble with random writes. The good new ones handle them much better than a mechanical hard disk.

See for example http://www.legitreviews.com/article/1022/6/ . While a few SSD have 20KB/s random write speed, the good ones like Intel's x25-m have 60MB/s, way better than a hard disk.

He doesn't care about that, he wants random access performance.

And yes, your RAID0 of four Velociraptor drives will have pitiful performance.

Here's a performance review that included IOPS:

http://www.pcper.com/article.php?aid=892&type=expert&pid=7

Everyone says these drives get 300-400IOPS peak. An Intel SSD will get you 8,000-12,000 easy, and the X25-E model will get you 15,000-20,000 easy. To compare:

http://www.legitreviews.com/article/1208/13/

That's the top two SSDs in the market, using Intel's controller and Sandforce's controller. For reads and a large request size the limitation is the SATA bus, you'll notice that each SSD maxes out the bus at 260MB/s. For small reads, it gets increasingly more ridiculous.

Four 600GB velociraptors in RAID0: $1120 and approximately 1200 IOPS. For 1.07IOPS/$.
One X25-M or Sandforce SSD in the 80-120GB range: $300 and approximately 8000 IOPS. For 26.67IOPS/$. IOPS actually grows as block size decreases, and both the X25-M and Sandforce SSDs see more than double the performance for 512B requests.

If thats the case they must not have heard of devices like the Patriot Box Office which will stream a Blu-Ray iso from your computer. Devices like this are definitely cheaper than whatever they will be charging for the new burners when they come out.

Uh, what?

Patriot Box Office page 4, near the bottom:

Once again, we had no luck when trying to play our Blu-ray ISO rips over the network as that format continues to be one of the most elusive.

Though the concept itself does appeal. And since this device is firmware updateable, your first sentence may become true in the future.

Since TiVo has fscked up for the last time AFAIC, I might just check this out... thanks!

If thats the case they must not have heard of devices like the Patriot Box Office which will stream a Blu-Ray iso from your computer. Devices like this are definitely cheaper than whatever they will be charging for the new burners when they come out.

Uh, what?

Patriot Box Office page 4, near the bottom:

Once again, we had no luck when trying to play our Blu-ray ISO rips over the network as that format continues to be one of the most elusive.

Though the concept itself does appeal. And since this device is firmware updateable, your first sentence may become true in the future.

Since TiVo has fscked up for the last time AFAIC, I might just check this out... thanks!

If thats the case they must not have heard of devices like the Patriot Box Office which will stream a Blu-Ray iso from your computer. Devices like this are definitely cheaper than whatever they will be charging for the new burners when they come out.

http://www.legitreviews.com/article/1258/15/

I discovered that the GeForce GTX 480 video card was sitting at 90C in an idle state since I had two monitors installed on my system. I talked with some of the NVIDIA engineers about this 'issue' I was having and found that it wasn't really an issue per say as they do it to prevent screen flickering. This is what NVIDIA said in response to our questions:

"We are currently keeping memory clock high to avoid some screen flicker when changing power states, so for now we are running higher idle power in dual-screen setups. Not sure when/if this will be changed. Also note we're trading off temps for acoustic quality at idle. We could ratchet down the temp, but need to turn up the fan to do so. Our fan control is set to not start increasing fan until we're up near the 80's, so the higher temp is actually by design to keep the acoustics lower." - NVIDIA PR

Regardless what the reasons are behind this, running a two monitor setup will cause your system to literally bake.

Yikes!

I already wasn't impressed, but after reading this it looks more like a fiasco, than just a mild disappointment.

we can't assume people bought their computer last week

True, but if they've got even a Pentium 4 (remember those?), they can get 2 to 5 GB/sec. See:

A 2Ghz P4 can get 2GB/sec for ordinary "integer" code

and up to 5GB/sec for better optimized SSE2 code.

Those CPUs are old, and they could still mix an entire orchestra, in real time, without breaking a sweat.

Take a look at the bar graph at the bottom, most CPUs released in the last few years easily do 5GB+ even for "integer" code (SSE3 would be more than double), and the Core i7s do 25GB/sec, which is higher than I thought.

There's just no need to 'standardize' on anything, or even have kernel-mode drivers for anything other than basic "input" or "output". Write your sound mixing code in ordinary C (even Java or C# would be fast enough!), and just send it down the line...

Heck, take a look at software defined radio, there's just no need for dedicated hardware for a lot of things when the CPU is so ridiculously powerful.

better question, how would they physically handle a processor that small, 4004 has 2300 transistors, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intel_4004 , and the i7 has 731 million transistors at 45nm at 263 mm^2, http://www.legitreviews.com/article/824/1/ , So by those numbers the 4004 on a 45 nm process would have an area of .00082749 mm^2 or 1/317826th the physical size of an i7 die. Disclaimer: this is a very rough calculation, but in any case it is more than 5 orders of magnitude smaller than an i7. On the other hand you could have the king of multicore processors....

The 24 head flight simulator at the launch was running Linux

http://www.legitreviews.com/article/1069/1/

Display are 4 x 3x2 layouts, multi-asic with each having 1 head. Single processor, Ubuntu, X-Plane.

RANDR is great for configuring each head. You can't do multi-head with RANDR.

I know you're making fun but at the bottom here is 24 monitors in a four-way setup for 55MP of "because we can".

Dunno these reviews seem to say something different:

http://www.legitreviews.com/article/708/5/

http://www.anandtech.com/cpuchipsets/showdoc.aspx?i=3305&p=7

But anyway, seems Nvidia has discontinued HybridPower for the desktop. Nvidia's excuse is that the newer cards will idle more efficiently. Not sure how true that will be in the near future :).

of course existing GPU solutions in slots are MUCH easier to upgrade, which is something against this sort of solution, unless they come out with a form factor that combines Chip+Cooling solution (similar to the old Slot1/A)

You're not gonna believe this dude, but someone beat you to the idea of a slotted GPU. Sorry. =[

http://www.legitreviews.com/images/reviews/378/ati_radeon_x1950.jpg

They put all the pins on the bottom in such a way that it fits into a modular slot on the motherboard and even comes with built in cooling. =]

Thanks for posting that.

Meanwhile, some searching of my own did indeed turn up new firmware. The main change is the addition of TRIM functionality though, and it does not seem to have any serious bug fixes. Still:

"The OCZ Vertex SSD series is one of the few on the market that supports consumer firmware updates. Flashing the drive destroys all data on the drive, so this isn't something you want to do often. Just to give you an idea the OCZ Vertex has not had one, but five firmware updates over the past couple months! Since we had to update the Vertex to firmware v1.10 we'll walk you through the process."

does not really add strong confidence that I would never have to flash the drive.

http://www.legitreviews.com/article/954/3/

Also, Anandtech also concluded that OCZ could not do any of the hard testing Intel does with their drive.

On the Dutch site tweakers.net there's some discussion on the Vertex drive and stability problems for USERS. This article is dated later than the anandtech article you are posting and specifically tells about a firmware revision to solve stability problems.

See the number of threads mentioning flashing on the OCZ forums as well. I'll send a mail to my retailer to see what version they are shipping though.

Ask the misguided minds behind Aero Glass.

This is something I find hilarious, actually. You look at the low end, and Apple has plain white plastic chassis, whereas several (if not most) brands will sell you a plastic chassis painted to look like metal. Which one strikes you as more style conscious?

As soon as you step into the higher end, if we're to believe the "Apple is all about style" crowd, this laptop's design is purely utilitarian, whereas this one is all about looking flashy. And I'm not even going to start a rant about the Dell Adamo. Leather? Really?

(Full disclaimer: I am an Apple user, but I also rather like the nice, simple lines of the Thinkpads. I don't like excessive flashiness.)

On the other hand performance-wise, Windows XP running on a Core i7 with 3GB of triple channel DDR3 ram should be sufficient for checking your email. Personally I am using a 1x2GB module. This was recommended to me so I could upgrade easily when 64 bit becomes more common and/or RAM drops in price. In the meanwhile I save a few watts of power by only having one module of RAM.

Vista Media Center refuses to record certain TV shows:
http://news.cnet.com/8301-10784_3-9943631-7.html

Loose all your music when you upgrade or reinstall
http://forums.legitreviews.com/about14833.html

Get falsely accused by Microsoft of piracy - "Windows Genuine Advantage falsely accuses millions"
http://arstechnica.com/old/content/2007/01/8690.ars
Now it can lead to "Reduced functionality mode"

"Windows Vista includes an extensive reworking of core OS elements in order to provide content protection for so-called "premium content", typically HD data from Blu-Ray and HD-DVD sources. Providing this protection incurs considerable costs in terms of system performance, system stability, technical support overhead, and hardware and software cost. These issues affect not only users of Vista but the entire PC industry, since the effects of the protection measures extend to cover all hardware and software that will ever come into contact with Vista, even if it's not used directly with Vista (for example hardware in a Macintosh computer or on a Linux server)"
http://www.cs.auckland.ac.nz/~pgut001/pubs/vista_cost.html

Jon

See also SlashGear's writeup or Legit Reviews coverage at least until the /. effect allows Linux Devices some breathing room.

There was a comparison between Atom and Nano a while back, and the conclusion was while the Nano does draw a bit more power overall, it does more work per watt. This is even taking into consideration the Atom chip had HyperThreading.

http://enthusiast.hardocp.com/article.html?art=MTUzNSwxLCxoZW50aHVzaWFzdA==

http://www.legitreviews.com/article/757/1/

http://arstechnica.com/reviews/hardware/atom-nano-review.ars

That took a whole 10 seconds of searching on Google.

With regards to the discussion, which would be this open source tablet thingy, I think the Nano is the better choice.

Have you actually tried the solution you think is so obvious? I haven't, but I can think of a ton of problems with it:

• Labels help you remember what you intended to use the card for. They don't help you remember what you actually used the card for. They don't prevent you from forgetting where you put them. Or from them just getting lost, which they're likely to do if you stick in your wallet credit card slot.
• SD slots tend to be pretty tight. I'd be afraid that the label would scrape off, maybe making the slot useless in the process. Oops, there goes my $300 camera!
• Can you really write small enough to put a useful label on MicroSD card? And can you read it without a magnifying glass?

"Body LANs" don't exist in any meaningful form.

Interestingly, this is one prediction where he isn't ambitious *enough*. I have one device that's a phone, a PDA, a GPS, a music player, and an internet connection.

Admittedly, some of his predictions are a little silly. Keyboards aren't going away, at least with this generation. The behavior of typing is just too ingrained, and dictating (even when speech recognition software works well) feels awkward. Star Trek: TNG may actually be a really good predictor of the future along these lines (someone mentioned Picard ordering coffee above). Good speech recognition will be nice for issuing short commands or asking short questions, but for doing anything complicated (like navigating a starship) you'll still want a console.

A trillion calculations per second on a home computer, eh?

Take a peek into that SLI-enabled machine under your desk with those two high end graphics cards. What you're seeing there is 1.5 teraflops. Of course, they do very specific kinds of calculations, but the prediction doesn't say the calculations are all taking place on the main CPU. In fact, this prediction was a little conservative; you can pull it off for under a thousand dollars and get half again as much processing power.

Digital books, movies, music? Napster was already out by then. The entertainment industry did its best to stop this from happening and it's only been in the past year or three that it's even been practical (from a legal perspective)

The technologies are available and not particularly difficult to use (again, I can purchase music instantly from my telephone) if not particularly ubiquitous. Physical media will take a long time to go away; not so much because the technology to replace it isn't available, but because people (myself included) *like* having something they can touch. Also, it makes a better gift.

I like the phrase 'ancient graphics cards' - I had a Hercules Graphics Station Card, a full-size graphics card with the innards of a GPU splattered all over the circuit board. The VRAM chips were a problem - they stuck out so much that they would make contact with the adjacent cards.

I guess, if RAM chips were installed in sockets, they would have be slid in between the heatsink and the circuit board like a memory stick.

From this article, GPU memory clock speeds are coming close to 990 Megahertz, while regular CPU memory is running at 1333 Megahertz, but that GDDR3 memory is optimised for longer length block read and writes.

That trend has been happening for the past 40 years. If you looked at a 1990's graphics accelerator card (Hercules Graphics Station Card or a Voodoo 5000/6000, you would see that all the different components (RAMDAC, graphics processor, memory controllers) were all on different parts of the circuit board. Now, most of that logic is within a single chip Geforce 9800GTX

Memory chips keep changing as rapidly as the CPU's do. Assuming that a CPU manufacturer wanted to enter the memory chip market, by the time they had caught up with current state-of-the-art in memory technology, bus communication and got the product onto market, the memory chip manufacturers would already be designing, producing and marketing the next generation.

Try these links instead: http://www.legitreviews.com/article/475/1/ http://www.ocztechnologyforum.com/forum/showthread.php?t=38413