CeBIT : DDR2 and DDR3 for the X48 CeBIT : Scythe being excessive CeBIT : 8.9 inches and XP for the EEE CeBIT : AMD reassures and attacks PowerColor: an HD 3870 X2 with the highest perfs CeBIT: AMD 45nm CPU demo CeBIT : Thermaltake, 14cm better than 11 ? CeBIT : Zalman FPS Gun on demo CeBIT : GeForce 9800 GX2 sightings CeBIT : DDR3-2133 CL8 for Corsair CeBIT : a semi-fanless 8800 GT for MSI AMD launches its 780G and 740G MSI: GeForce 9600 GT 2 GB CeBIT: Samsung SyncMaster T220P

Mars 2008 L M M J V S D 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 You can read previous news using our archives. [ Print all news of this day ]

<< Previous day's news March 3, 2008

Next day of news >> March 5, 2008

CeBIT : DDR2 and DDR3 for the X48   Posted on 04/03/2008 at 23:39 by Marc

	Even if Intel only specifies DDR3 support for its X48 chipset, a new revision of the X38 officially supporting FSB1600 and DDR3-1600 (two settings that function well in practice on the X38), manufacturers are releasing DDR2 motherboards or even combined DDR2/DDR3 models. Gigabyte chose to offer two distinct versions: the GA-X48T-DQ6 is DDR3 while the GA-X48-DQ6 is DDR2. In practice, Gigabyte goes further than official specifications by announcing respective support of DDR3-1900 and DDR2-1200. MSI also presents two motherboards, the X48C Platinum, a DDR2/3 combo, and the X48 Platinum, a DDR3 version. The latter additionally integrates an IDT chip, called a « PCIe Expander » by MSI, and which allows having 2 PCI-E x16 ports (cabled in x4 for data as the IDT chip is relayed to the southbridge in x4) in addition to two ports managed by the northbridge. ASUS follows the trend and also offers two cards: the Rampage Formula in DDR2 (up to DDR2-1200) and the P5E3 Premium in DDR3 (up to DDR3-2000).

CeBIT : Scythe being excessive   Posted on 04/03/2008 at 21:23 by Marc

	As usual, Scythe is proving to be rather outrageous in terms of cooling. In addition to the Orochi which is destined for store shelves, the manufacturer has presented a prototype under the name Ninja Master. For the moment, nothing has been decided regarding the commercialization of this model, although one thing is certain: the tower casing will prove to be too small and Scythe will not be able to outdo these behemoths!

CeBIT : 8.9 inches and XP for the EEE   Posted on 04/03/2008 at 20:56 by Marc

	ASUSTeK has made two major announcements about its EEE PC at the CeBIT. The first is that the 900 series has been officially unveiled. In terms of innovations, there is a larger screen that goes from 7 to 8.9 inches which enables attaining a resolution of 1024x600 versus the current 800x480. In addition, RAM goes from 512 MB to 1 GB and flash memory from 4 to 8-12 GB. Finally, the webcam will be increased from 0.3 megapixels to 1.3 megapixels and the touchpad is notably larger. All of this should be available this summer for 100 € more than the 700 series or around 400 €. The second announcement involves the official partnership between Microsoft and ASUSTeK which aims to provide pre-installation of Windows XP and Works. In theory, this isn’t (yet?) a question of exclusivity and it will therefore be an option as the Windows version should normally be a little more expensive than the Linux Xandros version. The only thing is that Microsoft appears to have made an effort in order that this additional cost, even if it is unknown, remains rather small. Microsoft thus doesn’t seem ready to leave Linux the exclusivity of the good exposure provided by the EEE and the 3 to 5 millions of units that ASUSTeK is planning on selling this year. We will just have to see if the price is in accordance with the healthy laws of competition.

CeBIT : AMD reassures and attacks   Posted on 04/03/2008 at 20:52 by Damien

	AMD organized a press conference to close the first day of the CeBIT. Besides the standard discourse, the manufacturer wanted to reassure us on its advances in the development of its 45 nm CPUs, and as we mentioned earlier, they conducted a demonstration of a quad core Shanghai (video encoding that didn’t entirely saturate the 4 cores). A Shanghai wafer. AMD also wanted to reassure us on the Puma, its future mobile platform mobile which should finally arrive this summer. You may recall, it will be based on a new CPU and the 780 G chipset in its mobile version of course. A working laptop based on the Puma platform. However, what stood out the most in their presentation was AMD’s strong insistence on the graphics aspect, first with the 780 G, which adds a big improvement compared to previous solutions, and then with CrossFire X. The latter is now available via a new driver which you may recall enables combining 3 or 4 graphic cards. While the manufacturer stressed this point, we noticed the usual "Customer Centric" slogan being replaced by the "Ultimate Visual Experience" on most slides, it’s not without reason. This is more or less the only domain that allows it to set itself apart from Intel whose integrated cores can be short-winded and which often rely on poorly evolved drivers. AMD thus uses the 780 G to aggressively point out the poor performances of Intel’s integrated graphic cores as well as the absence of DirectX 10 support and HD video acceleration. So while waiting for more performance competitive CPUs, it’s in graphics that AMD will try and fend off its rival.

PowerColor: an HD 3870 X2 with the highest perfs   Posted on 04/03/2008 at 19:23 by Nicolas

	PowerColor has just officially announced «its» Radeon HD 3870 X2. You may recall, it uses a design different from the one proposed by ATI. By bringing the PLX switch closer to the PCI-Express connector, PowerColor was able to reduce the space between the two RV670s and therefore slightly shorten the card. While at 825 MHz the GPU frequency is unchanged compared to other R680s, it has 2 X 512 MB of GDDR4 from Samsung and set at 1126 MHz. This is compared to rival cards which normally have GDDR3 functioning at 900 MHz. Finally, there are three DVI, one HDMI, and one TV outputs.

CeBIT: AMD 45nm CPU demo   Posted on 04/03/2008 at 19:02 by Nicolas

	AMD is taking advantage of the CeBIT to show journalists that the Shanghai and Deneb, the server and desktop versions of its next 45 nm quad core CPUs, are functional. These were produced in the Dresden Fab 36 on 300mm wafers. The manufacturer also used the event to stress the "performance per watt" ratio of its future processors and not simply performances, a sign that in the short term they will not be able to rival Intel on the very high end. Expected out in the second half of 2008, these CPUs will have an L2 cache of 512 KB per core, a shared L3 cache which can be as high as 6 MB and they will still fit into the Socket AM2+ and support DDR2. We will have to wait until 2009 to see AM3 versions which will support DDR3.

CeBIT : Thermaltake, 14cm better than 11 ?   Posted on 04/03/2008 at 17:39 by Marc

	After the BigTyp 14 presented at the CES, Thermaltake is taking advantage of the CeBIT to launch a new CPU cooling system equipped with a 14cm fan. The V14 Pro thus borrows the design of theV1 launched a year ago but which had an 11cm fan. Based on the idea that bigger is better, this cooling system should offer interesting results.

CeBIT : Zalman FPS Gun on demo   Posted on 04/03/2008 at 17:17 by Marc

	At the CeBit, Zalman is really pushing its FPS Gun FG1000 which was launched in early 2008 at the CES. This «mouse» devoted to FPS is based on the simple idea of offering a peripheral upon which you can press a trigger to fire instead of a mouse button. Equipped with a resolution of 2000 dpi (which can be reduced) and a 1ms response time, it also offers five programmable buttons. Zalman also is stressing the fact that the length of the FPS Gun and presence of the sensor on the front enables a wider angle of horizontal movement. In practice, we have to say that utilization is rather odd but there does seem to be some potential. The FPS Gun FG1000 is available for a price of around 50 Euros.

CeBIT : GeForce 9800 GX2 sightings   Posted on 04/03/2008 at 17:07 by Marc

	With rather unexciting GPU news, the absence of technological strides for what will soon be 16 months now, and the launch of the GeForce 8, the only innovation at this CeBIT is the GeForce 9800 GX2 which was seen at Albatron and Inno3D amongst others. You may recall, this solution is actually comprised of two G92s (8800 GT, GTS) and double the 512 MB of memory fitting on two distinct PCBs which are then assembled. The 9800 GX2 combined with the return of Quad SLI should allow Nvidia to end the dominance of G80 performances which started at the end of 2006. Of course, we would have liked to have seen a new chip rather than a solution of this type but we have to admit that the weak competition in the high end on AMD’s part doesn’t push Nvidia in that direction.

CeBIT : DDR3-2133 CL8 for Corsair   Posted on 04/03/2008 at 16:51 by Marc

	At the CeBIT, Corsair is presenting the fastest DDR3 memory on the market, more specifically, DDR3-2133 functioning in 8-8-8-24. These 1 GB modules should arrive between now and the end of this month for an unrevealed price. Here they were functioning on an NVIDIA platform and therefore with the nForce 790i as this chipset which will be launched in two weeks is the first nForce DDR3.

CeBIT : a semi-fanless 8800 GT for MSI   Posted on 04/03/2008 at 16:33 by Marc

	MSI is taking advantage of the CeBit to launch the Hybrid Freezer, a technology devoted to the cooling of graphic cards starting with implementation on the GeForce 8800 GT 1 GB. The principle is relatively simple as up until 87°C the card functions in passive cooling mode. Once temperature surpasses this figure, the fan, announced as very discreet, comes into action. Here is an intermediate solution between passive and active that could be of interest.

AMD launches its 780G and 740G   Posted on 04/03/2008 at 15:00 by Nicolas

	AMD has just officially announced two new IGPs: the 780G and 740G which now join the 790FX and 770. The 780G mainly sets itself apart by its integrated graphic circuit baptized the Radeon HD 3200 which supports DirectX 10. In addition, it is the first AMD chipset compatible with Hybrid Graphics. Furthermore, it supports PCI-Express 2.0 and HyperTransport 3.0, enabling it to optimally function with the Phenom. While waiting for our first tests, we were already able to carry out a few benchmarks. If the Radeon HD 3200 is apparently not enough for gaming, Hybrid Graphics, without being revolutionary, still enables the 780G - Radeon HD 3450 combo to surpass the GeForce 8500 GT in some cases. As for the 740G, it has a DirectX 9.0 graphic core, which however should offer higher performances than those of its predecessor, the 690G. This is nothing too dramatic because it’s not very likely that we will be able to play games with an IGP in DirectX 10 in the near future. For the Southbridge, without surprise we find the SB700 which is rather classic because it can support up to 6 SATA-II ports, RAID 0, 1 and 0+1, an IDE Ultra ATA/133 and 12 USB 2.0 ports Finally, count on spending around 85€ for a 780G motherboard and 65€ for a 740G in France.

MSI: GeForce 9600 GT 2 GB   Posted on 04/03/2008 at 12:42 by Nicolas

	During the launch of the GeForce 9600 GT, MSI unveiled a model equipped with 1 GB of memory while the card normally has 512 MB, which is largely sufficient for a mid-range GPU. Perhaps this company is trying to set itself apart from other Nvidia partners given that the G94 is indeed being commercialized by a myriad of manufacturers. Either way, according to PCGamesHardware, the Taiwanese company should soon go even further by offering a card equipped with no less than 2 GB! Knowing that the GB of memory present on certain ASUSTeK GeForce 8800 GTs has trouble being used on a card with 112 scalar processors, it’s hard to imagine the utility of 2 GB with the 64 scalar processors of the GeForce 9600 GT. In the desire to make a product that stands out at any price, why not simply offer a GeForce 9600 GT 512 MB but with much faster memory, a very silent and high performance cooling system, or a design well apt for increases in frequency?

CeBIT: Samsung SyncMaster T220P   Posted on 04/03/2008 at 00:01 by Vincent

	The top screen of 2008 could be the T220P : •22 inches •TN 2 ms •Contrast of 20000:1 •HDMI + DVI + VGA + YUV + TV tuner •A price announced barely higher than that of the current 226BW. The problem: Samsung added a lighted bar on the lower front part of the screen. Depending upon your taste, you can opt for a red model (should be the most widely available Europe), green or blue. The inconvenience is that this bar never goes out not even via manual controls!