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AMD Ships One Million Llano Processors
It appears that AMD has successfully managed to ship one million Llano chips in the second quarter, which is weeks ahead of the official launch.
AMD released the news during its earnings conference call. Where interim CEO Thomas Seifert said demand for Llano was strong. “We expect Llano ramp to outpace the Brazos ramp,” he noted.
If you look back at AMD’s Brazos launch, they managed to ship around one million units ahead of its scheduled launch, in the fourth quarter of 2010. Conversely, introducing Llano will be a bit more challenging, because AMD is planning to offer many varieties of mobile and desktop SKUs; including affordable dual- and triple-core processors. Therefore, Llano is expected to outpace Brazos very soon. AMD also made mention in their earnings call that total APU shipments for the quarter hit seven million. That said, so 6 million of them were Brazos processors.
It is believed that AMD Llano chip will take 50 percent of their total CPU shipments by the end of the year. In the first quarter of 2012, the Llano is expected to garner over 60 percent of their shipments.
HP Announces TouchPad 4G Deal
Hewlett-Packard announced it would release a 4G TouchPad tablet with upgraded hardware that will be available on AT&T’s wireless network.
The tablet will have a 1.5GHz processor, which is a change from the dual-core 1.2GHz Qualcomm Snapdragon processor available with older Wi-Fi-only TouchPad models that went on sale just two weeks ago.
Last August Qualcomm said that by the start of this year it would ship the dual-core Snapdragon QSD8672 chip that could run at clock speeds of up to 1.5GHz.
The TouchPad will have 32GB of internal storage, GPS and built-in AT&T wireless mobile broadband capabilities, HP said in a statement. Specific pricing and availability will be announced at a later date.
Wireless connectivity will be available through AT&T’s DataConnect mobile data plans for tablets or Wi-Fi hotspots around the country, HP said.
TouchPad users have expressed concerns about the device’s performance, especially the long load times for some applications. HP attributes the performance issue to software problems and said it will deliver an over-the-air software update that should resolve some performance problems.
Some buyers also were concerned about the TouchPad’s weight of about 1.6 pounds (740 grams), which is heavier than Apple’s iPad at 1.32 pounds. The TouchPad includes a 9.7-inch screen and comes with WebOS 3.0, which is also used in smartphones.
Gigabyte Debuts New Motherboards
July 14, 2011 by admin
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Gigabyte just announced their new slate of motherboards that will support AMD’s A75 series chipsets and the latest AMD A-Series APUs or Llano. The new A75 based motherboards are said to offer DIY PC builders and developers a higher level of 3D and multimedia performance that is scalable and said to offer the best value upgrade path imaginable.
Gigabyte’s VP of Service and Marketing Henry Kao is quoted as saying that the new boards were new and exciting as AMD new APU’s were “ground breaking” APU technology. As well as bringing AMD A-Series technology to DIY users who demand excellent gaming and multimedia performance on a budget, these motherboards also offer a compelling upgrade path that includes Dual Graphics configurations.
The A75 motherboards from Gigabyte feature an AMD A75 ‘Hudson’ chipset supporting the latest 32 nanometer AMD A-Series APUs. That said, these chips are the first ever to combine a DX11-capable, high performance graphics processor with the option of a dual or quad core CPU on one silicon die, offering a 3D gaming and multimedia experience which is similar to a discrete graphics configuration.
AMD’s Bulldozer Overclocked To 4.63 GHz
It appears that those techies toying around with samples of AMD’s FX-8130P were able to overclocked this processor to a remarkable 4.63GHz.
That said, Bulldozer appears be AMD’s fastest offering where the eight cores run at 3.8GHz, or up to 4.2GHz with AMD’s Turbo Core 2.0. The processor 8MB of L2 cache, 8MB of L3 cache, supports DDR3 1866MHz and is said to have a 125W TDP.
Verizon Adds LTE Network To More U.S. Cities
June 17, 2011 by admin
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Verizon Wireless announced 19 more cities that will get its faster 4G wireless network service starting Thursday, bringing the total to 74 metropolitan areas.
San Francisco and Detroit, already on Verizon LTE since last December, will also see the existing LTE network in those cities expanded, Verizon said in a statement.
The new 19 LTE cities include several state capitals such as Sacramento, Calif., Hartford, Conn., Boise, Idaho, Harrisburg, Pa., Indianapolis, Ind., Salt Lake City (with Ogden), Utah; and Madison (with Milwaukee), Wis. The full list of cities is on Verizon’s website.
This news comes as competitor AT&T is scheduled to launch LTE 4G service in five cities in the U.S. this summer: Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas, Houston and San Antonio.
Rumors have also surfaced that Sprint will begin adding LTE service to its existing nationwide WiMax 4G capability, partly to support a future LTE-ready iPhone, although Sprint has not confirmed those reports.
AMD’s Bulldozer Will Be Late
AMD has confirmed that their Bulldozer chip-set will be delayed until later in the summer.
The FX Series which is codenamed Zambezi is based on the Bulldozer architecture. Unfortunately, AMD didn’t provide an official date they just said that the FX Series is coming in “late summer”, which means do not expect to the chip until probably late August.
10-Inch Tablets For $299?
June 5, 2011 by admin
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Taiwan’s Micro-Star International unveiled two new Android-based tablets at Computex this week that appear much sleeker than the WindPad tablets it has manufactured in the past.
The WindPad Enjoy 10 and Enjoy 7, which are being shown in a location further away from the show floor, will start shipping to retailers at the end of July, priced at $299 for the 10-inch version and $199 for the 7-inch version, said MSI product manager Rory Chen.
The tablets on show here were running the 2.3 Gingerbread version of Android. MSI hopes to start using the 3.0 Honeycomb Android OS on the tablets later this year, but it’s unlikely to be available with the first devices that go on sale.
The Enjoy 10 isn’t as thin and light as the iPad 2, and a spec sheet shows the new tablets have no 3G option — only Bluetooth and Wi-Fi. It’s also behind the iPad in other areas such as memory and storage. But the Enjoy 10′s $299 price tag makes it considerably cheaper than Apple’s tablet, which starts at $499 for the Wi-Fi-only model.
Verizon Adds LG’s Revolution
June 1, 2011 by admin
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Verizon Wireless announced the Revolution by LG, an LTE-ready smartphone, will become available for sale in stores and online Thursday for $249.99 with a two-year service plan.
The Revolution has a 4.3-in. touch screen and 1 GHz Snapdragon processor. It utilizes the Android 2.2 mobile operating system and comes preloaded with the Netflix application for access to movies and TV shows.
Verizon called the smartphone an “entertainment powerhouse” partly due to the Netflix capability, but the Revolution also runs the Adobe Flash player, provides Dolby Mobile sound and features high-definition video recording and playback.
iPhone Gaining on Nokia’s Dominance
May 11, 2011 by admin
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Apple’s iPhone is moving closer and closer to Nokia’s top spot in smartphones globally, according to first-quarter 2011 results reported by IDC on Thursday.
With the iPhone in the second spot, BlackBerry maker Research In Motion dropped to third after finishing second a year ago, IDC said. 99.6 million smartphones shipped in the first quarter, out of 372 million mobile phones overall.
Nokia sold 24.2 million smartphones in the first quarter, holding on to its global smartphone lead despite announcing that it will move from Symbian to Windows Phone as its main smartphone operating system in next few years, IDC said. Nokia “may find itself in danger of ceding market share as the competition ramps up,” IDC said.
Apple shipped 18.7 million iPhones in the first quarter, IDC said, a new record for a single quarter, “and inched closer to market leader Nokia, with fewer than 6 million units separating the two companies,” IDC noted.
Apple also had triple-digit growth in the U.S., with the Verizon Wireless CDMA iPhone 4, and in greater China.
RIM, while down from second place where it was a year ago, remained in third place from the fourth quarter of 2010. The majority of RIM’s shipments are older, lower-cost devices, IDC noted, a trend that will continue in the second quarter.
Samsung finished fourth in smartphones for the first quarter, with 10.8 million smartphones shipped, while HTC finished fifth, with 8.9 million shipped.
Samsung grew the most of any vendor for the first quarter — 350% year-over-year. Samsung has a multiple-OS strategy and sells mostly Android smartphones, including Galaxy S phones, as well as Windows Phone 7 and Wave devices.
Samsung Infuse Smartphone Outed
May 9, 2011 by admin
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AT&T Wireless and Samsung Mobile jointly announced the thin and lightweight Infuse 4G smartphone during a press conference Thursday in New York.
The phone is 8.99 millimeters (0.35 inches) thick, making it just a fraction thinner than Apple’s iPhone 4, and has a 4.5-inch Super AMOLED display, one of Samsung’s most advanced, stated Jeff Bradley, senior vice president for devices at AT&T Wireless.
The device weighs 4.7 ounces and is powered by a single-core ARM processor running at 1.2GHz. It runs Google’s Android 2.2 OS and will become available in the U.S. on May 15, priced at $199 with a two-year wireless contract. It runs on AT&T’s HSPA+ (Evolved High-Speed Packet Access) network, which AT&T considers a 4G service.
The display shows more pixels than Samsung’s earlier AMOLED smartphone screens offered on the AT&T network, Bradley said. Infuse also includes an 8-megapixel camera with auto-focus and flash.